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Hamish Macbeth #14

Death of a Scriptwriter

From the author of the Agatha Raisin television series...DEATH OF A SCRIPTWRITER: A Hamish Macbeth Mystery HOLLYWOOD IN THE HIGHLANDS
With the lovely Priscilla Halburton-Smythe away in London, Lochdubh Constable Hamish Macbeth pines for company during the long Scottish winter. He gets his wish -- and more -- when a troupe of flashy, urbane filmmakers clamors into the nearby town of Drim. Before long bedlam erupts around their make-believe mystery ...and culminates in the sudden appearance of one very real corpse.
The initial suspect in the killing is one Patricia Martyn-Broyd, the aging mystery writer furious that her musty old cozies are getting a risque face-lift in their TV reincarnation. Yet, going behind the scenes, Hamish soon finds a town full of locals bitten by the movie bug and a cast of quarreling show business types, all harboring their own secrets, lies, and hidden agendas. And as the culprit strikes again, Hamish must quickly find the right killer -- or script the wrong finale to a show gone murderously awry.

198 pages, Paperback

First published June 1, 1998

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M.C. Beaton

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Marion Chesney Gibbons
aka: Ann Fairfax, Jennie Tremaine, Helen Crampton, Marion Chesney, Charlotte Ward, Sarah Chester.

Marion Chesney was born on 1936 in Glasgow, Scotland, UK, and started her first job as a bookseller in charge of the fiction department in John Smith & Sons Ltd. While bookselling, by chance, she got an offer from the Scottish Daily Mail to review variety shows and quickly rose to be their theatre critic. She left Smith’s to join Scottish Field magazine as a secretary in the advertising department, without any shorthand or typing, but quickly got the job of fashion editor instead. She then moved to the Scottish Daily Express where she reported mostly on crime. This was followed by a move to Fleet Street to the Daily Express where she became chief woman reporter. After marrying Harry Scott Gibbons and having a son, Charles, Marion went to the United States where Harry had been offered the job of editor of the Oyster Bay Guardian. When that didn’t work out, they went to Virginia and Marion worked as a waitress in a greasy spoon on the Jefferson Davies in Alexandria while Harry washed the dishes. Both then got jobs on Rupert Murdoch’s new tabloid, The Star, and moved to New York.

Anxious to spend more time at home with her small son, Marion, urged by her husband, started to write historical romances in 1977. After she had written over 100 of them under her maiden name, Marion Chesney, and under the pseudonyms: Ann Fairfax, Jennie Tremaine, Helen Crampton, Charlotte Ward, and Sarah Chester, she getting fed up with 1714 to 1910, she began to write detectives stories in 1985 under the pseudonym of M. C. Beaton. On a trip from the States to Sutherland on holiday, a course at a fishing school inspired the first Constable Hamish Macbeth story. They returned to Britain and bought a croft house and croft in Sutherland where Harry reared a flock of black sheep. But Charles was at school, in London so when he finished and both tired of the long commute to the north of Scotland, they moved to the Cotswolds where Agatha Raisin was created.

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Profile Image for Sana.
23 reviews21 followers
November 12, 2023
نه نه نه و نه!
من گول نمره‌ی بالای کتاب رو نمیخورم و بهش یک ستاره بیشتر نمیدم. دو هفته اس که از مرینگ میرم سالزبورگ و این کتابو با خودم میارم تا تمومش کنم ولی امروز دیگه واقعا از دستش کلافه شدم.
من عادت دارم کتاب‌های سری رو شلخته بخونم. این بهم کمک میکنه که یک، از تخیل خودم کمک بگیرم و جاهای خالی رو پر کنم، دو، نشون میده که نویسنده چقدر تبحر داره که داستانشو برام تعریف کنه.
تا الان این روش کتابخونیم هیچ وقت ناامیدم نکرده بود تا این دفعه! هرچند مطمئن نیستم که مشکل از کتاب باشه. مطمئنم که از هر کدومش شروع میکردم احتمالا همین آش بوده و همین کاسه!
من هری پاتر، پوآرو، شرلوک هلمز و حتی مونتالبانوی عزیزمو همین طوری خوندم.
و حالا این کتاب…
من دوست دارم کتاب جنایی همون فصل اول تکلیفشو روشن کنه. ولی این کتابه ۲۰۰ صفحه‌ای تا حدودای صفحه‌ی ۷۰ حرفی از قتل نمیزنه.
کتاب پر از جزییات مسخره‌اس که ما میتونستیم همین جزییات رو با پلیس متوجه بشیم و نیازی نبود نویسنده پرچونگی کنه.
اگه الان به من بگن برو دانشگاه آکسفورد و در مورد مونتالبانو لکچر بده با کمال میل اینکارو میکنم. ولی در مقابل میتونم بگم هیچ شناختی از همیش مکبث ندارم.
نویسنده حتی زحمت نکشید ما رو با قهرمان کتابش آشنا کنه.
درنهایت، به نظرم پاتریشیا دقیقا خود نویسنده است، کتابی پر از جزییات خسته کننده.
حیف که دستم بستس و کتاب دیگه‌ای با خودم نیوردم. ؛(
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