Paris Between the Wars Books in Order

The Paris Between the Wars trilogy is where Lemaitre moves from pure crime fiction into a wider historical sweep, without giving up pace or suspense. The three books, The Great Swindle, All Human Wisdom, and Mirror of our Sorrows, stretch from the end of the First World War to the chaos of 1940. They are linked by family ties, recurring characters, and the sense that private lives are constantly being bent by public disaster.

The first book, The Great Swindle, begins in the last days of the war and then follows Albert Maillard and Édouard Péricourt back into a France that prefers its dead heroic and its survivors out of sight. Their revenge plot gives the trilogy its opening jolt, but the book is really about a whole society trying to dress up greed, grief, and class privilege as patriotism. It is full of crooked officials, broken men, and people improvising their way through a country that has not healed.

The second book, All Human Wisdom, shifts forward to 1927 and places Madeleine Péricourt at the center. After catastrophe wrecks her position and her fortune, the story turns into a revenge novel, a financial thriller, and a portrait of Parisian society all at once. Lemaitre likes big casts, and this book shows that talent clearly. Bankers, crooks, nurses, fixers, performers, and opportunists all get pulled into Madeleine's fight to survive and strike back.

History never stays in the background here.

By Mirror of our Sorrows, the trilogy has reached the Phoney War and the collapse of France in 1940. Louise Belmont runs through the story's opening in shock, and from there the novel widens into panic, retreat, black market schemes, roadside alliances, and the strange mix of farce and fear that comes with national breakdown. The cast changes again, but the method stays the same: large events are filtered through people making hurried choices, hiding secrets, and trying to keep hold of themselves.

What makes this series stand out is the balance. These are historical novels, but they move with the snap of thrillers. They are full of period detail, yet never feel buried under research. Lemaitre is interested in money, class, corruption, war memory, and the brittle performances of respectability, but he delivers all of that through strong scenes and restless plotting. Some chapters feel almost like serial fiction, ending on turns that make it very easy to keep going.

If you want one central hero in every volume, this trilogy is not built that way. Think of it more as a linked panorama of France between wars, where one family's fortunes keep crossing with bigger national crises. Start with The Great Swindle, go straight on to All Human Wisdom, and finish with Mirror of our Sorrows for the full rise, crash, and reckoning.