Fleur de tonnerre

Fleur de tonnerre is a novel set in the time when the spirit of Enlightenment and catechism had not yet subjected popular imagination to the laws of reason and the one God. Throughout Brittany, in forests and moors, on dunes lashed by the mad winds of the Atlantic, ran the most extravagant legends. In the evening, in the depths of farms, one endlessly evoked the machinations of supernatural beings whom one knew to be responsible for the misery and ills that relentlessly struck. Of all, the Ankou, the worker of death, was the most feared, and it is this terrible image that struck with unprecedented violence the mind of little Hélène Jegado.

Curled up against the icy granite of gigantic menhirs, the tiny child convinced herself that she was the incarnation of the Ankou. She had to kill everyone who crossed her path and carried out her mission with unwavering determination and cold blood. After poisoning her own mother, whom she called "Fleur de tonnerre," she crisscrossed Brittany, eliminating without hesitation all those who welcomed this perfect cook with joy.

She killed everyone, men, women, children, the elderly and infants. She poisoned in houses, in presbyteries, in convents, in brothels. And she was so good, so compassionate at the bedsides of the dying, that no one could suspect for a moment her monstrous plan. On the contrary, one pitied this person so devoted that bad luck always led to families who were victims of the jinx. By leaving too many traces, she finally got caught, the day when she attacked an old judge, an expert in criminal matters.

Hélène Jegado remains the greatest "serial killer" in France and, no doubt, in the world.