Review: A Fondness for Truth: A Polizei Bern Novel by Kim Hays

 

Following Pesticide and Sons and Brothers, A Fondness for Truth: A Polizei Bern Novel by Kim Hays is the third read in the Linder and Doratelli Mystery series set in Bern, Switzerland. While billed as mysteries, and they are, these are also police procedurals with plenty of family and other off the job elements. They are also very good reads.

 

As the novel begins, Andi Eberhart is headed home on a cold and icy March night. It is late and she is on her bicycle as that is how she gets around town. Her helmet has vanished and she has no idea what happened to it. Not that it probably matters when she is deliberately hit by a car and sent flying to an impact that killed her.

 

Initially Homicide Detective Giuliana Linder, though marginally aware of the case, is not assigned to it. But, as things happen, because she is in the station while the lead detective is out in the field, she is the first point of contact for Nisha Pragasam, Andi’s partner. Her family are refugees from Sri Lanka and the civil war decades ago and Nishi is a member of the Swiss Tamils community. This means there are issues of societal caste, assimilation, and more in the background of the case. Then there is the fact that her and Andi were not legally married, even though the two women were partners, lived together, and were raising a baby. Nisha is devastated by what has happened. She is also sure that the crash was no accident.

 

For several years now, Andi has been receiving horrible hate mail. The homophobic screeds have gotten worse since their baby girl was born a few weeks ago. Andi was also recently promoted Skip on her curling team and at least one teammate was vehemently and very publicly upset and causing issues over the promotion and being passed over. Then there is the fact that she was an advocate on social issues and did so as well in her job as an advisor to people drafted into Switzerland’s civil service. Andi was a strong-willed woman with a clear sense of right and wrong and rubbed some folks the wrong way.

 

She had a lot going on in her job and elsewhere so there are many suspects. Friends, family, coworkers, and others all must be investigated and ruled out as the police have little to go on. The only clue is the fact it was a red car that did it and fled the scene.

 

The case is being handled by others, for now, so Giuliana can focus on her current assignment. She is to meet with Manfred Kissling in prison where he awaits trial and get some sort of confession that would explain the horrible act he did a two months ago. Others have tried with no success and now the powers that be want Giuliana to have a crack at him.

 

On a Sunday in January, he picked up his daughters, Mia and Lea, three and five years old, for visitation. He drove over an hour from their house where they lived with their mother who had primary custody, and took them to an outing at a cliff in the Jura mountains. He parked at an overlook, took them to the edge of the cliff, and threw them to their deaths fifteen-hundred-foot below. He then got back in his car and went to where he lived. He was still there when the coops came to arrest him days later.

 

The prosecution easily prove he did it. The evidence is not disputable. He did it. But, nobody, including his ex-wife, knows why he did it, Manfred Kissling has refused all requests to explain. The prosecution does not want to get sandbagged with a surprise at trial so they want Giuliana to go to the prison and interview him. The hope is that she can get him to talk. To do so, she has to make the hour-long plus trip each way and deeply immerse herself in the case so that she can, hopefully, get him to open up and explain to her why he did what he did.

 

As she works that case, it isn’t long before she is drawn into the murder of Andi Eberhart. She, Detective Renzo Donatelli, and others work the increasingly complicated murder case. Along the way they learn quite a lot about the people who have moved here from Sri Lanka, how they are seen back home as well in and outside of the community in Switzerland, racism, assimilation, and more.

 

This goes on while both Giuliana Linder and Detective Renzo Donatelli deal with a lot of stuff going on in their respective families. There are marital strains, a health crisis, and a lot of life stuff going on as both juggle home and their work. Both struggle trying to do it all.

                                  

A Fondness for Truth: A Polizei Bern Novel by Kim Hays is a very complicated mystery/police procedural read. The main characters as well as many of the secondary characters at home and work continue to evolve as life happens. The concept of family, and the many different forms it can take, has always been present in this series and even more so in this read.

 

A series that absolutely should be read in order, A Fondness for Truth: A Polizei Bern Novel is a mighty good read. Strongly recommended.

 

 

Amazon Associate Purchase Link: https://amzn.to/3Z68F8B

 

 

For more reading about this author and the book, go to Sunday Spotlight—Kim Hays at Lesa’s Book Critiques.

 

My review of Pesticide can be found here. Aubrey reviewed Pesticide here (which got me reading the series) and Sons and Brothers here on the blog. I thought I had also reviewed it, but I can’t find it now and I don’t seem to have a record of it.

 

 

Publicist Wiley Saichek sent me a copy of this book, with no expectation of a review, over a year ago.

 

Kevin R. Tipple©2025