M.C. Beaton
Agatha Raisin And The Walkers Of Dembley

After six gruelling months back in London, Agatha Raisin returns to her beloved Cotswold village of Carsely - and to the charms of her neighbour, James Lacey. True, James is less than thrilled to see her, but Agatha is soon distracted by a sensational murder. The victim, found in a lonely field, is hiker Jessica Tartinck, who spent her life enraging wealthy landowners by insisting on her walking club's right to hike over their properties. Now she has been found dead....

Sally Beauman
The Landscape Of Love

Summer, 1967, rural Suffolk: Lucas, an artist and friend, is painting a portrait of thirteen year-old Maisie and her sisters. In turn, Maisie embarks on a portrait of her own: telling the story of herself and her sisters and their lovers, and of her friend, Daniel Nunn. Twenty-three years later, Daniel, determined to understand what happened that last summer at the abbey, pursues the answers to the past.

When Emma Roberts goes to France to research garden design, she finds a diversion from her studies in her unlikely new friend Frangoise Desnoyers, in whose house she is welcomed as a friend. However, she cannot ignore the tensions that exist between Fran~oise and her formidable mother, or between Mme Desnoyers and her other guests. London recedes as life in France becomes more significant, but it is when a horrifying episode occurs that Emma has to compromise.