Death of an Outsider
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3.9 • 12 Ratings
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- $9.99
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- $9.99
Publisher Description
From the author of the Agatha Raisin television series...
Death of an Outsider: A Hamish Macbeth Mystery
The most hated man in the most dour town in Scotland is sleeping with the fishes, or-more accurately-dumped into a tank filled with crustaceans. All that remain of the murdered victim are his bones. But after the lobsters are shipped off to Britain's best restaurants, the whole affair quickly lands on the plate of Constable Hamish Macbeth.
Exiled with his dog, Towser, to the dreary outpost of Cnothan, Macbeth sorely misses his beloved Lochdubh, his formerly beloved Priscilla Halburton-Smythe, and his days of doing nothing but staring at the sheep grazing in a nearby croft. Now the lawman has to contend with a detective chief inspector who wants the modus operandi hushed up, a dark-haired lass who has an ulterior motive to seduce him, and a killer who has made mincemeat of his victim-and without doubt will strike again . . .
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
The endearing Constable Hamish Macbeth (of Death of a Gossip and Death of a Cad ) is sent to the Scottish Highlands town of Cnothan, a place of ``dark hates and enmities'' whose inhabitants cordially loathe outsiders. Cnothan hospitality is mingy even toward the incoming constable, who finds his cupboard bare and his furnace set on a short timer. In view of the town's bad manners, few people display surprise when Mainwaring, an annoyingly brusque Englishman who settled eight years ago on his late aunt's estate, is reported murdered. There are plenty of suspects, among them the dead man's browbeaten widow, forced to wear mail-order-catalogue dresses. Suspicion falls on Sandy Carmichael, the drunken watchman for the nearby Fish and Game Company. And what of the two town ``lookers,'' glamorous Helen Ross or Jenny Lovelace, a young painter, possibly former mistresses wreaking revenge? Matters grow complicated when Hamish and Jenny become lovers. The characterization is wryly humorous, while a horde of ravenous lobsters give the plot a wildly ghoulish twist. Jaundiced views on love and marriage abound, and the visiting constable finds himself doubling as the local psychiatrist among this amusing cast of eccentrics.
