Hamish Macbeth (16)

Returning from a foreign holiday, Hamish Macbeth is worried because he senses a dark cloud of evil hanging over the Highland village of Lochdubh. He learns that a newcomer, Catriona Beldame, is regarded as a witch and various men have been seen visiting her. Hamish himself is charmed by her until he finds out she has been supplying dangerous potions. At first the villagers won’t listen to him, saying that the loveless Hamish has turned against all women. He threatens to kill her so that when she is found murdered, he must clear his name and then work to solve yet another murder to bring peace and quiet back to his beloved village. His investigations are complicated by a romance with a female forensic expert. Perhaps he’ll get married at last!

Gentle by name, gentle by nature. Everyone in the sleepy Scottish town of Lochdubh adores elderly Mrs. Gentle – everyone but Hamish Macbeth, that is. Hamish thinks the gentle lady is quite sly and vicious, and the citizens of Lochdubh think he is overly cranky. Perhaps it’s time for him to get married, they say. But who has time for marriage when there’s a murder to be solved? When Mrs. Gentle dies under mysterious circumstances, the town is shocked and outraged. Chief Detective Inspector Blair suspects members of her family, but Hamish Macbeth thinks there’s more to the story, and begins investigating the truth behind this lady’s gentle exterior.

Mrs. Gillespie is famous for being the best maid in the northwest of Sutherland. But to Hamish Macbeth, she is a malicious gossip who bangs around the furniture and clanks pots. When Hamish wins Mrs. Gillespie’s services in a church raffle, he spends most of the day trying to avoid her. He doesn’t understand how she managed to gain such a fine reputation. Then she is found dead, struck down violently by a metal bucket of water. Knowing Mrs. Gillespie’s penchant for gossip, Hamish is sure she delighted in finding out her clients’ secrets – which means that everyone whose home she cleaned is a suspect.

Occasionally, the rugged landscape of Scotland attracts dreamers who move north, wrapped in fantasies of enjoying the simple life. They usually don’t last, defeated by the climate or by inhospitable locals. But it looks as if Effie Garrand has come to stay. When local constable Hamish Macbeth calls on her, he is amazed to find the small woman still in residence after a particularly hideous winter. Unfortunately, Effie is also quite delusional, having convinced herself – and everyone else – that local artist Jock Fleming is in love with her, and that they are engaged. After a huge fight with Jock, Effie is found in the mountains, poisoned by hemlock. Now, it’s up to Hamish Macbeth to find the dreamer’s killer – before any more nightmares unfold.

Minor writer John Heppel has a problem – he’s by all accounts a consummate bore. When he’s found dead in his cottage, there are plenty of suspects. But surely boredom shouldn’t be cause for murder, or so thinks local bobby and sleuth Hamish Macbeth, whose investigation of Heppel’s soap opera script uncovers much more than melodrama. Popular reader and actor Graeme Malcolm makes this intricate whodunit set in Beaton’s beloved Scottish village a memorable audio experience. This is the newest title in the popular Hamish Macbeth series.

Fans of the critically acclaimed Hamish Macbeth whodunits are in for a real treat with Death of a Poison Pen. Police constable Macbeth knows that, in most cases, the wild accusations and scandalous suppositions in poison-pen letters are an annoyance, not a genuine threat. But, from the first, Hamish suspects that what’s going on in the remote village of Lochdubh is no ordinary case. When the village postmistress is found dead with a poison-pen letter at her feet, the coroner confirms Hamish’s worst fears, that the woman’s apparent suicide was in fact a carefully concealed murder. Now it’s up to Hamish to trace the letters and the escalating violence to the source. His efforts are both aided and complicated by the arrival of Jenny Ogilvie, a lovely lady whose passion for Hamish is only equaled by her dangerous curiosity about the murderous poison pen who is her rival for Hamish’s attention.

With his neat new uniform, big new truck and important new job as head of Lochdubh’s state-of-the-art recycling center, dustman Fergus Macleod is a force to be reckoned with-issuing harsh fines and enforcing petty rules, much to the dismay of the businesspeople in town. But when the unpopular trash collector is found dead, stuffed in his own recycling bin, Scottish detective Hamish Macbeth is called to the scene to make a clean sweep of the murder and dig up a dirty killer with ties to Lochdubh’s new oceanfront hotel.

Christmas is an ancient Roman festival, not to be celebrated by decent folk in the Scottish Highlands. Police Constable Hamish Macbeth has always loved the festivities, but this year his family is vacationing in sunny Florida. He is stuck with the long, lonely Christmas shift in freezing Lochdubh. A cranky old lady kicks off the holidays by reporting her cat missing. Then the Christmas lights and tree in a nearby village disappear soon after the local council voted to allow decorations. As Hamish finds a way to bring Christmas to the Highlands and make a little girl's dreams come true, he finds – to his delight – that he has the best Christmas ever.

Scottish detective Hamish Macbeth investigates the slaying of a mystery writer who dares to complain about a television adaptation of her books that turns her aristocratic heroine into a marijuana-smoking hippie.

His troublesome toothache must be put on hold when one-man police force Hamish Macbeth discovers the local dentist dead of nicotine poisoning, despite the fact that he was a non-smoker.

The one-man Scottish police force Hamish Macbeth becomes the prime suspect in the murder of the town ne’er-do-well, Randy ‘Macho Man’ Duggan, whose real killer is surprisingly close at hand.

Taking a vacation in order to ride out the storm of a broken engagement, Constable Hamish Macbeth visits a bed-and-breakfast at coastal Skay, where he meets an annoying array of characters and finds himself the prime suspect in a murder.

Enjoying his new fiancée and a lull in his Scottish village’s crime rate, police sergeant Hamish Macbeth is upset when his future bride urges him to find a better job, and rivalry over a local heartthrob results in murder.

Police Sergeant Hamish Macbeth’s new promotion means more money, but it also means that an eager beaver of a policeman has been thrust upon him, interfering with Hamish’s easygoing way of life. Fans of the lazy Hamish will delight in seeing him pitted against a zealous young officer while solving a disturbing murder.

Maria Worth has come to hate her partner, Peta Gore, who has become the bane of her otherwise successful business life. When Peta turns up at a gathering in a remote village, everyone bands together in mutual loathing – but does someone hate her enough to kill her? Hamish Macbeth investigates.

When Constable Hamish Macbeth receives news that there has been a murder at the home of the practical joker Arthur Trent, he prepares himself for another prank. But on arrival Macbeth finds Trent most decidedly dead, and a houseful of greedy relations all interested in the contents of the will.