A Quiet Life in the Country, the first in the Lady Hardcastle Mystery series, by T E Kinsey is new to me, and what a find it was! I will warn you right up front, I was up very late reading it! (So was Tall Reader). Although it is the first in a series, there are hints to events that happened in the past, which is why Lady Hardcastle and her maid, Armstrong, are hoping for a quiet life in the country. They are not the proper widow and companion they seem, for sure! While exploring their new home, and the lovely country around them, they come across a body hanging from a tree. There are things that just aren't right for it to be suicide and soon they are helping the local police (it becomes obvious they've done this before). And don't overlook the missing trumpet case! Wonderful characters, and dialogue that will make you laugh out loud.

Murder at Hawthorn Cottage, by Betty Rowlands, came as a recommendation from Canadian Reader and is the first in the Melissa Craig Mystery series. Wishing to escape the city and a relationship that needed to end, Melissa moves to the Cotswolds where she plans on having lots of time to work on her next book (she writes crime novels). I'm not sure if it's 'life imitates art' or 'art imitates life' but there are similarities between what she is writing and what is happening around her! Not a bad mystery, not a cozy, (wait until you discover what some of these proper ladies like to do on an afternoon), but not as gritty as, say, a police procedural can be.

Reading Hermit With Dog