Fruitful Bodies

After an aging musician becomes the chief suspect in a murder investigation, only her former pupil can save her

Sara Selkirk lives one of the most complicated lives in Bath. When she isn’t performing to rave reviews as a cellist, she must navigate the troubled waters of small-town life, a complicated relationship with the newly single amateur cellist DCI Andrew Poole, and the occasional murder. Another problem is heaped on when she discovers her former teacher Joyce Cruikshank trapped in the clutches of alcoholism. Sara decides to take her in and help her get the therapy she needs in the idyllic English spa town of Bath.

Dr. Golightly, the charismatic director of the Sulis Clinic, a magnet for the rich and supposedly unwell, claims that its mix of rest, art therapy, and organic cuisine is a potent one for well-being, and Sara arranges for Joyce to be admitted. But when Joyce is implicated in the murder of a Japanese tourist who is found dead in a cupboard in a Bath pub, Sara’s relationship with Andrew comes under strain. Then the Sulis patients begin to die, and Dr. Golightly’s reputation is on the brink of collapse. Sara is drawn further into the investigation—and into danger.