The Sunset Years of Agnes Sharp

To avoid being consigned to a retirement home, Agnes Sharp invites a memorable cast of older adults to live with her at Sunset Hall, her family home in the rural English village of Duck End. They help each other as they face the trials of aging. One morning, Agnes finds a dead body in her shed, and as she is trying to decide how to handle it, a police officer shows up and informs her that a dead body has been found next door. Hoping to pin the death on their neighbor, the group sets out to discover the victim’s identity, even as they struggle with declining vision, hearing problems, and memory lapses. Swann’s (Three Bags Full) latest is a laugh-out-loud mystery with a cast of quirky characters who find themselves in increasingly odd and hilarious situations. Narrator Moira Quirk provides a lively performance, capturing the unique personalities of each of Sunset Hall’s house-share residents. The best characters—a tortoise named Hettie and a dog named Brexit—steal the show through their personalities alone.