Cozy Women Sleuths

Lucie Montgomery's semi-estranged brother, Eli, calls her in France to tell her that their father, Leland, has been killed in a hunting accident on the family's 500-acre Virginia vineyard. But the vineyard is now shabby and run-down and her siblings want to sell it. Then Lucie's godfather tells her Leland's death was no accident. With her greedy brother, hell-raising sister, and a seemingly cut-rate vintner hired by Leland just before he died, all the suspects are disturbingly close to home.

When a body turns up in the dumpster behind Caroline's Cupcakes, Holly White is horrified to learn her best friend, Caroline, is the main suspect. Everyone in town, including Mistletoe, Maine's sheriff, saw Caroline fighting with the victim on the night of his death. Worse, Caroline's fingerprints are all over the murder weapon, a custom-designed marble rolling pin. Now, just 10 days before Christmas, Holly's up to her jingle bells in holiday shenanigans and in desperate need of a miracle.

Greta Plank, library director in the small lakeside town of Larkspur, Wisconsin, prefers her rose-tinted glasses extra rosy, thank you very much. It's how she copes with the hard stuff in life . . . like her sister's death and her ex-boyfriend's deception. But Greta's cheery resolve takes a hit when she stumbles upon a dead body on her way home from work. What she assumes is a terrible accident Greta soon learns is something more sinister, and to make matters worse, a new-to-town detective cites her as not only his primary source for the case, but his top suspect.

When aspiring actress Pansy Arceneaux returns to Sinful, Louisiana, to head up the beauty pageant portion of the Summer Festival, CIA assassin Fortune Redding knows she's in for trouble. Her undercover identity as a former beauty queen makes Fortune the perfect choice to chair the event with Pansy, but Pansy's abrasive personality makes it impossible to get through a single rehearsal without a fight. When Pansy turns up dead, Fortune is the prime suspect.

After unexpectedly losing her husband, Hope Herring and her daughter, Cori, leave their home and move away to start over in a new town. With a heavy heart, a new house, a new job, and a new community, Hope is trying to settle in when she is reluctantly drawn into two mysteries. Will Hope and Cori find the clues to a killer before he or she strikes again?

While some people escape into books or music, Liv Spyers escapes through her camera’s lens, which inspires her to jump into things she might otherwise have no business tackling—like moving to New York City. Hustling to make her dreams come true as a portrait photographer, she runs a studio below her grandparents’ brownstone and key shop, where she also lives and works. Everything changes in a flash, however, when elite events photographer Regina Montague invites Liv to shoot with her at New York City’s most exclusive socialite event of the year—the Holiday Debutante Ball!

No nine-to-five cubicle career will suit Stacie Calder—the naturalist much prefers working in the great outdoors. Specifically, the spacious and spectacular Alaskan wilderness, whose rugged charms she shares with sightseers on the top deck of the tour boat where she works. But one May afternoon, Stacie’s passengers see more than glittering glaciers, frolicking harbor seals, climbing bears, and soaring seabirds…they also witness a man lying dead in the frigid Alaskan waters. And it seems likely that someone gave him a fatal push.

Sisters Hope and Summer Bailey run Bailey's Boutique, a mystic shop in Asheville, North Carolina. While Hope's performing a palm reading, a local doctor, Dylan Henshaw, bursts in, accusing them of trying to kill his patient with a tincture. The confrontation is interrupted by the arrival of the sisters' grandmother, Gram, who announces that one of her friends has died suddenly.

Life is good for Kit Marshall. She's a staffer in DC for a popular senator, and she lives with an adoring beagle and a brainy boyfriend with a trust fund. Then, one morning, Kit arrives at the office early and finds her boss, Senator Langsford, impaled by a stainless steel replica of an Army attack helicopter. Panicked, she pulls the weapon out of his chest and instantly becomes the prime suspect in his murder.

This Christmas, Callie Aspen returns to her childhood hideout Heart's Harbor, Maine, where her great aunt runs Book Tea, a vintage tearoom where every sweet treat contains a bookish clue. Upon arrival in the fairy-tale snowy town, Callie is drawn into the preparations for a special tea party at Haywood Hall, the rambling house of Heart's Harbor's oldest resident, rich but lonely widow Dorothea Finster, who invited her estranged relatives, old friends, and the elite of the town to make a mysterious announcement about her will.

As Philadelphia's premier image consultant, Allison Campbell helps others reinvent themselves, but her most successful transformation was her own after a scandal nearly ruined her. Now she moves in a world of powerful executives, wealthy, eccentric ex-wives, and twisted ethics. When Allison's latest Main Line client, the 15-year-old Goth daughter of a White House hopeful, is accused of the ritualistic murder of a local divorce attorney, Allison fights to prove her client's innocence when no one else will.

Shelby Cox never intended to become a bookseller, so when the former editor returns to her hometown of Alexandria Bay, nestled in upstate New York’s breathtaking Thousand Islands region, to take over her aunt’s bookstore, she has no idea what to expect. To her amazement, she discovers that she now owns a 50 percent share in Bayside Books and will also run the store’s second location in the majestic castle on nearby Blye Island.

Jenna McGovern’s strappy shoes and sundresses are not going to cut it when she makes the move from Hollywood Hills to Blueberry Lake, Minnesota in the stone-cold dead of winter. A former stylist to the stars, Jenna’s determined to bring the latest red-carpet fashions back to the Midwest in an effort to revive her mother’s floundering thrift shop. But when a difficult client is found dead hours after visiting the store from a high heel to the throat, she becomes the chief of police’s number-one suspect.

A year and a half after accepting the calling to return to her home church in Port Marie, Reverend Margot Quade is finally moving into the parsonage. The festivities to celebrate the move come to a painful halt when one of the attendees falls gravely ill.

Fed up after 30 years of teaching, Deena has no idea she’s just traded in lesson plans for lethal weapons and report cards for ballistics reports. It’s been fifty years since her uncle disappeared without a trace, but when science and luck collide, a rookie sheriff’s deputy breathes new life into this cold case. And when Deena’s elderly grandmother asks for her help, how can she say no? After all, she’s just quit her teaching job and is looking for a new challenge.

Abbey has barely arrived in the quaint, quiet town of Hideaway Grove before things turn from blissful to bloody—as the new librarian is mowed down by a car. The only witness on the scene isn’t much help, aside from handing Abbey the bag of books dropped by the victim. Even worse, the sheriff’s office seizes Abbey’s car because of a suspicious dent in the right front fender.

Nestled in the historic waterfront town of Beaufort, North Carolina, Chapters Bed-and-Breakfast is a reader's paradise. Built in 1770, the newly renovated inn hosts a roster of special events celebrating books, genres, and authors. It's the perfect literary retreat - until a rare-book dealer turns up dead in the carriage house during a celebration of Golden Age mystery author Josephine Tey. The victim's daughter points the finger at 42-year-old widow and former schoolteacher Charlotte Reed, who inherited the B&B from her great-aunt Isabella.

Nora Best is the envy of her friends. She's just turned 50 and has traded in her home with The Perfect-Ass Husband for an Airstream trailer and an adventure of a lifetime across the US. But during their leaving party, Nora finds her husband in a compromising position with a friend. Storming out of the party, she jumps into her truck with no idea how to tow the Airstream or where she's going. Nora ends up in a campground in the mountains of Wyoming, drowning her sorrows with its managers, Brad and Miranda.

Rosemary and Athena are just settling into their new life in the unapologetically magical village of Myrtlewood. After so many years in financial turmoil, things are looking up. Rosemary even nabs the perfect part-time job while waiting on a certain handsome vampire lawyer to process her inheritance. Life is surprisingly peaceful until strange disappearances throw everything into chaos leading up to the Spring Equinox.

Veronica and Stoker are practically dying for a new adventure, but when their wish is granted, they find themselves up against a secret society and a darkly seductive duo in this landmark historical mystery from beloved New York Times bestselling and Edgar Award–nominated author Deanna...