English Women Sleuths

In Brian Klingborg's Thief of Souls, a brutal murder in a rural village in Northern China sends shockwaves all the way to Beijing - but seemingly only Inspector Lu Fei, exiled to this tiny town, is interested in finding justice for the murdered village girl....

Carrie Kennersly, a veterinary technician, has become known for baking healthful and popular dog treats at the clinic where she works, in the town of Knobcone Heights, California. When a friend moves away, Carrie buys her bakery and converts half into a Barkery to sell her canine delights. But Myra and Harris Ethman, who own a local store selling pet products, hate the new competition. After publicly badmouthing Carrie and antagonizing family and other townsfolk with her big mouth, Myra is found dead with a Barkery biscuit beside her.

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.

Sabrina has never been the superstitious type. Still, when she moves to Lavender, Texas to write her first novel and help her Aunt Rowe manage her vacation rental business, Sabrina can't avoid listening to the rumors that a local black cat is a jinx - especially after the stray in question leads her directly to the scene of a murder. The deceased turns out to be none other than her Aunt Rowe's awful cousin Bobby Joe Flowers, a known cheat and womanizer who had no shortage of enemies.

Meet Sister Veronica Angelica, a secret crime fiction writer and lover of custard cream biscuits. When she discovers a dead man in the grounds of the Catholic Youth Hostel, a building next door to her Convent, she can see he's been brutally murdered. What she doesn't know is that Jamie had a secret he'd been about to confess. Being forbidden by the Cardinal to contact the police, the nuns at The Convent of the Christian Heart are instructed to contain news of the murder. As Sister Veronica tries to uncover the truth, another murder takes place, plunging her deeper into the mystery.

Hello. My name is Stevie Cartwright, and I've been witchless for 30 days. If only there was a support group for down-on-their-luck ex-witches who've had their powers slapped right out of them (literally). Just as I was licking my wounds after returning to my hometown of Ebenezer Falls, Washington, and navigating my suddenly nonmagical existence with the help of my familiar, Belfry, things got sticky. Enter an ex-spy and newly departed spirit named Winterbottom, who's infiltrated my life with his sexy British accent and a couple of requests....

When Monica Albertson comes to Cranberry Cove - a charming town on the eastern shore of Lake Michigan - to help her half brother, Jeff, on his cranberry farm, the last thing she expects to harvest is a dead body. It seems that Sam Culbert, who ran the farm while Jeff was deployed overseas, had some juicy secrets that soon prove fatal, and Jeff is ripe for the picking as a prime suspect.

After her divorce from her thrice-married embezzler husband, Trinidad Jones is ready for a fresh start. So when she's left one of her ex's businesses in Upper Sprocket, Oregon, she decides to pack up her dog, cash in her settlement, and open the Shimmy and Shake Shop, introducing the world to her monster milkshakes. Soon Trinidad's life seems to be churning along smoothly. That is, it was until she discovered her neighbor, the Popcorn King, face down in his giant popcorn kettle.

Chester Henry and his adult granddaughter Clare lovingly repair old typewriters and restore old books. Who ever thought their quaint store would hold the key to some modern-day trouble? When a stranger to town demands they turn over an antique Underwood typewriter they're repairing for a customer, Clare fears she may need to be rescued. A call to the police scares the man off, but later Clare finds his dead body in the back alley. What about a dusty old typewriter could possibly be worth killing for?

Her job description is the "tracking and apprehension of mentally-fractured killers". What this really means in FBI profiler Jace Valchek's brave new world - one in which only one percent of the population is human - is that a woman's work is never done. And real is getting stranger every day. Jace has been ripped from her reality by David Cassius, the vampire head of the NSA. He knows that she's the best there is in the business, and David needs her help in solving a series of gruesome murders of vampires and werewolves.

When autistic dog rehabilitator Maddie "Mad Girl" Whitney discovers a corpse on her neighbor's ranch, she impulsively tries to drum up business by claiming that psychic abilities led her to the victim . . . with devastating consequences. Maddie's forced to start a K-9 Search and Rescue team with her ex-girlfriend's twin, a hostile sheriff, or risk losing her beloved former military dog. She reluctantly begins reaching out to others . . . and finds friendship and kindness in the unlikeliest of places.

As a storyteller, Maureen Nash can't help but see the narrative cues woven through her life. Like the series of letters addressed to her late husband from a stranger—the proprietor of The Moon Shell, a shop on Ocracoke Island, off the coast of North Carolina. The store is famous with shell collectors, but it's the cryptic letters from Allen Withrow, the shop's owner, that convince Maureen to travel to the small coastal town in the middle of hurricane season. At the very least, she expects she'll get a good story out of the experience, never anticipating it could end up a murder mystery.

Attorney Avery Andrews has returned to her humdrum hometown of Dacus, South Carolina, leaving her job at a powerful law firm in the rearview mirror. But with her Donna Karan suits she's struggling to fit back in. Is it still a place she's able to call home now that she's swapped her prestigious clients for high school bullies and formidable aunts? She finds sanctuary in her grandfather's cabin on Luna Lake until police arrive to investigate a mysterious rumor. But more than secrets lie beneath the dark surface of Luna Lake.

Once again, death has found its way to Rockfish Island’s National Park and this time, in the form of a terrible climbing accident. When Sheriff Lane discovers the victim has ties to an accidental drowning the summer before, she becomes suspicious the two deaths are linked and not accidents at all.

Bloody murder is the last thing on Barbara Hollis's mind when she agrees to travel to a sleepy little town to keep house for her widowed brother. Aside from chasing after her irritating young nephews, she thinks the biggest challenge she'll face is learning to cook a proper soufflé. But a bizarre encounter on a train quickly draws her into a more complicated and dangerous future than she bargained for....

Discovering a body on her property presents Lady Abigail Worthing with more than one pressing problem. The victim is Juliet, the wife of her neighbor, Stapleton Henderson. Although Abigail has little connection with the lady in question, she expects to be under suspicion. Abigail's skin color and her mother's past have earned her a certain reputation among the ton. And she can't divulge that she was attending a secret pro-abolition meeting at the time of the murder. To her surprise, Henderson offers her an alibi.

Neither Beryl nor Edwina are the least bit interested in attending events at their alma mater, Miss Dupont’s Finishing School for Young Ladies. Their lives are very full indeed in the village of Walmsley Parva. However, when a letter arrives from Miss Dupont herself requesting their help in a professional capacity, they reluctantly pack their bags for London. Upon arrival, they learn from Miss Dupont that her business has seen a steep decline since the days before World War I and that now she is concerned a saboteur is attempting to damage the school’s reputation.

Katherine Fairfield isn’t a typical woman—or a typical witch. Once upon a time, she worked as an agent for Hex Support, a secret division within the Federal Bureau of Magic. Following the tragic death of her husband, she quit to focus on raising their twins. Now the kids are in college, and Kit spends her days at the enchanted family estate known as Dark Hollow along with her two younger sisters and a sanctuary of forgotten familiars. But then duty calls.

Hatch was at one point in time the second female to ever pass the Army’s rigorous Special Forces Selection Course. Now she’s put to the test and must return to do it all over again. A challenge made that more difficult due to the injury to her right arm.

There's nothing practical about magic—which is why I ditched my wand years ago. Thirteen years, to be exact. The day I left Silverlake. Except now, a family emergency has called me back home, and quite frankly, I'd rather be anywhere but here. But when my aunt raises her wand to cure a friend and he ends up dead, it becomes abundantly clear I'm not leaving anytime soon.