Pierre Lemaitre is a highly acclaimed literary fiction author from France. He was born in Paris in 1951 and spent many years working as a teacher of literature before turning to novel writing. Lemaitre is best known for his "Commandant Camille Verhoeven" series of novels, which have gained him international recognition.
Lemaitre's first novel to be translated into English, "Alex," is a translation of the French book with the same title. It jointly won the CWA International Dagger for best translated crime novel of 2013. In addition to this, Lemaitre has won the Crime Writers' Association International Dagger three times, once alongside Fred Vargas, for "Alex," and twice as sole winner for "Camille" and "The Great Swindle."
In 2013, Lemaitre's novel "The Great Swindle," published in French as "Au revoir là-haut," won France's leading literary award, the Prix Goncourt. The novel is an epic about World War I and is set to be released as a film in 2017. Lemaitre also writes standalone thrillers, including "Blood Wedding" and the forthcoming "Three Days in a Life" and "Inhuman Resources." He has plans to develop "The Great Swindle" into a trilogy in the coming years.