English Women Sleuths

Avery Mason, host of American Events, knows the subjects that grab a TV audience’s attention. Her latest story - a murder mystery laced with kinky sex, tragedy, and betrayal - is guaranteed to be ratings gold. New DNA technology has allowed the New York medical examiner’s office to make its first successful identification of a 9/11 victim in years. The twist: The victim, Victoria Ford, had been accused of the gruesome murder of her married lover. In a chilling last phone call to her sister, Victoria begged her to prove her innocence.

To solve her father's murder and save the family-owned glass shop, Savannah Webb must shatter a killer's carefully constructed façade... After Savannah's father dies unexpectedly of a heart attack, she drops everything to return home to St. Petersburg, Florida, to settle his affairs - including the fate of the beloved, family-owned glass shop. Savannah intends to hand over ownership to her father's trusted assistant and fellow glass expert, Hugh Trevor, but soon discovers the master craftsman also dead of an apparent heart attack.

In the south of France, where hatred simmers in the heat, a man seemingly admired, and certainly feared, drops dead at a dinner party. All of the guests fall under suspicion, including Welsh-Canadian professor Cait Morgan. A criminologist who specializes in profiling victims, Cait sets out to solve the murder - and clear her name. Add to this the disappearance of an ancient Celtic gold collar said to be cursed and there you have the ingredients for a Nicoise salad of death, secrets, and lies.

Some places seem too beautiful to be touched by horror. Summit Lake, nestled in North Carolina’s Blue Ridge Mountains, is that kind of place. But two weeks ago, Becca Eckersley, a first-year law student and daughter of a powerful attorney, was brutally murdered there. Now the town is reeling with grief, and the police are baffled.

Bath, England, 1890. Mystery author Lady Amy Lovell receives an anonymous letter containing shocking news: her fiancé, Mr. Ronald St. Vincent, has been dabbling in something illegal, which causes her to promptly break their engagement. Two evenings later, as Lady Amy awaits a visit from Lord William Wethington, fellow member of the Bath Mystery Book Club, her former fiancé makes an unexpected and most unwelcome appearance at her house.

Electra McDonnell has always known that the way she and her family earn their living is slightly outside of the law. Breaking into the homes of the rich and picking the locks on their safes may not be condoned by British law enforcement, but World War II is in full swing, Ellie's cousins, Colm and Toby, are off fighting against Hitler, and Uncle Mick's more honorable business as a locksmith can't pay the bills anymore. So when Uncle Mick receives a tip about a safe full of jewels in the empty house of a wealthy family, he and Ellie can’t resist.

Forty-something Maggie Sharpe is returning to her quaint childhood town of Dogwood Mountain, Missouri, nestled in the beautiful Ozark Mountains, Maggie recently inherited Dogwood Bakery, along with a cute little cottage, from her aunt Marjorie. With a son in the Navy, deployed six months at a time, and an ex in Kansas, Maggie decided that it was time for a change, but she soon learns that life back home is not all sprinkles and jelly-filled donuts.

London, 1883. Actress Lizzie Dixie drowned in the River Thames, so how was she murdered five years later in Highgate Cemetery? Intrepid Fleet Street reporter Penny Green was a friend of Lizzie's, and Scotland Yard needs her help. Does Penny unwittingly hold clues to Lizzie's mysterious death? Penny must work with Inspector James Blakely to investigate the worlds of theater, showmen, and politicians in search of the truth. But who is following her? And who is sending her threatening letters?

Cass Neary made her name in the 70s as a photographer embedded in the burgeoning punk movement in New York City. Her pictures earned her a brief moment of fame. Thirty years later she is adrift, on her way down, and almost out when an old acquaintance sends her on a mercy gig to interview a famously reclusive photographer who lives on an island in Maine. When she arrives Down East, Cass stumbles across a decades-old mystery that is still claiming victims, and she finds one final shot at redemption.

Bailey King is living the sweet life as assistant chocolatier in New York City. But then her grandmother calls with news that her grandfather's heart condition has worsened. Bailey rushes to Harvest, Ohio, where her grandparents still run Swissmen Sweets, an Amish candy shop. She finds her grandfather is doing better than she feared. Unfortunately, the same can't be said for a local Englisch developer, whom Bailey finds dead in the candy shop kitchen - with Jebediah King's chocolate knife buried in his chest.

Grandeur and opulence are everything in the famed New Orleans Garden District where pets are family and no bling is too big. Opening Furry Godmother, pet boutique and organic treat bakery, is Lacy Marie Crocker's dream come true - until the glitter gun used to make her Shih Tzu tutus becomes a murder weapon - and Lacy becomes public enemy number one. Now detective Jack Oliver is hounding Lacy, and her Furry Godmother investor wants out before his name is tarnished by association.

Manhattan fashionista Kelly Quinn thought she'd left her upstate New York town far behind...until the Seventh Avenue expat returns home to revamp her grandmother's consignment shop into an upscale boutique - and unwittingly sets a trend for murder....After her rising career as a Manhattan buyer is derailed, Kelly has mixed feelings about relocating back to Lucky Cove, in spite of her big plans for the soon-to-be-renamed Curated by Kelly Resale Boutique. What's left of her luck starts running out when a customer puts on a black lace dress that triggers visions of someone being murdered.

Angie Turner hopes her new farm-to-table restaurant can be a fresh start in her old hometown in rural Idaho. But when a goat dairy farmer is murdered, Angie must turn the tables on a bleating black sheep.... With three weeks until opening night for their restaurant, the County Seat, Angie and her best friend and business partner Felicia are scrambling to line up local vendors - from the farmer's market to the goat dairy farm of Old Man Moss. Fortunately, the cantankerous Moss takes a shine to Angie, as does his kid goat Precious.

Sheriff Sadie Mills navigates the challenges of single motherhood while solving crimes in the rural community of Possum Gap, Kentucky. The recent trailer shootings in her jurisdiction have her on edge, and the new coroner, a Yankee transplant from the east coast, is still adjusting to life in the wilderness when all hell breaks loose. Cases stemming from an out-of-control hillbilly clan, sex trafficking, and a murder in the nearby Amish community collide, and Sheriff Mills finds herself in a race to stop a serial killer before they strike again.

Francie Vespertine has lived all her life in a supernatural town full of powerful witches, but her own magic is lackluster at best. The only place she fits in is the Magical Archives. Head librarian (and bookworm extraordinaire) might be a boring job . . . if it wasn't for the ghosts of fictional characters haunting the shelves.

The descendant of adventuring-dead-aristocrats, Clarissa Knightley supplements a modest inheritance by penning gothic novels that cost more than they earn. Upon learning that she has mysteriously inherited a share of an earl's estate, she rashly packs up her household. In remote Gravesyde Priory, she hopes to find a safe haven and family who will welcome her and her young nephew. Instead, she discovers a drunken American army captain, his African servant, and ancient, surly caretakers.

I'm Hazel Kinsey, a special agent for the FBI, and I'm also a witch. Seventeen years earlier, I packed up my belongings and my squirrel familiar Tizzy, and I left my paranormal hometown of Paradise Falls for good. Or so I thought. When my best friend from high school, Lily Mason, calls and asks me to investigate her brother's murder, I can't say no. She was there for me during the worst time of my life, and it's my turn to return the favor, no matter the personal cost.

In Cara Black’s “accomplished, absorbing debut” ( Kirkus Reviews), PI Aimée Leduc must decrypt a digitized photo from the 1940s. But when Aimée visits the historic Jewish quarter of Paris to deliver the picture, she finds its intended recipient murdered—and with a swastika carved in her aged forehead

Newly minted private detective Charlotte Morgan, resident orphan of the Pineapple Port 55+ community, discovers she might not be an orphan after all. Stunned by the news, she distracts herself with a cat burglar who left a smear of make-upped whiskers on a sliding glass door and a path straight to "Clown Town," a community for retired circus performers. When a fortune-teller doesn't see her own death in the cards, Charlotte's burglary becomes a murder investigation!

Trouble is brewing as April May approaches her 50th birthday and the opening of her tearoom. When word gets around that a local reporter is penning a tell-all, everyone in town is on edge that their secrets may be revealed.