The Deadly Dance (Agatha Raisin Mysteries, No. 15) - Hardcover

M.C. Beaton

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 0312304366 ISBN 13: 9780312304362

Publisher: Minotaur Books, 2004

Synopsis

Bossy, impulsive, and unlucky in love, the all-too-human Agatha Raisin has proved to be a surprisingly effective---and endearing---amateur sleuth. But can Agatha make it as a private investigator? After getting mugged on vacation, in what she will always think of as the Paris Incident, she decides to find out.

Agatha soon learns that running her own detective agency in the Cotswolds is not quite like starring in a Raymond Chandler movie. Instead of dames in distress with big shoulder pads, her clients are ladies with missing cats and a man whose son has run off with his car. Agatha even worries that she might be outclassed by her sixty-seven-year-old secretary, Emma Comfrey.
But then wealthy divorcée Catherine Laggat-Brown walks in with their first "real" case. Mrs. Laggat-Brown's daughter has received a death threat, and when Agatha thwarts an attack on the girl at a dinner dance, she recognizes an opportunity to show what Raisin Investigations can do. Even better, the case gives her a chance to reunite with her long-absent friend, Sir Charles Fraith. As they scour the Cotswolds in search of leads, Charles' insights prove invaluable and his charms irresistible, leading poor Emma to fall madly in love with him.

As ever, Agatha bumbles her way through the case, trying her friends' patience and flirting shamelessly with the chief suspect. Will she put her tiny agency on the map, or has even the outrageous Agatha finally bitten off more than she can chew?

About this title

From the Back Cover:

She's outclassed, outmatched, and outgunned

Infuriated that her holiday was ruined by a mugging, Agatha Raisin decides to open up her own detective agency. The romance-minded sleuth is thrilled by visions of handsome fellow gumshoes and headline-making crimes but soon finds the only cases she can get are a non-glamorous lot of lost cats and an errant teenager. But when a wealthy divorcee hires the agency to investigate a death threat against her daughter Cassandra, Agatha thwarts a vicious attack on the heiress bride. Now Agatha is in hot pursuit of the culprit. But when the groom's father turns up dead, Agatha must untangle a growing list of suspects, from Carsely's quiet village lanes to Paris' most fashionable streets. Soon the willfully undaunted Agatha is in trouble with French and British police; on the outs (again) with old friends and dead in the sights of a murderer.

"Anyone interested in intelligent, amusing reading will want to make the acquaintance of Mrs. Agatha Raisin."
Atlanta Journal Constitution

"I simply love mysteries that have all the requirements necessary to make them great the characters, the action, the plots, and that thing we call humanity. Beaton has them all in
spades."
--Tulsa World

"

From the Inside Flap:

Praise for M.C. Beaton and the Agatha Raisin series:

"Outwardly bossy and vain, inwardly insecure and vulnerable, Agatha grows more endearing with each installment."
- Cleveland Plain Dealer

"Beaton's imperfect heroine is an absolute gem."
- Publishers Weekly

"Agatha Raisin, a cranky, crude and raunchy woman, somehow manages to warm her way into the reader's heart and elicit their sympathy."
- Midwest Book Review

About this edition

• Publisher: Minotaur Books
• Publication date: 2004
• ISBN 10: 0312304366
• ISBN 13: 9780312304362
• Binding: Hardcover
• Edition number: 1
• Number of pages: 240