It's as if he's being mocked from beyond the grave. When John Nichols arrives to identify the body of an old friend, he is immediately caught up in the detritus of Alan Musgrave's life, the side of Paris the tourists don't see, where everyone has a past but very few count on a future. But what can he expect from a man who bled to death in his own excruciating S&M stage show? Now there's a maverick police lieutenant on the prowl who thinks that Musgrave's suicide was murder. Guérin might not look like much, but he's one of the few honest officers on the force. As the horrific extent of police abuse is revealed, the race is on to find the link between a slew of recent suicides - and the key to it is buried deep in Nichols's past. Bed of Nails does for Paris what James Ellroy did for vintage America, shining a light as never before on the seedy underbelly of La Ville-Luminère.

仿佛他正被从坟墓中嘲笑。当约翰-尼科尔斯来到这里辨认一位老朋友的尸体时，他立即陷入了艾伦-马斯格雷夫的生活垃圾中，这是游客们没有看到的巴黎的一面，在这里，每个人都有自己的过去，但很少有人指望有未来。但是，他能从一个在自己痛苦的S&M舞台表演中流血致死的人那里期待什么呢？现在有一个特立独行的警察中尉在潜行，他认为马斯格雷夫的自杀是谋杀。Guérin可能看起来不怎么样，但他是警队中为数不多的诚实的警官之一。随着警察滥用职权的可怕程度被揭露，人们开始竞相寻找最近一连串自杀事件之间的联系--而其中的关键就深埋在尼科尔斯的过去。钉子床》对巴黎的影响就像詹姆斯-艾罗伊对美国的影响一样，以前所未有的方式照亮了La Ville-Luminère的肮脏的底层。