Mrs. Pargeter's Pound of Flesh

Rating:
Summary: The difficulty with mud is keeping it muddy
Review: Mrs. Pargeter is at a health spa, but she does not seem to dislike her body. The health spa business relies upon the emotions of guilt and envy. Mrs. Pargeter and her friend Kim Thurrocks are attending gratis. The late Mr. Pargeter had had business connections with the owner. Mrs. Pargeter is not inclined to eat the diet food. Eating creme brulee pleases the chef.

There are shady characters at the spa, but only Mrs. Pargeter seems to notice and she is not concerned. She witnesses an overly thin girl being wheeled from the premises. She hires a detective to find some answers. The supposed decedent is an only child. The detective has the name of Truffler Mason. At the spa the Dead Sea Mud Bath treatment is based on a book. The difficulty with mud is keeping it muddy. The basement of the place is divided into cubicles for the mud treatment.

The boyfriend of the university student, the thin girl, is located. Eventually Mrs. Pargeter travels to Cambridge to interview some of the girl's fellow students. At the spa the customers aree dressed in Mind over Fatty Matter leotards. These costumes accentuate their bulges.

Mrs. Pargeter discovers an employee disabled by the mud and finds the response of the physician suspicious. Mr. Pargeter had been involved in questionable schemes and so Mrs. Pargeter's frame of reference is broad-based, liberal. It is discovered a whole line of goods has emerged from the concept of Mind over Fatty Matter. Mrs. Pargeter uses an investigative journalist to challenge the creator of the concept in search of clues to explain the doubtful scenes she has encountered at the spa.

Along the way it is discovered that the owner of the spa, Arkwright, acually belongs to a Rotary Club. It turns out an experimental treatment to alter body shape underlies the problems at the spa. The writing is accomplished and merry.

Rating:
Summary: The difficulty with mud is keeping it muddy
Review: Mrs. Pargeter is at a health spa, but she does not seem to dislike her body. The health spa business relies upon the emotions of guilt and envy. Mrs. Pargeter and her friend Kim Thurrocks are attending gratis. The late Mr. Pargeter had had business connections with the owner. Mrs. Pargeter is not inclined to eat the diet food. Eating creme brulee pleases the chef.

There are shady characters at the spa, but only Mrs. Pargeter seems to notice and she is not concerned. She witnesses an overly thin girl being wheeled from the premises. She hires a detective to find some answers. The supposed decedent is an only child. The detective has the name of Truffler Mason. At the spa the Dead Sea Mud Bath treatment is based on a book. The difficulty with mud is keeping it muddy. The basement of the place is divided into cubicles for the mud treatment.

The boyfriend of the university student, the thin girl, is located. Eventually Mrs. Pargeter travels to Cambridge to interview some of the girl's fellow students. At the spa the customers aree dressed in Mind over Fatty Matter leotards. These costumes accentuate their bulges.

Mrs. Pargeter discovers an employee disabled by the mud and finds the response of the physician suspicious. Mr. Pargeter had been involved in questionable schemes and so Mrs. Pargeter's frame of reference is broad-based, liberal. It is discovered a whole line of goods has emerged from the concept of Mind over Fatty Matter. Mrs. Pargeter uses an investigative journalist to challenge the creator of the concept in search of clues to explain the doubtful scenes she has encountered at the spa.

Along the way it is discovered that the owner of the spa, Arkwright, acually belongs to a Rotary Club. It turns out an experimental treatment to alter body shape underlies the problems at the spa. The writing is accomplished and merry.

Rating:
Summary: A frothy delight
Review: This book is, in a word, delightful. Mrs. Pargeter, she of the comfortably ample physique, checks into a posh "fat farm" with her friend Kim, who wants to shed a few pounds before her husband is released from an obligatory, er, engagement. I was perfectly willing to suspend all logical objections to the rather thin plot, as Mrs. Pargeter and her late husband's cronies enchanted me. I'm not generally a fan of the British cosy, but this one kept me reading late into the evening; and if it hadn't been Christmas eve, I'd have rushed out to find a few more of Mrs. Pargeter's adventures to sustain myself over the coming long weekend.