Publisher's Weekly Review
At the start of Beaton's enjoyable 22nd Hamish Macbeth mystery (after 2006's Death of a Dreamer), the lovable Scottish constable stumbles over the body of a gossipy housecleaner, Mrs. Mavis Gillespie. She's been bludgeoned to death with her own pail, and there are plenty of suspects to go around in the Highlands village of Lochdubh. None of her clients liked her, but they insist she was a superb maid. Macbeth, noticing thick layers of dust in their homes, digs a little deeper and learns that Mrs. Gillespie was a more skilled blackmailer than housecleaner. His jealous senior colleagues try to thwart his investigation, but he's determined to get to the bottom of things. Meanwhile, the arrival of an erstwhile ladyfriend in town with a new beau makes lifelong bachelorhood appear not so appealing to Macbeth, who remains as charming a hero as ever in this funny, unpredictable read. (Feb.) (c) Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved
Kirkus Review
Hamish Macbeth rides to the rescue of the Highland village of Lochdubh, which once again has more than its share of homicides. Once Hamish (Death of a Dreamer, Feb. 2006, etc.) stumbles upon the body of charwoman Mavis Gillespie, brained with her own cleaning bucket, he quickly realizes her prying made her an obvious target for murder. Although not much of a cleaner, Mavis had a talent for ferreting out information her clients didn't want revealed. Which of them was willing to kill to preserve a secret? The candidates include an arrogant professor who may have passed a student's work off as his own; a lady whose husband died after falling down the stairs; a mysterious newcomer whose past surely needs investigating; and several others with seemingly more innocuous secrets. When Hamish's sometime girlfriend, reporter Elsbeth Grant, shows up with a new love interest, Hamish, who has commitment issues, goes so far as to buy a ring before Elspeth accepts his rival's proposal. While his boorish boss gets into a territorial fight with a female officer assigned to the case, Hamish quietly interviews the locals and learns enough to make him the target of two murder attempts. Can he solve the crime without winning the promotion that will ruin his quiet life? The faithful won't mind that Hamish's amours this time take second place to his detecting skills. Copyright ©Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.
Booklist Review
The laid-back Hamish Macbeth police procedurals, set in the remote reaches of the Scottish Highlands, almost define the British cozy. The Atlantic rages at the borders of the tiny village of Lochdubh, while unseemly passions rage within the town's picturesque cottages, reliably spilling over into murder. Macbeth, the local constable, is responsible for cleaning up the messes. A conflict running through the series, which gives a bit of contemporary zest to the plots, is Macbeth's struggles to fight against promotion, which would entail leaving the trout streams and Highland paths of Lochdubh for the crime-ridden streets of Strathbane. In this twenty-second entry in the much-loved series, a mean-spirited local housecleaner is brained with her own bucket. Local feeling runs so high against the nasty, gossiping shrew that Macbeth's suspect card is overfull. Macbeth's investigation uncovers, as usual, secrets seemingly worth defending with murder. As usual, Beaton delivers a delightfully old-fashioned, absorbing village mystery. --Connie Fletcher Copyright 2007 Booklist
