The Void Registry

About this book

Archivist Claire Boutet believed her father died in 1999, until she finds proof that he was travelling four years later. Her search leads three levels below the Archives Nationales in Paris, to a steel door that is on no map. A thriller about a state that can erase a life.

A dead man’s boarding pass. A hidden door in the Paris archives. A secret that could dismantle the French state. Claire Boutet is a reclusive archivist who thought her father died in 1999, until she finds evidence he was traveling four years later. Her search for the truth leads her to the third basement level of the Archives Nationales, where she discovers a steel door that doesn’t exist on any map. Behind it lies the Programme Neant: a shadow bureaucracy that has systematically erased the identities of hundreds of citizens.

Among the 417 dossiers is Subject 317—her father. He didn’t die; he was forcibly relocated to a guarded facility in the Auvergne. Now, Claire must navigate a deadly web of surveillance and institutional corruption to expose the program director, Etienne Servier, before his operatives can execute a final, deniable assault to keep the secret buried forever. Joined by a disgraced judge and an investigative journalist, Claire enters a high-stakes game of political chess where the price of the truth might be her father’s life.

Fans of Robert Ludlum’s intricate conspiracies and the atmospheric suspense of Mick Herron will be gripped by this cerebral, high-stakes political thriller. Shadow Inventory explores the terrifying power of the state to delete a human life with the stroke of a pen. Can one woman restore the identities of the disappeared, or will she become the next file to be shredded? Grab your copy today.