Waste of a Life, Simon Brett
Waste of a Life, Simon Brett
List: $17.99 | Sale: $12.59
Club: $8.99

Waste of a Life

Author: Simon Brett

Narrator: Simon Brett

Unabridged: 7 hr 11 min

Format: Digital Audiobook Download

Published: 12/08/2022


Synopsis

Declutterer Ellen Curtis has been working to bring order into the life of Cedric Waites, a recluse in his eighties who hasn't left his house or let anyone inside it since his wife died. On one of her regular visits, Ellen finds the old man dead. It's sad but, given his age, perhaps not unexpected, and nothing to get worked up about...until the police raise the suspicion that Cedric might have been poisoned! The cause seems be something he ate, and since Ellen cleared away the old man's food containers, she is under suspicion. As is Dodge, who works for Ellen and has unhelpfully done a runner and disappeared... Meanwhile, Ellen's life has taken on a chaotic turn of its own: a rival declutterer is out to sabotage her reputable business, her two grown-up children are back home and in crisis, and she has a potential love interest. Can she uncover the killer and bring order back to her own life?

About Simon Brett

Simon Brett is the author of more than one hundred books, including the Fethering, Charles Paris, Mrs. Pargeter, and Decluttering series. In 2014, he won the CWA’s prestigious Diamond Dagger for an outstanding body of work, and in 2016, he was awarded an OBE for services to literature. He worked as a producer in radio and television before taking up writing full-time and lives in an Agatha Christie-style village in the South Downs.


Reviews

Goodreads review by Sophie on November 25, 2022

Simon Brett's Waste of a Life is a novel about the life of eightieth-year-old hermit Cedric Waites, who has not left his home or allowed anybody inside since his wife's death. During one of her routine visits, Ellen discovers the elderly man dead. I appreciated the novel's cosy, suspenseful mood crea......more

Goodreads review by Eilonwy on January 23, 2023

Ellen Curtis, professional declutterer, finds one of her clients dead and assumes the cause was old age ... until the cops arrange an autopsy and start asking questions. Meanwhile, her sort-of adult children both require her attention. Life is pretty busy, but she's nevertheless determined to fig......more

Goodreads review by Ivonne on December 19, 2022

Decluttering expert Ellen Curtis returns in the third entry in this offbeat mystery series. One of Ellen’s clients, a 70-something recluse named Cedric Waites, dies; this being a cozy mystery, Cedric’s been poisoned. Author Simon Brett creates a lovely plot for the mystery, but I also loved catching......more

Goodreads review by Sid on October 12, 2022

I very much enjoyed Waste Of A Life. This series has a good deal more emotional heft than some of Simon Brett’s other work, which I like very much. Here, in the third of the series featuring professional declutterer Ellen Curtis, an old and much-liked client dies and the death soon begins to look sus......more

Goodreads review by Laura on November 20, 2022

It's amazing to me that Simon Brett has written nearly 100 books, and still keeps writing fresh material and growing as a writer. Waste of a Life is the third book in his Decluttering series--a series that I am following avidly. Ellen Curtis's decluttering service, Spacewoman, is well-established. S......more