Death of a gossip

The setting is the Scottish Highlands, the detective is laid-back village constable Hamish MacBeth--and those are, alas, just about the only pluses in this awkwardly written mystery. The murder victim: Lady Jane Winters, a bullying gossip columnist who's attending the local fishing school (this is salmon and trout country)--and loudly broadcasts the fact that she knows something hidden and unsavory about each of her fellow students. So, after Lady Jane turns up dead in a fishing pool, strangled with casting line, officious Inspector Blair can find motives for all the class members: wimpy secretary Alice Wilson, who's out to snare smarmy lawyer Jeremy Blythe. . . who has his eye on heiress Daphne Gore, who. . . well, you get the idea. But it's slow-moving, red-haired Hamish, of course, who nails down the culprit--in a resolution that's as ponderous as amiable Hamish himself. Clumsily plotted, overall, and told with an amateur air. Copyright ©Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.