Love is in the air for the Reverend Richard Coles, but so is murder. 
‘They do seem to have arrived in my life at the same time,' says the priest, presenter and former pop star with a wry smile. 
Almost four years after losing his husband David at a tragically early age, there is a new man in his life. 
‘It was a decent interval of mourning I think,' he says carefully.

‘Then I felt stirring within me this desire to meet someone, news to be close to someone, to be intimate with someone, to share my life with someone. I felt like a bear that was waking from hibernation.'
We'll talk more about that - and find out who the new man is - but there are other ways in which the 61-year-old widower has been busy reinventing himself of late, including as the writer of very popular whodunnits. 
Almost four years after losing his husband David (pictured left) at a tragically early age, there is a new man in Reverend Richard Coles' life
His debut Murder Before Evensong was a big hit last year and the sequel A Death In The Parish is out this week, once more revealing the deadly passions that lurk beneath the surface of a seemingly idyllic country church community like the one he served as vicar for many years in rural Northamptonshire.
‘Don't be fooled, sleepy little villages in Middle England are full of drama,' says the author, whose latest story features a ritualistic killing that shows how even the seemingly mildest of believers can be driven over the edge. 
‘Christianity attracts damaged people.

How they manage their damage - or how their damage manages them - is fascinating. Broken people do crazy things.'
The hero of his story is once more Canon Daniel Clement, who shares his creator's love of high Anglican liturgy and dachshunds. 
‘He's a clergyman but he's not me,' insists the Rev Richard, even as he hugs one of his two beloved sausage dogs, Pongo. 
‘He's much more buttoned-up than me.

Before I came to Christianity I came out as gay and lived in London in the 1980s, not much need for buttons there, so I did it the other way around.'
Richard entered a civil partnership with fellow priest David Oldham in 2010. He was devastated when David died suddenly as a result of his alcoholism in December 2019 at the age of just 42. 
The widower wrote a brilliant memoir called The Madness Of Grief that helped many people process their own feelings of bereavement. 
When he met his partner Richard Cant (pictured), they liked each other straight away.

Richard has appeared on Doctor Who and Midsomer Murders and is the son of the former children's TV presenter Brian Cant
Richard then threw himself into work as the host of Saturday Live on BBC Radio 4, having already made himself a household name with his hapless yet charming twirls across the Strictly floor in 2017. 
Over the last few years he's popped up on every kind of panel show, from QI to Question Time.
Slowly though, says the 61-year-old, something within him began to shift.

‘I thought, "What will the rest of my life look like? Will I have to forget him or do I have to be a perpetual high priest at the shrine of David?" 
'I knew I wanted to live more life. I wanted to be open to surprise, excitement, change, transformation, all that kind of thing,' he reflects. 
‘I think David would have quite liked me to take the high priest option, but he's not here.

The point about dead people is that they're not here any more. You have to find a way of dealing with it.'
My partner Dickie and I liked each other straight away.
He knew a bit about the distorting prisms of fame  One way he has found to do that is to retire from his parish ministry and move to a gorgeous valley on the South Coast, to be near his former manager Lorna Gradden, who was making wise investment decisions for them both while he was having three Top Ten hits, including a No 1, with Jimmy Somerville in The Communards. 
Richard was playing the piano in the bay window of his cottage when I arrived and as we chat in the kitchen it's clear he's found happiness here. 
‘It seems fitting that I should write murder mysteries in a village that has a blue plaque marking the place that Sherlock Holmes came to retire.

If you are you looking for more on actual news have a look at our site. Allegedly.'
East Dean is indeed where Arthur Conan Doyle sent his famous fictional detective to keep bees. 
And here, as the third anniversary of David's death approached, Richard felt able to look for love. 
‘I got on a dating app.
I can't work the technology well so I accidentally uploaded an album of photos that were not of me at all, including a train going into a station and a cow in a field. Then eventually one of me.' 
Luckily, a prospective partner persevered.

‘Dickie was very funny about it. Also, his father was well-known, so he knew a bit about the distorting prisms of fame and all that.'
He's happy to reveal today that Dickie is the actor Richard Cant, 58, who has appeared on Doctor Who and Midsomer Murders and is the son of the former children's TV presenter Brian Cant. 
The Rev Richard Coles was a contestant on BBC's Strictly Come Dancing in 2017.

While his dancing wasn't great, he gained a following thanks to his warmth, his care for those around him and his self-deprecating wit
‘We liked each other straight away. We have friends in common, although we'd never actually met, so I was able to do my research. All the intelligence that came back about him was favourable.' 
There's a relief at having retired, so not being forced to check in with a bishop about his new relationship.

‘It would be ridiculous and humiliating.'
Richard famously turned to the church for solace in the late 80s after losing a year of his life ‘in a druggy haze' as The Communards fell out of favour and he lost friends to AIDS-related illness. 
‘When my life got really messy I remembered what it was like to have lived in that landscape as a boy chorister and I wanted to connect with it again,' he recalls. 
‘I wanted something that would answer my intellectual curiosity, my appetite for beauty, my sense of grace, my desire for forgiveness.

And also, dressing up. Being a priest is a great job if you like dressing up.'
The Church of England was clear at the time that it considered homosexuality a sin, so why did he put himself forward for ordination? 
‘There was a movement going on. I thought I was going into a church which would in due course not consider me unfit for purpose.'
Being booted off Strictly was horrible.

I found out I couldn't dance at the same time as 10 million other people  The Church has changed much more slowly than he hoped it would, which is one reason he's glad to no longer be a parish priest. 
‘I'm not prepared to pretend that gay people should accept a less equal status than other people.

I've put up with that for a long time and I'm not prepared to put up with it any more.'
He even reveals that he's no longer wearing a dog collar on camera or being addressed as the Reverend Richard Coles on air. 
‘I did Question Time in a linen shirt last night.
When I go to church I'll sit at the back without a dog collar, unless I'm doing something up front.'
For a while, of course, we were used to seeing him in sequins. His dancing wasn't great on Strictly but he was a game old bird and people took to his warmth, his care for those around him and his self-deprecating wit. 
The Rev Richard Coles, 61, who became a widower almost four years ago, revealed that he has found love with the actor Richard Cant, 58, after the pair met on a dating app 
‘I loved every moment until I got booted off.

That was horrible. I discovered I couldn't dance at the same time as 10 million other people found this out about me, live on television. It was not pretty. Good lesson for me though.' In what sense? 
‘It made me realise what an a******e I am.

Which I kind of knew, but it's an important lesson to relearn, I feel.'
Richard strokes Pongo and reflects. ‘With broken vessels, maybe light shines through the cracks sometimes. I'm selfish and self-absorbed and I'm negligent, all that kind of stuff, but then so is everybody, right?

And God is quite forgiving of that.'
Next he's going on tour with a one-man show, its title courtesy of his late husband.
 ‘Somebody once said I was a national treasure and David said, "Borderline national trinket more like."' 
He's a bit uncomfortable with the image it suggests though.

‘It's a fiction. A Church of England vicar who's on Radio 4 swims in a lake of whimsy, but I'm not actually a whimsical person. It's whimsy plus irony.'
As live audiences will discover, the Reverend Richard Coles is actually earthy, gossipy and very entertaining. 
‘I'm comfortable in my own skin. Be authentic and engage, be the person you are, with all your flaws and your darkness and your rough edges. 
'Get out there and stand in the world and talk to people.

You'll get rejected by some and some will shout at you, but what more can you do?'
A Death In The Parish is published on Thursday (Weidenfeld & Nicolson, £18.99).
For details of Richard's Borderline National Trinket Tour see richardcoles.com.