HIVE OF SUSPECTS

Pim, Sheila

ISBN 10: 0915230380 / ISBN 13: 9780915230389

Published by Rue Morgue Press, Boulder, CO, U.S.A., 2001

About this Item

1st prt., a fine, unread copy of this trade paperback. Once again, sheila Pim paints a vivid and affectionate portrait of life in a small Irish town in this 1952 novel as death strikes beekeeper Jason Pendergast. Jason Prendergast built his fortune taking minerals from the earth near the Irish town of Drumclash, but bees became the real passion of his life once the mines gave up the last of their riches. When he dies after dining on honey from one of his own hives, village beekeepers suspect local bees are feasting on poisonous plants and infecting hives with deadly nectar. But the Civic Guard prefers to look for a human hand and suspicion falls on Phoebe Prendergast, a niece who gave up a promising career on the stage to look after the old man. The dead man's solicitor can't believe in Phoebe's guilt and conceals from the police the fact that the old man was about to add a codicil to his will disinheriting her should she return to the stage -- even after his death.

Seller Inventory # 011240

Bibliographic Details

• Title: HIVE OF SUSPECTS
• Publisher: Rue Morgue Press, Boulder, CO, U.S.A.
• Publication Date: 2001
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 0915230380
• ISBN 13: 9780915230389
• Binding: Pictorial Cover
• Edition: First Printing.
• Condition: As New
• Book Type: Book
• Seller catalogs:
  • Rue Morgue
  • Ireland
  • Small Town / Country Village
  • Z 30
  • Cozy
  • Mystery and Detective
  • Paperback

About this title

Synopsis

Jason Prendergast built his fortune taking minerals from the earth near the Irish town of Drumclash, but bees became the real passion of his life once the mines gave up the last of their riches. When he dies after dining on honey from one of his own hives, village beekeepers suspect local bees are feasting on poisonous plants and infecting hives with deadly nectar. But the Civic Guard prefers to look for a human hand and suspicion falls on Phoebe Prendergast, a niece who gave up a promising career on the stage to look after the old man. The dead man's solicitor can't believe in Phoebe's guilt and conceals from the police the fact that the old man was about to add a codicil to his will disinheriting her should she return to the stage -- even after his death.

Reviews

The mining village of Drumclash, Ireland, circa 1950, is all abuzz when irascible curmudgeon Jason Prendergast dies after dining on honey taken from his own hives. In a town filled with eccentric characters, suspects abound, including the bees themselves. There's Penrose, the morose chauffeur, and Vera, the vamping maid; throw in a couple of traveling thespians, some curious cousins, and a peculiar partner, and you have a typical Pim crew of likely candidates. Not one to fly off course, the head of the investigating Civic Guards gets a particular bee in his bonnet and suspects Phoebe, Prendergast's niece and caregiver. Doubting that sweet Phoebe was involved in murder, professional lawyer and amateur apiarist Edward Gildea makes a beeline to come to her defense, a task that keeps him as busy as a bee in the second Pim detective novel to be reissued in the U.S., following Common or Garden Crime [BKL My 1 01]. Whether she's holding forth on beekeeping lore or explaining the traits of mineral ore, Pim enthusiastically educates as much as she entertains. Carol Haggas
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