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Portrait of Fred Vargas Photo: Eamonn McCabe/Popperfoto via Getty Images (2008)

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Vargas, Fred

Fred Vargas is a pseudonym used by the French historian, archaeologist and crime writer Frédérique Audoin-Rouzeau. "Vargas" was a character played by Ava Gardener in The Barefoot Contessa; the name was first used by Audoin-Rouzeau’s twin sister Joëlle, the visual artist Jo Vargas.
Their father, Philippe Audoin-Rouzeau, was a journalist and a famous figure in surrealist circles. He was very part...

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Literary figures

Francis Hancock

Gender: Male

His father was an Englishman, his mother from India. Francis Hancock himself is a funeral director in London during the Second World War, when the Germans bombed the city. His experiences during the First World War, when he was a soldier, have given him mental problems. He is very withdrawn, which doesn’t, however, prevent him from being a clever – albeit reluctant – amateur detective in a suite o...

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