Agatha Raisin, in her well-preserved middle age and something of an amateur detective, is leaving her home in Britain's Cotswolds for a while.
In M.C. Beaton's very readable mystery, "Agatha Raisin and the Fairies of Fryfam" (St. Martin's, 208 pages, $19.95), the widowed Agatha is trying to overcome her fixation on her neighbor, James Lacey, whom she loves but who has proved elusive so far.
She has rented a cottage in Fryfam, a village in Norfolk in eastern England, where the wind comes in from the cold North Sea and days are often chilly and gray. A fortuneteller told Agatha that her destiny and true love were in Norfolk. She chose Fryfam by sticking a pin into a map.
Mysterious lights and laughter at the bottom of her garden, boundless gossip, and a village squire who made his money from bathroom showers contribute to the scene Agatha finds. The locals become silent when she mentions the lights and laughter, or they suggest it's mischievous children or fairies. It's an old region of England, they say, and legends abound.
Quilting with the local women's group and gossip about the beautiful barmaid are about as exciting as Fryfam gets until a relatively valuable painting of the squire's is stolen. A friend of Agatha's who has helped her solve cases before takes her up on an invitation to visit. The squire is found dead with his throat cut and the painting turns up in Agatha's cottage. The action picks up and the reader has a good romp.
After Agatha and her visitor have solved the murder, they return to their homes in the Cotswolds. (Their send-off from Fryfam was not what some might expect.)
And there is Lacey, finally proposing marriage, and Agatha's friends warning her not to — he's cold and selfish, they say.
Readers will learn which path she chooses and wait eagerly for the next Agatha Raisin novel.