Customer Reviews

The Tale of Hill Top Farm

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"The Tale of Hill Top Farm" is a delightful debut story in an engaging new mystery series by veteran mystery writer Susan Wittig Albert. Ms. Albert has done a fine job of blending biographical information from the life of Beatrix Potter (author of "The Tale of Peter Rabbit" and other children's tales) with a compelling murder mystery of her own imagining.

This story introduces the reader to the real Lake Country Village of Sawrey, along with a large host of imagined village inhabitants. As the story opens, one of the village's middle-aged spinsters is found dead in her cottage on the day right after her birthday. The venerable Miss Abigail Tolliver seemed healthy enough at her birthday celebration, and when the village doctor pronounces that she passed due to heart trouble, the local gossips are quick to suspect that Miss Tolliver was poisoned. When Miss Beatrix Potter arrives in town to survey her newly purchased farm, she finds herself looking for answers to the mystery surrounding Miss Tolliver's death. Other strange goings-on in the village include the loss of the Parish Village Register, which contains the church records of the village, and the mysteriouos disappearance of a large sum of money donated to repair the village school roof. The village animals also get involved in trying to solve these mysteries.

Just like the Peter Rabbit stories, all the village animals can talk, but not all the humans can understand them. The animals in this story are embued with much personality, as are the village locals.

I have thoroughly enjoyed Ms. Albert's China Bayles series, and I expect that this series will be one to savor as well.

It's England in 1905, Beatrix Potter has purchased Hill Top Farm in Near Sawrey in the Lake District. Local farmers are upset that the farm is now owned by an outsider and a woman at that. On arrival, Beatrix Potter finds the woman she was to board with, Abigail Tolliver, has died unexpectedly and foul play is suspected. Beatrix rents a room at Belle Greene and begins to get a feel for her farm from Mr. Jennings who she hopes will stay on to run it for her. But the town is uneasy with Miss Tolliver's death, a missing painting, a theft at the school, a head teacher that seem bent on mischief and mayhem, and now a London woman owning a local farm.

Since the book is based on an actual historical figure, Beatrix Potter, the story must fit into the spaces in her life not covered by her diaries, writings, letters, and other documentation. I haven't read much about Potter and knew little of her except for her children's books and her love of nature, biology, and science. I was enchanted by the story. The character of Beatrix Potter is rich in contradictions and yet steeped in the traditions and strictures of her time. Albert has given us a woman who yearned for love, independence, and growth but who felt obligated to obey her parents every whim at the expense of her own happiness. Yet, Potter's mind is quick, concise, and her courage, especially when needed by others, is unfailing. I hope to be able to take advantage of some of the suggested resources listed in the back of the book to learn more of Beatrix Potter's life.

The story is a wonderful mix of characters including animals as well as humans. The point of view shifts from the animal views to those of humans with distinct and interesting contrasts for the same events. The mystery is low key and while the solution is fitting and satisfying it's not so much the mystery as the wonderful insights into small town mores and society. This is truly a town filled with believeable people living their lives in 1905 England.

Reading the story is a quite trip in time and a delightful vacation in another place with people you may end up caring about as if they were your own neighbors.

Book also contains a Historical Note, Glossary, List of Resources, and recipes for Tatie Pot, Sponge Cake, Elsa'a Grape's Gooseberry Sauce, Bertha Stubbs's Rhubarb and Strawberry Tart, Gingersnaps, and Mrs. Stokes's Treacle Pudding.

Susan Wittig Albert (and her husband) are no strangers to creating characters that live and breathe. This author has yet again managed to create a very engaging story along with her quirky characters. In this series her animal characters are just as believable and enjoyable as the human characters are. I am planning to read it as one of our family read aloud stories, even though I just finished reading it and am looking forward to the next installment of this series.

Beatrix Potter, successful author, has bought a farm in the Lake District of England. She loves the area and is hoping to use it to set up an independent life from her parents.

She expects peace and quite in the village of Near Sawrey. But on her first visit, she realizes that's not to be.

Miss Tolliver passed away rather unexpectedly on her birthday. Her death was a shock to all, and the village is buzzing. Additionally, things seem to be disappearing around the village, and Miss Potter gets caught up in the middle.

All this is on top of the personal problems Miss Potter faces. She's still reeling from the death of her fiance just a few months before. And, while she may own Hill Top Farm, she must figure out a way to live there while keeping the current farmers there to run it for her.

I went back and forth on whether I enjoyed the book or not. The pacing is slow, and at times I was ready for things to speed up. Yet at other times I got caught up in events and couldn't put the book down.

The characters were interesting. I especially like the portrayal of Beatrix. I completely believed her temperament from the little I know about this period of her life.

Since the book is about Beatrix Potter, there are lots of animals in the story. While they can't communicate with humans, they can talk to each other and actually play an important part in the story. It's handled in a believable way but might bother those who don't like that kind of thing.

There were parts that were enjoyable, but on the whole it was an average read.

I'm so happy to have discovered the Beatrix Potter mysteries. What a gem! The writing is clever, the characters - both human and animal - are thoroughly engaging, and the author's physical descriptions of the Lake District where the book takes place is first-rate. I love mysteries that take place in small English villages with characters that are so real you feel as though they could walk off the page and enter your life.

The mystery itself is not deep or involved, but the author's engaging writing of English village life more than makes up for it. This is the ideal book to read on a weekend afternoon with a cup of tea and a scone.

Apart from Peter Rabbit and the rest of the menagerie, part of every childhood, I've been fond of Beatrix Potter since viewing The Tale of Beatrix Potter on Masterpiece Theater in the early 1990s; rooting for her as she went from repressed Victorian spinster to successful published author, through her tragic love affair, her bid for independence at Hill Top Farm, and her well-earned happiness in later life.

Susan Wittig Albert has done an amazing thing with her Cottage Tales of Beatrix Potter. She's incorporated the character of Beatrix Potter into cozy village mysteries with overtones of Miss Marple and Potter's own animal stories. The villages of Near and Far Sawrey are full of similar undercurrents to those of St. Mary Meade and far from being twee, the animals are active participants. Their observations and machinations are integral parts of the story, and provide gentle humor and plot twists as needed. The beauty of the area around Lake Windermere is on every page, and how Beatrix Potter changes and is changed by by Sawrey and its inhabitants is a wonderful weekend read.

Hill Top Farm contains several mysteries; was Miss Tolliver murdered? What happened to the Parish Register, Miss Tolliver's Constable, and the School Roof Fund? Can city mouse Tom Thumb find happiness with Teasel after Hunca-Munca's tragic death? Why did Miss Tolliver leave her cottage to a near stranger? What will happen to the Jennings?

The characters are varied and interesting, not the least is the rather shy and repressed Miss Potter, whose timid forays into independence are chronicled most believably. From Miss Potter's inimitable pets Josey, Mopsy and Mrs. Tiggy Winkle, the animals of Near Sawrey, Crumpet, Max and Felicia Frummety, the humans such as the aptly named Miss Crabbe, the almost-outrageous Miss Barwick, and the solicitor Mr. Heelis. Though we know one of these characters will become of increasing importance, it'll be so much fun to see how Ms. Albert tells the story.

These books are not to be read in a hurry, nor by a reader with a short attention span. They are to be savored and enjoyed. While the pace may seem slow to readers of contemporary mysteries, the book is full of the charm of a small English village at the turn of the 20th century, and the interdependence and kindness of those who live there. Ms. Albert is pitch-perfect.

The Tale of Hill Top Farm is the first of a planned 8 book series loosely based on the life of Beatrix Potter. This first installment introduces the citizens (human and animal), of the small English town in which the farm is located, and chronicles the arrival of Beatrix Potter. There are several mystery subplots, but they don't really begin until the latter half of the book. Instead the focus is on the characters, and this is indeed where this book's charms lie.

In addition to an eccentric crew of villagers who have their doubts about the shy new resident, The Tale of Hill Top Farm features animal characters from Potter's books, including my personal favorite: Mrs. Tiggywinkle, the hedgehog. The animals talk to each other and help Beatrix and the townsfolk unravel the mysteries.

This book is absolutely charming, and anyone who likes Beatrix Potter's work is sure to enjoy this story. The author includes a brief biography of Beatrix Potter, and several recipes as well.

SWA has found the most clever niche for herself in her Beatrix Potter books; all the readers in my family adore them, we all dream of having such animals around us! I have learned a new respect for the family dog, and now find myself talking to the birds when I am out in the garden. Cannot wait for the next book to be released.

I've always had a problem with books that have talking animals as main characters. I'm not talking the picture books of our childhood; I am talking about grown up books, without pictures, that have farm animals talking to each other in a regular tone and voice.

Maybe I should have done a little more research into this series by Susan Wittig Albert to know that this is really a mature version of the Beatrix Potter books of my childhood.

After the untimely death of her fiancé, a fictional Beatrix Potter travels to a new home that she has purchased with the proceeds from her little books. Trying to break free from a demanding father, Beatrice purchases Hill Top Farm where she can continue her interest in writing, drawing and studying nature. But most important, to achieve the almost impossible, that being independence.

A cozy mystery would be nothing without the appropriate dead body showing up and that is just what happens when a well liked villager is found dead- but is it not as simple as that when there are also funds missing, a valuable painting is no longer the wall that Beatrix remembers from a previous visit, and most importantly, the parish register that holds the records of Near and Far Sawrey residents.

Nothing is as simple as it seems, but with the local cats, dogs and owl on the case, it won't be long until all is right in this little part of the Lake District.

While I place this in the mystery genre, it's a cozy mystery with a heavy emphasis on cozy. This book is more about an idyllic English village with thatched cottages, a bumbling vicar, several eccentric old maids, hard working farmers, prosperous ladies who gossip over afternoon tea, and beautiful gardens. The townspeople all know one another intimately, as do the animals. The animals are delightful. They eavesdrop, talk, lament that humans are too stupid to understand them, and generally save the day.

Beatrix Potter moves to the lovely village mentioned above with her two rabbits (Flopsy and Mopsy), her hedgehog (Mrs. Tiggy-Winkle), and her mouse (Tom Thumb). I loved the scenes in which she is gaining inspiration for her upcoming book, The Tale of Jeremy Fisher. I was amused by the way in which she sees animal characteristics reflected in people, and vice versa.

I can't wait to read the rest of the series!