WASTE OF A LIFE

Not even the death of a client can keep professional declutterer Ellen Curtis from probing the details of his sorry life.

“I get interested in people and I want to see how their stories turn out,” says the proprietor and sole employee of SpaceWoman. It’s as good an explanation as any for why she attaches herself to Cedric Waites, an elderly widower who'd been referred to her by social services after a nasty fall. At first Cedric, whose accident clearly hasn’t mellowed his disposition, won’t let Ellen inside; even after he relents, he’s not her most cordial client, and their standoffs don’t end until she finds him lying dead on his bed. DI Bayles thinks Cedric was poisoned, and he’s not pleased that Ellen’s unwittingly disposed of some important evidence before the Chichester police could examine it. She expresses due regret, more to herself than him, but her continuing interest in the arc of Cedric’s life must compete with her work for retired English teacher Mim Galbraith, whose dementia is worsening, and new client Lita Cullingford; with her dismay that Bayles favors her colleague Gervaise “Dodge” Palmier, who retired from the city to do hauling and woodworking, as the poisoner; and with the distressing complications in the personal lives of her grown children, aspiring animator Ben and aspiring influencer Jools, who’s always been “mildly bolshie” anyway. The veteran author, who could probably compose these chronicles in his sleep, distributes his clues cleverly and ties them up with a professional neatness his heroine might envy.

Brett’s brisk descriptions, pacing, and juggling of subplots temper the sadness of the victim’s recovered biography.