Showing results by narrator "Penelope Keith" in All Categories

Agatha Raisin's detective agency has become so successful that she decides to take time off for rest and relaxation. But as soon as she does, she remembers that when she does have time on her hands, she doesn't know what to do with it. So it doesn't take much for the vicar of a nearby village to persuade her to help publicise the church fete - especially when the event organiser, George Selby, turns out to be a handsome widower.

Penelope Keith - who starred as Agatha Raisin in the popular BBC Radio 4 series – reads M. C. Beaton’s eagerly-awaited murder mystery. Agatha Raisin has never been one for enforced holiday cheer, but her friendly little village of Carsely has always prided itself on its traditional Christmas festivities. However, this year Mr John Sunday has chosen Christmas as the time to crack down on what he sees as gross misconduct by everyone. But when Mr Sunday goes too far, he is soon found lying face down in the petunias, very much dead.

After pursuing him for nearly four years, Agatha is finally about to marry James Lacey, the handsome Colonel next door. But there's just one little problem.

A newcomer to the village, Mary Fortune, is discovered murdered. Agatha seizes the moment and immediately starts yanking up village secrets by their roots and digging the dirt on the victim. But the problem is, Agatha has an awkward secret of her own.

Agatha Raisin's neighbouring village of Ancombe is usually the epitome of quiet rural charm, but the arrival of a new mineral water company - which intends to tap into the village spring - sends tempers flaring and divides the parish council into two stubborn camps. When Agatha, who happens to be the PR person for the water company, finds the council chairman murdered at the spring, tongues start wagging. Could one of the council members have silenced the chairman before he could cast the deciding vote?

Agatha Raisin's ex-husband James has become engaged to a beautiful young woman and Agatha has been kindly invited to the wedding. This is a difficult pill to swallow, so to take her mind off it Agatha begins a flirtation with Sylvan, a Frenchman she met at James's engagement party. She also decides to holiday in Istanbul, where unfortunately she bumps into James and his fiancée, not once but twice - convincing him she is stalking them.

When the village curate is found murdered, retired PR guru Agatha Raisin vows to bring his killer to justice, particularly if the investigation also brings her closer to her handsome next-door neighbour, Colonel Lacey. Duck and Cover Still reeling from the death of their curate, the inhabitants of Carsely decide on Duck Racing and Morris Dancing to cheer themselves up. But the village Fete is unlikely to go smoothly while the killer is still amongst them.

Recently married to James Lacey, Agatha quickly finds out that it's not all 'happy ever after' - before long the newlyweds are living in separate cottages and accusing each other of infidelity. After a fight down the local pub, James vanishes completely, leaving a bloodstain as the only clue to his fate. Naturally, Agatha is Prime Suspect. Determined to clear her name and find her husband, Agatha begins her investigation - and promptly finds a murdered mistress....

Abandoned by new husband James, Agatha Raisin hops on a plane to the South Pacific in the hope that an idyllic holiday will bring some consolation. There, she befriends a honeymooning couple, but tragically, the young bride is accidentally drowned. Returning home to the Cotswolds, Agatha finds herself involved in a strangely similar situation: a woman, dressed in a wedding gown, is found floating in the river. The police say suicide, but Agatha, spurred on by bitter reflections on the married state, sets out to prove them wrong.

Meet Agatha Raisin, high-flying public relations boss turned village sleuth. After her many years of bullying and cajoling others, her early retirement to a picture-perfect village in the Cotswolds is a dream come true.

Sea, sand ... and the slammer for Agatha! Agatha Raisin thinks she's in for a treat when her ex-husband, James Lacey, invites her on holiday, but - horrors! - his idea of an idyllic break is the small, run-down resort of Burryhill-on-Sea. And from there on, things go from bad to worse. So when a fellow guest in their hotel is found murdered, Agatha herself is chief suspect - and has to solve this case from a locked police cell!

After being nearly killed by both a hired hit man and her former secretary, Agatha Raisin could use some low-key cases. So when Robert Smedley walks through the door of her detective agency, determined to prove that his wife is cheating on him, Raisin Investigations immediately offers to help. Unfortunately for Agatha, Mabel Smedley appears to be the perfect wife: young, pretty and a regular volunteer at church.

When private detective Agatha Raisin comes across a severed leg in a roadside hedge, it looks like she is about to become involved in a particularly gruesome murder. Looks, however, can be deceiving, as Agatha discovers when she is employed to investigate a case of industrial espionage at a factory where nothing is quite what it seems. The factory mystery soon turns to murder, and a bad-tempered donkey turns Agatha into a national celebrity, before bringing her ridicule and shame.

Feeling jilted and cross, Agatha follows a fortune-teller's advice and rents a cottage in the pretty village of Fryfam, where she hopes good fortune and true love will come chasing after her for a change. Unfortunately, her romantic notions are soon dispelled by the strange goings-on in the village. What are those strange lights in Agatha's back garden? Who is stealing paintings and pottery? And who murdered the local squire?

Agatha Raisin, retired PR supremo, has been spurned at the altar by the man of her dreams, her attractive neighbour James Lacey. So temporarily deserting the sleepy Cotswold village of Carsely, she pursues her fleeing fiancé to north Cyprus where, instead of enjoying a romantic honeymoon, they witness the killing of an obnoxious tourist in a disco. Can the duo forget their differences and resume their strangely successful sleuthing partnership?

Winter Parva, a traditional Cotswolds village next door to Carsely, has decided to throw a celebratory hog roast to mark the beginning of the winter holiday festivities and Agatha Raisin has arrived with friend and rival in the sleuthing business, Toni, to enjoy the merriment. But as the spit pig is carried towards the bed of fiery charcoal Agatha - and the rest of the village - realise that things aren’t as they seem....

With deceptive economy in these nine short stories, Ruth Rendell indicates hidden depths in ordinary events and creates a sense of profound unease. The stories are: 'A Pair of Yellow Lilies', 'Paperwork', 'Mother’s Hel'p, 'Long Live the Queen', 'Dying Happy', 'The Copper Peacock', 'Weeds', 'The Fish-Sitter', and 'An Unwanted Woman'.

Allotment wars! Lord Bellingham, Carsely's biggest landholder, has enraged locals by saying he is going to sell off their allotments to make way for a new housing development. So when he turns up dead, poisoned by antifreeze, nobody mourns his passing. On another fine summer's day, Agatha visits Carsley's allotments, where everything looks peaceful and perfect: people of all ages digging in the soil and working hard to grow their own fruit and veg.

The team of bells at St. Ethelred church is the pride and glory of the idyllic Cotswolds village of Thirk Magna, together with the most dedicated bell ringers in the whole of England: the twins Mavis and Millicent Dupin. As the village gets ready for the Bishop's visit, the twins get overly excited at the prospect of ringing the special peal of bells created for the occasion and start bullying the other bell ringers, forcing them to rehearse and rehearse...so much so that Joseph Kennell, a retired lawyer, yells at the sisters that he 'felt like killing them'! 

Even though Agatha Raisin loathes Christmas panto, her friend, Mrs Bloxby, the vicar's wife, has persuaded her to support the local am dram society in their festive offering. Stifling a yawn at the production of Babes in the Wood, Agatha watches the baker playing an ogre strut and threaten onstage until a trapdoor opens, followed by a scream and silence! Surely this wasn't the way the scene was rehearsed. When it turns out the local baker had been murdered most horribly, Agatha puts her team of detectives on the case.