Women Suspense

It's Memorial Day weekend in Spirit Canyon, and for Zo, that means the return of summer shoppers. It also means the return of her good friend Beth, who's moved back to the area to reopen her family's hotel, Spirit Canyon Lodge. Beth and Zo spent many childhood summers there, and Zo can't wait to reconnect and celebrate the Grand Opening. But the festivities go from bad to worse when a power outage knocks out the lights-and morning reveals a competitor's dead body found on the premises.

When Holly Kelly moves from Miami to the lavish Laguna Palms neighborhood, seeking community and friendship-with her husband and rambunctious triplets in tow-she finds it in spades. She is soon drawn into the intimate lives of almost everyone in their beachfront cul-de-sac, especially her three new ride-or-dies: Gina, Greta, and Chloe. But when the neighborhood's holiday fruitcake exchange takes a dark turn, the bodies start piling up. The deaths seem like accidents-at first.

Tara Sharp can see auras, and it’s ruining her life. When she tries to turn her inconvenient secret into a paying gig, her first job lands her in the middle of a tug of war between the biggest, baddest crime lord in town and the hottest business man Tara has ever met. A narcoleptic ex-roadie sidekick, a cranky pet parrot, and a psychic investigator with an uncanny ability to read auras—what could go right?

Hours later, the man’s cold body lies in the city mortuary, alongside the woman he couldn’t save. And his sister, unconventional nurse Gemma Tate, tracks down troubled police inspector Sebastian Bell to unravel the truth. Sebastian has enough pressure to solve the murder of an aristocratic heiress without Gemma meddling in his case. But the cryptic sentences she brings him from her brother’s notebook could be a crucial lead. If only they knew what “milky way” meant.

Mercedes Harrigan, novice landlord, is a pro at cleaning up messy apartments but cleaning up after an elderly tenant dies presents a different dilemma. It’s not the dead body lying on the kitchen floor that has Sadie freaked out—she grew up playing among the caskets at her grandmother’s mortuary—it’s the coroner’s suspicion that the wiring in Sadie's vintage apartments could be the culprit. Add a threatened lawsuit by the family of the deceased, along with bizarre clues that pop up but don’t add up, and Sadie’s morale dips lower than the meager balance in her bank account.

Hallie works as a skip tracer—hunting down people wanted by the law, for one reason or another. It's not glamourous, and it doesn't pay all that well. But it's legal work, and that's hard to come by in low city. When her best-and only—friend calls her in a panic, Hallie goes to help and gets a lot more than she bargained for. One of the elite has been murdered and the city police and special investigators are looking for someone to blame. The moment Hallie is near a dead body of one of the ruling class, her hard work and clean record count for nothing.

After playing a TV sleuth for years, Rita Martin retires to the sleepy town of Frantham-on-Sea. Here on the Dorset coast, she runs her own immaculate guest house, and life is blissfully quiet. But then a few doors down, harmless old Mrs. Freer is bludgeoned to death, and Rina can’t help but be drawn into the mystery. Mrs. Freer’s home was ransacked, but this was no ordinary burglary. Who knew the old lady kept a gun stashed under her pillow? And who wanted it badly enough to kill?

Quinn Victoria Caine is back in her quirky town of Vienna, Virginia, starting her new life as a bookbinder in her family-owned bookshop. With her trusty German Shephard RBG - Ruff Barker Ginsburg - by her side, what can go wrong? Okay, sure, bumping into her ex Scott or her former high-school nemesis Tricia is a drag. It certainly doesn't help that they’ve acquired the new hobby of shoving their recent engagement in her face every chance they get. But that doesn't mean Quinn wanted to find Tricia dead in the road. So why does half the town think she may have done it?

Beth Rivers is on the run - she’s doing the only thing she could think of to keep herself safe. Known to the world as thriller author Elizabeth Fairchild, she had become the subject of a fanatic’s obsession. After being held in a van for three days by her kidnapper, Levi Brooks, Beth managed to escape, and until he is captured, she's got to get away. Cold and remote, Alaska seems tailor-made for her to hide out, and she feels safer than she’s felt since Levi took her. That is, until she’s told about a local death that’s a suspected murder.

With her Let It Bee honey boutique buzzing along nicely, life is as sweet as nectar for Wren Johnson - until she takes a morning walk along the Pacific beach with her Havana Brown cat, Everett, and stumbles upon the body of Agnes Snow, the cranky queen of the local craft fairs, stiff as driftwood. More unfortunate? Clutched in the victim's fist is a label from Wren's homemade beeswax-and-honey lip balm. Which makes Officer Jim Hampton focus his dreamy-blue Paul Newman eyes on Wren as suspect number-one.

"Brassard's accents—whether French Canadian, Italian, or continental French—create indelible characters. His performance lets us feel Reine Marie's warmth and Armand's affectionate nature, and he adds an additional layer to surly Ruth and her potty-mouthed duck. Exciting and entertaining."...

While Augusta Hawke is a successful author of eighteen crime novels, since her husband's death, she's been living vicariously through her Jules Maigret-like detective Claude and his assistant Caroline. Then a handsome police detective appears investigating a real-life mystery. Where are her neighbors, the Normans? No one has a clue what's happened—except Augusta. Although she isn't nosy, spending all day staring out the windows for inspiration means she does notice things. Like the Normans arguing. And that they've been missing a week.

Chef Carrie Ann Cole is about to embark on the adventure of a lifetime - an assignment as the new Personal Chef to the Royal Family at Kensington Palace. But no sooner has Carrie Ann touched down across the pond and donned her apron than a dead body crops up beneath the royal kale beds.

Maggie McDonald has a penchant for order that isn't confined to her clients' closets, kitchens, and sock drawers. As she lays out her plan to transfer her family to the 100-year-old house her husband Max has inherited in the hills above Silicon Valley, she has every expectation for their new life to fall neatly into place. But as the family bounces up the driveway of their new home, she's shocked to discover the house's dilapidated condition. When her husband finds the caretaker face-down in their new basement, it's the detectives who end up moving in.

When Ruby returns to the small coastal town she'd left twenty years ago, she's overwhelmed with melancholy. After all, it's where her fiance dumped her at the altar. That's why all Ruby wants to do while in town is settle up and leave. But things get dangerous when Ruby's ex-fiance is found dead in his office. Ruby is the prime suspect and must solve the case in order to clear her name. Fortunately, she's not alone. Her feline familiar Rumpus is there to back Ruby up to the hilt. If only he could avoid making snarky comments and one liners while they do it!

At the luxurious Roarke Palace Hotel, a maid walks into suite 4602 for the nightly turndown - and steps into her worst nightmare. A killer leaves her dead, strangled by a thin silver wire. He's Sly Yost, a virtuoso of music and murder. A hit man for the elite.

Sixty-year-old Jane Hunter, forced into early retirement from her job as a university librarian, is seeking a new challenge to keep her spirits up and supplement her meager pension. But as she’s about to discover, a retiree’s life can bring new thrills—and new dangers. Cameron “Cam” Clewe, an eccentric 33-year-old collector, is also seeking something—an archivist to inventory his ever-expanding compendium of rare books and artifacts.

It isn’t the first time real estate agent Helen Morrisey has found someone naked in bed while showing a house. But this one is different. One glance at the bluish cast around his lips and the vacant, staring eyes, and Helen knows developer Al Capelli is never going to sign another sales agreement. His death is big news for a small Chesapeake water town where a family empire is built around secrets and their brash money style is resented by locals. Within days, his lover, her old friend, begs Helen to find the killer before she’s arrested for murder.

Young architect Wren Fontaine lands her dream job: restoring Greenleaf House, New York’s finest Gilded-Age mansion, to its glory days. But old homes have old secrets: Stephen Greenleaf—heir to what’s left of his family’s legacy—refuses to reveal what his plans are once the renovation is completed. And still living in a corner of the home is Stephen’s ninety-year-old Aunt Agnes who’s lost in the past, brooding over a long-forgotten scandal while watching Wren with mistrust.

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.