Serena Kent

Serena Kent has been a journalist, a banker, a music composer and a sheep-shearer - and is also the nom de plume of Deborah Lawrenson and her husband Robert Rees. They live in Kent in a house full of books, and own a ramshackle old farmhouse on the slopes of the Luberon hills in Provence which is also in desperate need of some more bookshelves.

Meet Penelope Kite

Penelope Kite has always wanted to live in the South of France. Now she is of a certain age - though ever young at heart. When she swaps her humdrum life in Surrey for a picturesque farmhouse in the Luberon, she imagines a simple life of long lunches and chilled rosé . . .

What she doesn't imagine is the dead body floating in her swimming pool. Convinced that the victim suffered more than a drunken accident, Penelope plunges headlong into local intrigue and long-simmering resentments to uncover the truth.

But with a meddling estate agent, an unfriendly Chief of Police, a suspiciously charming Mayor, and the endless temptation of that second croissant, life in the delightful village of St Merlot is certainly never simple. . .

Escape to the sunshine of Provence with the deliciously honest, sometimes surprising, Penelope Kite! Death in Provence  is the first in a delightful cosy crime series set in aspirational European locations. Watch out for Death In Avignon, coming soon.