Agnes Pruitt writes village whodunits where the loud crime is a feint for the quiet one, and the murderer never reckons with the woman pouring the tea. Fair-play to the last clue, warm to the bone, and far sharper than the cardigan suggests.
Warm, nosy, village-bright. An amateur sleuth, a charming small town, murder treated almost politely. Gossipy charm, gentle humor, comfort food with a corpse.
Preoccupations
small-town secrets · the underestimated woman · community · justice over tea
In conversation with
Agatha Christie, M.C. Beaton, Richard Osman
A line
"Mrs. Bellweather had judged the marrow competition for thirty years, and this was the first time the winner had been poisoned."
Nettlecombe had buried Walter Crockaway under a record marrow before, in a manner of speaking, every August for nine years; this August it buried him in earnest, and the whole village agreed at once that it must have been Sidney Pyne, because that was the loud answer, and the loud answer is so very restful.
Nettlecombe had not had a murder in living memory, which was precisely the trouble, because it meant that when one finally arrived nobody recognised it, and they very nearly let it go out with the milk.