DEATH OF A VILLAGE

Once again, Hamish Macbeth, sole guardian of the law in Scotland’s Lochdubh village and environs, is fighting the specter of promotion as he tangles—successfully, he hopes, but not too dramatically—with a series of complex puzzles in his bailiwick. Helped at times by local reporter Elspeth Grant, Hamish deals with domestic intrigue, fake insurance claims, and skullduggery at a nursing home in nearby Braikie village. The most worrisome item on his agenda, however, takes him to the village of Stoyre. The entire town seems to be gripped by an outbreak of unholy religious fervor, its church packed with grimly unresponsive worshippers. Is this ferocious newfound piety connected to the bombing of the house owned by Major Jennings, widely regarded by the locals as godless? Hamish is determined to find out. A couple of visits to Stoyre, its cliffs, and the surrounding sea, provide him with some far-fetched possibilities—none of them as bizarre as the actual events behind the town’s sudden and remarkable religious conversion.

Beaton (Death of a Celebrity, 2001, etc.) rarely disappoints, and his 19th adventure finds Hamish in top form, with intriguing puzzles to solve, the possibility of a new romance, and ever more inventive ways of avoiding a promotion to higher rank and transfer from his beloved Lochdubh.