time out

Agatha Raisin is at the top of her game. Her detective agency is going gangbusters and she has a dancing partner to boot. So when her old flame Sir Charles Fraith asks her to go back to her previous career as a public relations expert to create an event that will celebrate the best the Cotswolds have to offer in food and drink, where he can show off wines from his new Chateau Barfield, Agatha isn’t sure what to say. Charles wants the event to be huge, attracting wine lovers from all over, and he only has a few months to pull it off. He feels like Agatha will rise to the challenge, especially when he offers up a cold case murder for her to toy with too.

So Agatha calls up her old friend Roy, who is ready to jump into action to help Agatha with an investigation. But she wants his help with the event planning, and since he worked with her in her PR agency back before she retired, he agrees to help. As Agatha does some research on high ticket auctions, so she can help put together one for charity for the event, she finds herself captivated by an antique clock and outbidding everyone else to make it hers. When she shows it to the owner of the local antiques store, the man ends up dead.

Agatha is intent on investigating his murder, but she keeps getting mysterious letters. She tries to shrug them off, but her close friends insist that they are death threats. Agatha is scheduled to meet her boyfriend John in Mallorca soon, so she leaves England for her romantic tryst. But her suspicious mind goes into overdrive when she meets his beautiful dancing partner. Agatha stalks off and finds a quiet hotel where she can work in peace. Her detectives have been going through some of her old files, to see if some old enemy or someone she helped to convict might have a reason to start sending her death threats. Agatha spends her days in paradise hunched over her laptop, going through the files and racking her memories for someone who might be gunning for her.

Eventually, she gives up on that and heads back home to the Cotswolds, not having any idea about who was sending her death threats. But she finds out that someone had been desperately looking for her—John, who denies anything happening between him and his dance partner. He had been worried ever since she’d disappeared and wasn’t sure where to find her while she’d been in the hotel. With her live life back intact, now Agatha just has to figure out who it is who wants to kill her and why, all while putting on the most spectacular food and wine event the Cotswolds have ever seen.

Killing Time is book 35 in the popular Agatha Raisin series originally created by M.C. Beaton and carried forward by her hand-chosen successor R.W. Green. These charming cozies rely heavily on the personality of Agatha herself to carry the story forward, and it’s her intelligence, hard work, and confidence that have made her so popular with readers (me included). These light-hearted mysteries bring together Aggie’s big city sensibilities with the small town where she lives, making them the perfect balance of work and play.

I have come to the Agatha Raisin universe later in the series, but I am devoted to her now. These books are a sweet treat just when I need them, a touch of humor amid the difficulties of real life. I love Aggie’s spirit, the way she holds her own with anyone who comes at her, and I can’t help but root for her as she dodges bullets and bad relationships. This may be book 35 in the series, but I am ready for 35 more. I will read them all.

Egalleys for Killing Time were provided by Minotaur Books through NetGalley, with many thanks.