Bettie's Books

Recommended for: BBC Radio Listeners

Read from June 07 to 13, 2014

R4 Drama

http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b045y41q

Description: Best selling crime writer Val McDermid turns to comedy capers among the carrots, as we rummage through the undergrowth of a murder on the allotments. Starring Julie Hesmondhalgh and Miriam Margolyes.

It's a case for Detective Chief Inspector Alma Blair, the Alpha Detective, her sergeant Jason Trotter, and Jo Blake the crime scene manager. Watch how the women behave towards each other. Rivals? Not quite. There may even be a barely detectable flirtatiousness between them.

Sound Designer: Eloise Whitmore
Writer: Val McDermid
Directed and Produced by Justine Potter
A Savvy Production for BBC Radio 4.

Episode 1: A body is found on an allotment in Cranby

Episode 2: Are there green shoots of love between Alma and Jo?

Episode 3: Alma and Jason follow the money to intrigue on a market veg stall.

Episode 4: Fear stalks the herd. Surely we must be getting nearer to solving the crime

Episode 5: Events draw to a climax in the traditional mode of the detective story.


How disappointing - flippancy is neither what I expected nor desired. See, if I wanted EXPERT flippancy on the allotments I would search out a re-read of Robert Rankin's Brentford Trilogy. Nuff said.