|
|
|
|
Marion Chesney was born in Glasgow, Scotland, in 1936. She has worked as a fiction buyer for a bookseller, as women’s fashion editor for the magazine Scottish Field, as a reporter and theater critic for the Scottish Daily Express (Glasgow), and as a reporter for the Daily Express (London). Like her amateur sleuth Agatha Raisin, Chesney lives in a cottage in the English Cotswolds.
According to Willetta L. Heising in Detecting Women 2, the idea for the first Hamish Macbeth novel came to Chesney while she was learning to fly cast for salmon at a fishing school in northern Scotland. Macbeth is the town constable in Lochdubh, a small village in the Scottish Highlands. He keeps a low profile, preferring to have people assume he’s of limited competence and intelligence. But, despite the intervention of more high-powered police officials, he’s able to solve crimes by careful observation of the people involved. Hamish Macbeth’s quiet but steady process of investigation has lead one reviewer to say of a novel in this series, “The pleasures of the book are akin to those of a good gossip session with a perceptive old friend.”
Beaton’s later mystery creation, amateur sleuth Agatha Raisin, is a middle-aged public relations dynamo who retires to a village in the English countryside. She’s more self-important and assertive than Hamish Macbeth, but both series deal with life in a small village. Each town presents an isolated, insular community that doesn’t take kindly to strangers—perhaps because the arrival of outsiders often causes trouble and upsets the status quo. Like Hamish Macbeth, Agatha Raisin solves crimes by observing and analyzing the people around her, but unlike Macbeth she’s pushy, nosy, and manipulative.
British readers probably prefer the Hamish Macbeth mysteries. In fact,
the BBC has made the stories into a television series. American readers
seem to prefer the more brash Agatha Raisin, who crashes her way through
village life with more outright humor than occurs in the more subdued Hamish
Macbeth books. But both series examine small-town life under the guise
of a mystery. These are short books that provide the perfect diversion
when you’re in the mood for some light, amusing reading.
Every week during salmon-fishing season a new class arrives at the fishing school in Lochdubh run by John and Heather Cartwright. But town constable Hamish Macbeth has a bad feeling about this particular class….
Macbeth is the lone police officer in Lochdubh, a small village in the Scottish Highlands. Since not much happens in Lochdubh, he keeps a pretty close eye on the fishing school classes. He also has an uncanny knack for showing up just as the sandwiches and coffee are being distributed.
The current class includes Lady Jane Winters, a woman with a sharp, biting tongue who seems to know the secrets of all the others in the class as well as of the Cartwrights and of Hamish Macbeth himself. So it’s no surprise to the reader when Lady Jane first fails to appear for a morning lesson and then later floats to the surface of the lake where the others are practicing their fly casting.
But before killing off Lady Jane, Beaton cleverly uses her to fill in the necessary background of Hamish Macbeth. Except for the outdoor setting, this novel follows the formula of the traditional English drawing-room mystery. Beaton livens up the narrative, though, with her portrayal of Macbeth as the astute observer who quietly goes about identifying the murderer while the police higher-ups who’ve been sent in to solve the case continue to ridicule and ignore him.
When we first meet Agatha Raisin, she’s 53 years old and about to retire from her public relations job in London to a cottage in the Cotswolds: "The Cotswolds in the Midlands are surely one of the few man-made beauties in the world: quaint villages of golden stone houses, pretty gardens, winding green lanes and ancient churches [...] to Agatha the Cotswolds represented everything she wanted in life: beauty, tranquility and security" (1).
It’s hard to begrudge Agatha her coveted retirement bliss. After all, she’s had a tough life. The child of alcoholic parents, she was forced to leave school and go to work at an early age. As soon as she was old enough she left her parents and went to London, where she worked her way through secretarial classes. She went to work at a public relations agency and learned all she could before starting her own business, which she’s built up "over long hard years of work."
As a young woman Agatha was married briefly to the charming Jimmy Raisin. Once she admitted to herself that Jimmy was a drunk, Agatha walked out on him one day and has never heard from or of him since. She assumes he’s dead by now.
So who wouldn’t expect Agatha Raisin to be a bit gruff, a bit self-centered, a bit harsh? Now, after selling her business for a tidy sum, Agatha is off to fulfill her life-long dream. She’s determined to impose herself upon the village of Carsley. But is Carsley ready for Agatha Raisin?
On her first few days in the little village Agatha is offended that the villagers’ warmth does not extend beyond the superficial greetings of common courtesy. But no matter. When she sees posters announcing the annual quiche-baking contest, Agatha knows she’s found just the way to find acceptance in the village: she’ll submit the prize-winning quiche. So what if Agatha’s culinary skills don’t extend beyond warming frozen dinners in the microwave oven? She’ll just drive on into London and buy a smashing quiche at her favorite deli.
Agatha’s position in the village becomes even more tenuous when Mr. Cummings-Browne, judge of the quiche contest, dies of poisoning after eating Agatha’s quiche. Now, as Agatha sees it, the only way she can stay in Carsley is to find out who murdered Mr. Cummings-Browne. As she crashes her way through village society looking for the information she needs, Agatha Raisin learns a thing or two about life in a small, enclosed group.
Will Agatha solve the mystery and remain in her cottage in Carsley? To do so, she’ll have to mellow a bit. But not too much—without that edge to her personality, she just wouldn’t be the same Agatha Raisin.
Agatha Raisin arrived at London's Heathrow Airport with a tan outside and a blush of shame inside. She felt an utter fool as she pushed her load of luggage towards the exit.She had just spent two weeks in the Bahamas in pursuit of her handsome neighbour, James Lacey… (1)
Could this be the same Agatha Raisin whom we first met in Agatha Raisin and the Quiche of Death, the self-assertive middle-aged retiree who crashed her way into Carsley society? Indeed it is. Now having decided to stay in the village of Carsley after all, Agatha has set her mind on winning over the new occupant of the cottage next to hers. And what Agatha wants, Agatha works hard to get.
But wait. There’s another new, handsome bachelor in town, Paul Bladen, who has opened a veterinary clinic. So, after Lacey has proved elusive, Agatha decides that her cat could use a check-up. But when Agatha, dressed to the nines, arrives at the clinic waiting room, she finds just about every other woman in the village, similarly attired, there before her.
This is a mystery, so a murder occurs early on. But the murder is almost incidental. The real content of the book is the comic machinations that Agatha goes through to arouse Lacey’s interest and that Lacey goes through when he fears she’s after him. Has the inimitable Agatha Raisin finally met her match?
Search Notes in the Margin |
|
|
|
|
 |
|
|
|
|
|
|