"From Nice with Love" by Elena Topilskaya, summary Automatic translate

Elena Topilskaya’s novel "From Nice with Love" is a wry detective adventure story written from the perspective of Maria Sergeyevna, an investigator with the St. Petersburg district prosecutor’s office. The action takes place on the French Riviera and draws on the contrast between the relaxed resort life and the professional instincts of those whose job it is to track down criminals.

Departure and the road

Maria and her husband, medical expert Alexander Stetsenko, are heading to France for two weeks with fellow investigator Alexey Gorchakov and his wife, Lena. Gorchakov organized the trip: he found the villa "Dracaena" on Mont Boron in Nice online at a reasonable price, and the group quickly received vacation requests — the management at the newly formed Investigative Committee was busy with its own affairs and ignored the investigators. The fifth person on the trip was Maria’s friend, Regina, a cosmetologist at an expensive salon who had just broken up with yet another worthless partner.

At the Paris airport, a loud-mouthed stranger rushed toward Maria. He turned out to be a former detective from another district, who remembered years ago how she’d bossed him around in a stinking attic with a decomposing corpse. Maria casually mentioned that the group was going to a villa in the hills of Nice for two weeks — and later she would wonder if that was when criminals had become interested in their group.

The villa and the first days

Villa Dracaena turned out to be exactly what they’d dreamed of: a tiled gallery, a living room with a fireplace, panoramic windows overlooking the Mediterranean, an orange garden with a pool and barbecue. Regina immediately claimed the best romantic bedroom with a wrought-iron bed and silk linens; the others were given more modest but equally cozy rooms.

The first dinner on the embankment turned into a gastronomic adventure: due to their lack of French, Gorchakov and Stetsenko ordered snails in garlic butter instead of lamb, Lena received a plate of sprouts, and Regina single-handedly devoured a huge entrecote. The linguistic confusion culminated in a shared pizza and a fair amount of wine and cognac. During dinner, a handsome young man on an expensive Honda Hornet pulled up at a traffic light in front of the restaurant. Regina immediately perked up, and the men began discussing the motorcycle’s technical specifications, while the women discussed its owner’s personal qualities.

Night burglar

That night, Maria discovered a stranger in the living room rummaging through Regina’s bag. She screamed, and the stranger ran for the door and disappeared. In the morning, it was discovered that the burglar had forced open the window frame near the front door and thus gained entry. Regina’s money and credit cards, despite her fears, were intact — it seemed the burglar had been scared off in time. Gorchakov rushed to the police, but was stopped first by Regina, who pointed out his strawberry-print underwear, and then by the sober realization that no one knew where the police station was. They decided to report the break-in to the owner’s trusted contact.

Living in a villa

The group rented a car and began exploring the surrounding area. The itinerary included trips to Monaco, Antibes, and Cannes. Maria couldn’t forget the notice at the Paris airport — a printed notice about a fifteen-year-old British girl, Charlene Fitzpatrick, who went missing in Antibes on January 1, 2008. Her professional investigator instincts persisted, even on vacation.

Gorchakov confidently claimed there was no crime on the Côte d’Azur, but Maria methodically refuted him. The villa’s daily routine quickly settled: Lena Gorchakova did most of the cooking, Regina played the star and kept an eye on the male guests, Gorchakov devoured the food and provoked discussions, and Dr. Stetsenko stayed out of the fray.

Detective line

Parallel to the resort scenes, the text introduces a separate investigative episode from Maria’s St. Petersburg practice — the murder of an elderly professor. He was strangled with an extension cord in his home; no signs of forced entry were found, suggesting the victim had opened the door herself. The evidence led to a young repeat offender, Roma, whose fingerprints matched those on the murder weapon. Roma, however, had an explanation: he had handled the cord during a visit with his father two weeks before the murder, when they asked the professor for money for a lawyer. A young colleague of Maria’s exposed him: she ordered an examination to determine the age of the marks. The experts determined that such clear marks on a smooth surface could have survived for no more than two days, and Roma’s theory fell apart. The young man received a prison sentence.

Continuation of the intrigue

By the end of the first part of their vacation in Nice, it becomes clear that the random nighttime burglar is just the beginning. Maria intuitively senses that their group has stumbled into something far more serious than a run-of-the-mill resort theft. The meeting at the Paris airport, the villa in the hills, the missing girl in Antibes — all of this adds up to a picture that an experienced investigator can’t ignore, even while on vacation.