For any fan of classic movies, it is impossible to read “To Catch a Thief” by David Dodge and not picture Cary Grant and Grace Kelly as the main characters. But if one puts away Alfred Hitchcock’s adaptation, one will still get a great story and a glamourous picture of the postwar French Riviera, where the rich and famous would come and play for the season.

John Robie is an ex-jewel thief who is trying to live his life on the straight and narrow, enjoying his retirement. Before the war (WW II), he was known as Le Chat (The Cat), an acrobatic thief who would steal from the rich all along the Mediterranean coast, climbing into impossible to reach windows and making his escape along the rooftops. But after a stint in prison, along with his partisan work with the French Resistance, he has reached an unofficial truce with the police: they will leave him in peace as long as he refrains from returning to his old ways.

But we know retirement is never that easy for thieves. When a string of burglaries along the French Riviera mimics the modus operandi of Le Chat, Robie’s peace is shattered and he barely escapes the police. Now he is back in Cannes, joining with his fellow thieves in trying to catch the new Le Chat before the police catch him. When John finds a rich widow and her lovely daughter who might be the next target, he gets a surprise when the daughter sees through his disguise and now wants to be his partner in crime. Can John find the real criminal, avoid the police, and survive his partner before the dragnet closes in around him?

A fun caper set among the glitz of postwar Europe, with enough differences from the movie to still catch you by surprise.

I requested and received a free advanced electronic copy from Poisoned Pen Press via NetGalley. Thank you!

Another top notch novel - carefully plotted and unravelled in an engrossing tale. Interesting discussion on the morality of thieving. https://www.goodreads.com/review/show/6869034272

Worth the read, whether you know the film or not | As a Cary Grant devotee, I've known and loved the glamorous Hitchcock film for a couple of decades, but I didn't know the source material was a novel until this Library of Congress reprint crossed my path. Personally, I can't divorce John Robie from Grant, though it was easier to get the lovely Grace Kelly out of my mind while reading. The film hewed fairly closely to the book, so if you loved the screen version you'll likely appreciate this. If you've not seen the film, though, this is an enjoyable novel of suspense. In fact, the only problem is the one I complain of with every Library of Congress reprint: the footnotes. They are worse than unnecessary, they make the reading experience less enjoyable. They visually disturb the page, especially on Kindle where they're a bright blue link in the middle of the standard black text, and the information they provide is not needed, sometimes unhelpful. Twice, in this book, French exclamations that are clearly insulting from context are footnoted, and the footnote doesn't translate or define them, just says that they're profanity. There are no footnotes here that are necessary for understanding and enjoying the book, so instead of interrupting the reader, the details could have simply been explained in an epilogue. The British Library Crime Classics series doesn't insert these things, there's no need to have them in this series, which is published in the States by the same company

Thank you to NetGalley for the opportunity to read and review this book.. I have seen the 1955 movie so many times, I believe that I know much of the dialogue, so this book was a joy and pleasure to read. The book is slightly different than the movie, but all in all an enjoyable, fun read.