DEATH COMES TO DURHAM

Sleuths with a highly developed sense of fairness fight prejudice.

During a visit to see their friend David Tregarth, a retired policeman in the ancient English city of Durham, American expatriate Dorothy Martin and her husband, former chief constable Alan Nesbit, are introduced to Tregarth’s great-aunt Amanda, who suffers from dementia and lives in the posh Milton Home, where she is lovingly cared for until she is accused of murdering Blake Armstrong, a semiretired geriatric doctor with a dodgy reputation. Amanda, who’s naturally upset, is the perfect scapegoat since she has no memory of smothering the doctor with a pillow and would never be prosecuted even if she had. While the sleuthing duo enjoy the historic beauties of Durham, they work to clear Amanda, who looks no guiltier than all the old ladies the doctor cared for and methodically bilked. The couple make friends with Timothy Hayes, an entertaining castle guide and theology student who must struggle to pay his tuition because his mother’s best friend changed her will favoring Timothy and left her estate to Dr. Armstrong. Then Timothy’s friend Eileen Walsh, who had reported a drowning in the nearby river, reveals that she saw Dr. Armstrong nearby. When a second patient is attacked and Amanda’s put on notice to find another home, Dorothy uses her ability to extract information to help the police find the truth.

A travelogue, a complex mystery, and an empathetic look at the horrific nature of dementia.