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A delightful series featuring Agatha Raisin, a hard-headed businesswoman who retires to the Cotswolds and gets herself into outrageous situations through her own plans and schemes but always manages to justify her actions, often with hilarious results. I love these books and always grab them as soon as they are published. AGATHA RAISIN and the LOVE FROM HELLIn her 11th appearance (after 2000's Agatha Raisin and the Fairies of Fryfam), irrepressible amateur sleuth Agatha Raisin has, alas, lost her sense of humor. Finally married to the love of her life, neighbor James Lacey, Agatha soon realizes that what she hoped would be a happy modern marriage in the idyllic Cotswold village of Carlsey is anything but. First, James explodes with anger when she turns his laundry pink, then expresses vehement disapproval when she serves a Marks & Spencer's prepared lasagna for dinner. Finally, when each is sure the other is having an affair, James goes missing, leaving only blood stains behind. Determined to find him, Agatha and her friend, Sir Charles Fraith, begin an investigation that leads them to the discovery of the body of Melissa Sheppard, James's suspected mistress. Delving into Melissa's past life reveals two ex-husbands and an estranged sister, all with motive to kill. Beaton has been praised for bringing the traditional British cozy into the 21st century, but an up-to-date village setting is not enough. Without the wit and humor of prior outings that made the characters human, Agatha is unforgivably and inappropriately rude and sharp-tongued, the parsimonious Sir Charles is repetitively stingy beyond belief and James is just unreal. Stereotypical minor characters further disappoint. There are two mystery series by Ms.Beaton, whose real name is Marion Chosney. The first is about Hamish MacBeth, the constable of a small village in Scotland.
Agatha is bald from a run-in with a hairdresser/murderess from her last investigation and she travels to an old-fashioned seaside resort to re-grow her hair back in peace. Unhappy with the slow results, she consults a local witch. She buys a hair tonic, plus a love potion, and is soon sprouting hair! Then the quiet town is suddenly stunned by murder. By M.C. Beaton I love the books about Hamish...I have read them all.
With his neat new uniform, big new truck and important new job as head of Lochdubh's state-of-the-art recycling center, dustman Fergus Macleod is a force to be reckoned with-issuing harsh fines and enforcing petty rules, much to the dismay of the businesspeople in town. But when the unpopular trash collector is found dead, stuffed in his own recycling bin, Scottish detective Hamish Macbeth is called to the scene to make a clean sweep of the murder and dig up a dirty killer with ties to Lochdubh's new oceanfront hotel. |
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By Dick Francis Dick Francis is a grand master of crime fiction with stories that always have a touch of the world of horses, usually in racing or jumping, and fast moving action with good believable characterizations. Second Wind is the story of BBC TV weatherman, Perry Stuart, who joins a friend to fly through the eye of a hurricane as part of a vacation. The descriptions of climatic conditions, particularly those of hurricanes, are gripping and informative. This story has a typical Francis hero, a young Englishman who is smart, polite and thoroughly decent. In addition to the thrill of flying into the eye of the hurricane, Perry must survive a plane crash into the ocean,being stranded on an abandoned island and his involvement in a sinister scheme to sell uranium to foreign nations intent to building bombs. This is Mr. Francis' 40th novel. Some did not like it but I found it to be interesting from the first page. |
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Dorothy Simpson A British Mystery series that is most enjoyable is the Luke Thanet series by Dorothy Simpson. There are thirteen books in the series, beginning with THE NIGHT SHE DIED. What sets these books apart for me is he way Ms.Simpson handles the complex human relationships within the stories. If read from the start of the series, one can follow the development of the Thanet family, which includes the Inspector's wife, Joan, and their two children, however each story stands alone. Anyone who enjoys a good old-fashioned police procedural will want to read the latest Inspector Thannet tale. DEAD AND GONE is the fifteenth entry in this absorbing series. Due to Dorothy Simpson,s talent, the current tale retains a freshness and creative feel as if this is the first installment. |
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A British Mystery series that is most enjoyable is the
This is the 11th case in the series featuring Inspector
Alan Banks and he is being "punished" for insubordination
with an assignment that is most unpleasant. A drought has
exposed a village and an old corpse and aided by Annie Cabot
Banks wades into the muck!
Ms. Crombie is another author who lives in the U.S. and writes British mysteries. She lives in Texas. She has received much recognition for her mysteries featuring Scotland Yard detectives Duncan Kincaid and Sergeant Gemma James. These are tightly plotted police procedurals that compare favorably with the works of Martha Grimes and Elizabeth George. By Deborah Crombie Supt. Duncan Kinkaid's weekend is upset when a body
is found in an East London park. The victim was from
a family involved in the tea business and there are
some details that strike Duncan and Gemma James as odd!
One of my favorite authors of British mysteries is Ms. Martha Grimes, who writes the Richard Jury mystery series. Visit my homepage for Mr. Jury, hosted by Cyril,the Cat! I love the audiobook versions of some of these books also...performed by Mr. Tim Curry, who does a superb job of bringing the characters to life. The book titles are taken from the names of pubs in England. |
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Rhys Bowen stopped by the Tumbling TBR and told us she has started a new mystery series set in North Wales, featuring young Welsh policeman Evan Evans. The first book,
EVANS ABOVE, came out in December '97 and got all nice reviews. The second, EVAN HELP US came out this last September (St. Martins) and the paperback versions start Evan Can Wait The descent by a group of egocentric, flamboyant filmmakers on a small town has been the setup for a number of novels and a few movies. Rhys Bowen takes her crack at it with a tidy little story about a group of documentarians who invade a small village in Wales to capture the raising of a sunken German bomber on film. Llanfair is surrounded by abandoned mineshafts, and when the bombastic producer Grantley Smith is found murdered in one of them, Constable Evan Evans, Bowen's series hero, stumbles down more than a few dead ends before he uncovers the motive. Finding evidence of a stash of paintings from the National Gallery that were hidden at the scene of the murder, Evan uncovers a decades-old plot involving art forgery that doesn't really have much to do with the murder except coincidence. It does, however, keep the narrative moving, as does a love affair between the constable and the schoolteacher, who turns out to have been married to one of the filmmakers.  EVAN AND ELLE There is both excitement and dismay in Llanfair when a new French restaurant opens in an old chapel. The glamour owner, Madame Yvette, tries to win over the locals and everything seems to be going well until a string of arson fires plagues the village. One night the restaurant burns down, and a body is found in the rubble. Constable Evans joins Sergeant Watkins in follow a trail of clues that leads them to the South of England, and then to France, and finally to the conclusion that a dangerous killer is loose in Llanfair.  |
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I have this one in Audiobook and enjoyed the narrative by Michael York. To this day, the low, thin wail of an infant can be heard in Keldale's lush green valleys. Three hundred years ago, as legend goes, the frightened Yorkshire villagers smothered a crying babe in Keldale Abbey, where they'd hidden to escape the ravages of Cromwell's raiders. Now into Keldale's pastoral web of old houses and older secrets comes Scotland Yard Inspector Thomas Lynley, the eighth earl of Asherton. Along with the redoubtable Detective Sergeant Barbara Havers, Lynley has been sent to solve a savage murder that has stunned the peaceful countryside. For fat, unlovely Roberta Teys has been found in her best dress, an axe in her lap, seated in the old stone barn beside her father's headless corpse. Her first and last words were "I did it. And I'm not sorry." Yet as Lynley and Havers wind their way through Keldale's dark labyrinth of secret scandals and appalling crimes, they uncover a shattering series of revelations that will reverberate through this tranquil English valley—and in their own lives as well. |
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