Holiday Cozy

Es ist Advent auf Sylt. Ernst Mannsen hat zwar nichts gegen Weihnachten, aber die Insel ist ihm ohne Touristen zu leer, die Tage sind lang und dunkel. Seine Frau Gudrun freut sich hingegen auf den Weihnachtsmarkt, aufs Schmücken des Hauses und auf die Weihnachtsfeiertage mit der Familie. Als der gelangweilte Ernst erfährt, dass der Filialleiter der Bank mitsamt den Spenden für die bedürftigen Kinder verschwunden ist, ergreift er seine Chance auf Abwechslung: Er wird sich um das Problem kümmern! Und das Geld für die Weihnachtsgeschenke beschaffen.

Hemlock Falls is one of the most picturesque villages in Upstate New York, with the Hemlock Inn, owned by the amateur sleuth Quilliam sisters, as its centerpiece. For the Quilliam sisters, there’s nothing jolly about this Christmas. Meg and Quill are near-broke. At least there’s one bright start on the horizon: A big-time magazine and television show will feature the Inn. But soon the editor’s husband skis to his death. Now, if the Quilliams are to save the Inn from a lawsuit, they’ll need to prove this was no accident.

As Melanie attempts to deck the halls in a house overrun by pampered poodles, her event planner friend, Claire, is busy playing Santa for the wealthiest clientele on Connecticut's Gold Coast. A personal shopper gig in the affluent town of New Canaan seems like business as usual. Except Claire's stylish stint comes at a higher price than she bargains for when she stumbles over her newest customer's dead body. Named a prime suspect for murder, she begs for Melanie's help, then vanishes like cookies and milk on Christmas Eve.

Peace on Earth isn’t everyone’s cup of tea in Charlotte MacLeod’s “A Cozy for Christmas”. Peter Lovesey’s “The Haunted Crescent” delivers a holiday ghost story with a twist. A training session for department-store Santas turns up Saint Nicks who are anything but angels in Isaac Asimov’s “Ho, Ho, Ho”. Marcia Muller’s “Silent Night” finds a tough private investigator searching San Francisco’s Tenderloin district - and discovering something unexpected.

It's Christmastime, but not everyone is jolly - especially not Vonne Barnett. Her dead body has been found in Victoria Square. Katie Bonner, the manager of Artisan's Alley, happens to be at the tea shop Vonne's mother, Francine, owns when the news is delivered. Vonne left a trail of men behind her so the suspects are many - but the clues are few. A broken teacup leads Katie to one of the suspects, but before she can investigate, she's attacked. Katie may be closing in on a murderer, but time is ticking because the murderer is definitely closing in on her.

When the bewitching Diana Ravenscroft comes to quiet Tinker's Cove and opens Solstice, a quaint little shop offering everything from jewelry to psychic readings, Lucy Stone writes her off as eccentric but harmless. Even after Diana gives her a disturbingly accurate reading, Lucy can’t help but befriend the newcomer. But not everyone in town is so enchanted. And when Lucy stumbles upon a dead body near her home, she can’t shake the feeling that something ominous is lurking in the crisp October air...

Hannah Hickok is looking forward to her first Christmas in Casper Creek. She has plans for cookies, cuddles with her fiancé Cooper Wyatt, and a visit from Chris Kringle. Instead, the man who visits isn’t the one Hannah was inspecting. No, it’s her former fiancé Michael…and he’s arrived with an agenda. Michael has more attitude than brains, and he’s ready to make life difficult for Hannah…right up to the point where his new fiancée is killed and her body goes missing from the morgue.

Interior designer Shelby Nelson is looking for a new start. She gets a lucky break when she's hired to help decorate the homes in a wealthy subdivision for the holidays. But not everyone is thrilled with being forced to follow the strict rules set by the homeowners' association. And the person they're angriest with is Heather Redstone, the president of the HOA. So when Shelby is found standing over Heather's dead body under the Christmas tree, she quickly becomes the prime suspect. To clear her name, she’ll need to find the killer.

Life was going well for 25-year-old repo agent Andrea Sloan. She hadn't stumbled across any more naked dead guys at work, and her love life was pretty much wonderful. When she picked up a part-time job working at the mall for some extra cash as an elf, she never imagined she'd witness Santa gunned down in the parking lot. Just like that, Andi became tangled with friends and foes from her past in a race to find Santa's stolen bag of cash before Christmas.

The gang from The Last Stop Retirement Community is back in 12 hilariously inspiring short stories and 14 new issues of "The Last Stop Bulletin"! "Finders Keepers": Find out what happens when new resident, Benji Little, takes to the halls with his FX-458 Gold Digger X-treme Model 2 Metal Detector.

Attempts to get Stacie in the holiday spirit fall flat when Santa’s elf finds herself in a shooter’s crosshairs. With another shooting, initial theories go up in smoke and the search is on for the true motive. Stacie avoids her own stressors following up on the shooting and murder. Faced with relationship turmoil and a killer on the loose, Stacie embraces her "bah humbug" perspective as she seeks to identify the culprit.

Ainsley decides to set aside her search for answers to her past and enjoy her first Gooseberry Christmas by volunteering along with the rest of the gang for the Christmas festival on the boardwalk. Normally Ainsley didn’t bother much with Christmas and all its trappings, but this year she is excited to join in as most of the locals are prone to do. Of course it does put a bit of a damper on the festivities when a body is found in the tree lot where the gang had offered to help out.

Christmas is on trial, and time is running out. Attorney Thad Raker represents an eccentric client living in a house with a Christmas secret. When the county goes to court to take the client’s property, Raker must battle conspiring adversaries, a cantankerous judge, and his own personal feelings and doubts. If he loses the case, Christmas won’t come for hundreds of thousands of children. Can Raker save Christmas and, in the process, save himself?

Die Ehe von Andreas und Nicola Kantor ist in Routine erstarrt. Da bietet ihnen überraschend ein Freund an, über die Feiertage in sein Ferienhaus in Miramas-le-Vieux zu ziehen. Weihnachten in der Provence, nur sie beide... Tatsächlich reisen sie in einen malerischen, halb vergessenen mittelalterlichen Ort: Das Haus ist romantisch, die wenigen Nachbarn sind freundlich. Doch bereits in der ersten Nacht fällt Schnee in einer Landschaft, in der fast nie Schnee fällt. Langsam, aber unerbittlich wird Miramas-le-Vieux von der Außenwelt abgeschnitten.

Rachel's plans to spend Christmas with her fiancé are in tatters after he is called to Italy at short notice. Rather than spend Christmas with her parents, Rachel decides to take a last-minute Canary Island cruise. Sarah, cruise ship nurse and Rachel's best friend, is only too pleased to have her along, as Sarah's parents are taking their first cruise. With her mother keen for her to settle down, she is glad of the moral support.

Maggie Gerber and those discount divas the Good Buy Girls are gearing up for their first big holiday thrift-shop sale. But one of the Girls - Joanne Claramotta, pregnant with her first child - is acting less than festive. It could be hormones. Or it could be Diane Jenkins, the young knockout her husband Michael hired as his new deli assistant. Calming Joanne’s nerves proves impossible when Maggie finds Michael unconscious on his deli floor - with Diane next to him, strangled to death with her apron strings.

The Sinterklaas has tasked Christmas Special Investigator Steingrim Og with finding a missing spell, but he must first contend with a new assistant and aid an old friend. When mysterious explosions kill elves regardless of race and word of treason among the elves is revealed, Steingrim does not know whom to trust. His investigations uncover plans for an invasion by one of the village’s deadliest nemesis: Jack Frost.

House flippers Jack and Juniper are planning to ring in the New Year slinging tapas, vino, and beer in an old Victorian mansion that they've transformed into Bohemian Lake's first inn and taproom, but the mansion's poltergeist is out to dash their merriment with mean-spirited sabotage. Having laid otherworldly rumors to rest before, Juniper is skeptical, but the alarms aren't going off. When the mischief turns deadly, Juniper calls in a part-time paranormal investigator but the man's discoveries leave her thinking that her problem is more personal than paranormal.

In Hummelstich scheint die Welt noch in Ordnung zu sein: Die Dächer der niedlichen Fachwerkhäuser funkeln und glitzern unter strahlend blauem Himmel und die Bewohner gehen emsig ihrem Tagewerk nach. Aber der schöne Schein trügt - denn hinter der Bilderbuchfassade tun sich mörderische Abgründe auf... Aber zum Glück ist die energische Hobbydetektivin Bea von Maarstein vor Ort! Zusammen mit ihrem persönlichkeitsgestörten Papagei Dr. Jekyll und dem Dorfpolizisten Sven Grüneis löst sie jeden noch so verzwickten Fall.

During a break from his usual village beat, young Police Constable Nick finds himself involved with holidaymakers and their problems. As well as the normal seaside duties, how does he cope with a man who’s lost his false teeth in the sea and another who wants to give away thousands of pounds when drunk? Then there’s the stray Labrador that thinks he’s a police dog and accompanies police officers on night patrols, and the anxious fisherman who daren’t tell his wife that he owns a racehorse.