Down with a cold, an already grumpy Hamish Macbeth discovers he can't go home for Christmas in one of the most hilarious yet poignant entries in this marvelous mystery series by M.C. Beaton. This is one of my all-time favorites in this delightful series set in the Scottish Highlands. Feeling sorry for himself and nye on the verge of death - at least in his own mind - Hamish will see a light at the end of his predicament which will lead to a windy and eventful holiday.

When a miserable Macbeth discovers he can't go home for Christmas because a relative who intensely dislikes him is also coming, things could not look bleaker for our favorite constable. Even a visit from Priscilla can't cheer the bloke up, especially since she is sending an acquaintance by for him to help in spite of the fact he is so near death's door! Jane is all cleavage and legs, espousing trendy babble from magazines, so Hamish quickly dismisses her suggestion that someone wants her dead this holiday season. Once he discovers there is a big Christmas feast planned at her Happy Wanderer health farm, however, the always eager-to-mooch-a-meal constable decides the lass may need protecting after all.

The guests include Jane's ex and an odd assortment of people which prove to be the ingredients for murder. It is not the fun holiday Hamish had planned. A cookbook writer named Harriet offers a nice distraction for a time, but when someone is discovered with their neck broken on the hillside, and the local constabulary rule it an accident, Hamish puts in a call to Jimmy. The call brings the bane of Hamish's existence, Blair, to the health farm, just in case Blair's least favorite constable is correct in calling it murder.

Switched jackets and a trashy romance novel muddy the case, keeping Hamish working through the holiday. If that isn't enough to make Hamish's Christmas a blue one, Priscilla offers to deliver his presents to his parents and siblings, and ends up having the best Christmas of her entire life! In fact, a fun feel of Christmas pervades Death of a Snob, and there is more than a touch of poignancy at the conclusion in Glasgow.

This is an early one in the Hamish canon. Macbeth still has his dog Towser for company when the romantic disappointment of the lovable constable rears its ugly head. Beaton always writes with a keen and observant eye for human nature, and never have the situations been quirkier or Hamish's reactions to them more bitingly hilarious than in Death of a Snob. Fans of this wonderful series will find humor and charm at the description of him speaking quite seriously to a Fiat truck! A real winner in the series, and one of my personal favorites. ( )

good one out of this series - cozy mystery ( )

Macbeth and the Health Farm
Review of the Blackstone Audio Inc. audiobook edition (2013) of the St. Martin's Press hardcover original (1991)

After discovering M.C. Beaton's Hamish Macbeth cozy mystery series due to the Estonia cameo in "Death of Yesterday", I started to seek out the earlier books by finding several at Toronto's Sleuth of Baker Street. I enjoyed those and found them to be an especially delightful diversion during this continuing pandemic. My next plan was to go back and read the series in order. I then discovered the rather terrific bonus that most of the books are available for free on Audible Plus, a service that I had previously been underwhelmed by (some early attempts with longer books had audio difficulties, with book narrations freezing in midstream). Beaton's shorter books (usually 4 to 5 hours on audio) seem to be perfect for this medium.

Death of a Snob is the sixth of the series and continues the audiobook editions with the voice of Shaun Grindell in an ongoing excellent performance. Macbeth is forced to spend Christmas away from his Highland family and is instead a guest at a health farm on Eileencraig Island. One of the snobby guests is murdered and our favourite village constable has to solve yet another mystery. ( )

The on/off relationship between Hamish and Priscilla seems to have been doused with a bucket of cold water at the moment. Hamish ends up in a hotel at the request of the owner, to privately investigate what she fears is a murder attempt while there, he poses as a guest and learns about the other guests - it feels all very Cluedo at this point, or like the Agatha Christie books where everyone is stuck in a hotel when a murder happens. Anyway the murder does happen and it wasn’t exactly as I thought it would be. ( )

I like this series on audio, but this time I got a different narrator--Davina Porter--and I much prefer the narrations by Graeme Malcolm. ( )