Looking For a Good Book

It wasn’t too long ago that I reviewed the 24th book in the Agatha Raisin Mystery Series, Something Borrowed, Someone Dead, and now we have book #25 in the series and I have to say that Agatha Raisin is growing on me.

In The Blood of an Englishman, Agatha encounters a murder at a local pantomime performance (ie: community theatre).  Perhaps it was this theatre setting which appealed to me the most (coming from a theatre background, as I do), but it took no effort on my part to picture the setting and the theatrical characters.

It is, of course, every mystery writer’s goal to create unique characters for their detectives, but I think author M.C. Beaton has out-uniqued them all.  Agatha Raisin is unlike any other detective I’ve ever encountered.  She’s a cranky old lady who is man-hungry, but has a knack for solving crime.

Most of the other characters are fairly stereotypical, but they’re fun.  Beaton is writing light-hearted mysteries which means that making them fun is a priority, and this is a success in those terms.  You can’t go into this expecting a deep, dark mystery that will make you work hard as a reader.  Rather, this is a diversion.  This is the sort of book you pick up because you like mysteries but you want something that you can read at the bus-stop, and you want something that is more entertaining rather than something that makes you think.

This is not a book (or even a series) for everyone … not even for all mystery readers … but there is definitely an audience for this type of book (you don’t have twenty-five books in a series if it isn’t any good).

Looking for a good book?  If you are in the mood for a light-hearted mystery with a cantankerous, and very unique leading character, than this is a book worth checking out.

I received a digital copy of this book from the publisher, through Netgalley, in exchange for an honest review.

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The Blood of an Englishman

author: M.C. Beaton

series: Agatha Raisin #25

publisher: St Martin’s Press Minotaur Books

ISBN: 0312616260

hardcover, 294 pages