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December 2007

to

January 2008

M.C. Beaton
Agatha Raisin Volume 2

The Potted Gardener
When a garden festival is announced, the village of Carsely is gripped with enthusiasm for water features and mulch. But in episode three, the Grim Reaper is in the garden ...

The Gardener's Legacy
When her arch rival at the garden festival is found hanging from her conservatory roof, Agatha is determined to dig deep and root out the wrongdoer.

The Walkers of Dembley
Keen to get closer to James Lacey, Agatha joins his walking group. But she is soon embroiled in a saga of muder, lust and wellington boots.

A Marriage of Convenience
In the last episode of the series, Agatha and James are hired to investigate the murder of a militant rambler. They go undercover as a married couple, but it's a marriage made in hell.

'Agatha Raisin - sharp, witty, hugely intelligent, unfailingly entertaining, delightfully intolerant and oh so magnificently non-PC' - Anne Robinson

Francis Durbridge
Send For Paul temple

Crime novelist and detective Paul Temple made his first appearance on BBC Radio in 1938. The radio serials proved so popular that Francis Durbridge was inspired to write a succession of novels featuring the smooth sleuth. In this, the very first, Paul is on the trail of a gang of jewel thieves - aided by the pretty, vivacious reporter Miss Steve Trent. A wave of mysterious robberies is sweeping the country, and fifty thousand pounds' worth of diamonds has been stolen in six months. During the fourth raid, a nightwatchman is attacked with chloroform, and just manages to gasp out 'The Green Finger' before he dies. Chief Inspector Dale has heard the enigmatic phrase before: it was the last utterance of a drowning man wanted in connection with another robbery. But with no further leads, the police are baffled. The cry goes out in the popular press: 'Send for Paul Temple!'

Elizabeth Gaskell
Cranford

Prunella Scales reads the classic tale by Elizabeth Gaskell - complete and unabridged.

A portrait of the residents of an English country town in the mid­nineteenth century, Cranford relates the adventures of Miss Matty and Miss Deborah, two middle-aged spinster sisters striving to live with dignity in reduced circumstances.

Through a series of vignettes, Elizabeth Gaskell portrays a community governed by old-fashioned habits and dominated by friendships between women. Her wry account of rural life is undercut, however, by tragedy: with such troubling events as Matty's bankruptcy, the death of Captain Brown and the unwitting cruelty of Peter jenkyns.

Written with acute observation, Cranford is by turns affectionate, moving and darkly satirical.

Cranford, a major BBC television series starring judi Dench, is created from three novels by Elizabeth Gaskell.