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1 Peter 5:8—“Seeking Whom He May Devour”

Fred Vargas is the pseudonym used by the French archaeological-turned-novelist Frédérique Audoin-Rouzeau (1957– ). She has written a series of highly successful and critically acclaimed crime novels, all published in the twenty-first century.

Her second book in the series, Seeking Whom He May Devour, takes its name from 1 Peter 5:8: “Discipline yourselves, keep alert. Like a roaring lion your adversary the devil prowls around, looking for someone to devour.” In the novel, the voracious adversary is not the devil per se but a group of werewolves, the supposed existence of which the series protagonist Commissaire Adamsberg must investigate in a remote French village.

Actually, the biblical reference is found only in the title of the English translation of the book. The original French title was L’Homme à l’envers (“The Inside-out Man”), since werewolves can disguise themselves in human form only by turning their wolfskin inside out. Since that werewolf fact is not well known to English readers, the publishers thought a different (and more devilish) title would be better.