Sweet Venom by
Betty Rowlands
hbk out May 04
Published by Hodder
at £18.99
Betty Rowlands has been called 'the queen of the contemporary
cosy' and this is a classic example, set in a peaceful Cotswold village
peopled by ladies who do flower-arranging, gossiping charladies and
a benign vicar. One of a long series of similar tales, it features the
serial sleuth, Melissa Craig, a crime-writer who has recently married
her agent - a good career move, that!
In one of the larger houses of the sleepy village lives a rather odd
quartet of two brothers and their wives. One is Aidan Cresney, a
retired barrister and control freak, who is unpopular for his steam-
rollering of village issues, such as planning consent. A keen bee-
keeper, he is found dead one day suffering from multiple bee-stings,
inexplicable in an expert apiarist. It becomes even more bizarre when
his sister-in law suffers the same fate some days later.
Melissa is drafted in as a good neighbour and confidante of Aidan's
widow Caroline, and begins to learn of the strange convolutions of
the Cresney's family life. The plot becomes similarly convoluted as
Melissa herself becomes the target of angry bees, but it all works out
in the end.
For 'cosy' fans, this is Holy Writ, the excellent writing capturing the
atmosphere of an English village perfectly, with the undercurrents of
jealousy and spite that can exist beneath the idyllic calm of the
surroundings. And what a relief not to have a single obscenity in
almost three-hundred pages!
(
Bernard Knight
ex Home Office Pathologist and author of the highly acclaimed Crowner John series)
Sweet Venom by
Betty Rowlands
