Happy Release Day to Jenny Kales for her release of Spiced And Iced.
Month: December 2016
Christmas Books
Every day between now and Christmas I will spotlight some Christmas books for your reading pleasure. I hope you find some that you will enjoy. Happy Reading.
Caterer and cook Lilah Drake is up to her elbows in deadly trouble in the latest mystery from the author of The Big Chili…
The Christmas holidays are one of Lilah’s favorite times of the year, filled with friends, family, and, of course, tons of food orders for her Covered Dish clients. But Lilah’s Yuletide cheer ends when she sees a most Grinch-like crime: the murder of a Santa in a school parking lot.
It turns out the deceased Kris Kringle was a complicated tangle of naughty and nice, with a long list of people who might have wanted him dead. And whoever did the deed wants to make sure that Lilah keeps quiet. Now, Lilah will have to team up with her former fling, Detective Jay Parker, to unwrap the mysteries of a deadly Christmas killer and stay alive long enough to ring in the New Year… (Goodreads)
Christmas normally descends on Lake Eden, Minnesota, as gently as reindeer alighting on a rooftop—but this yuletide season the only thing coming down Hannah Swensen’s chimney is a case of murder . . .
The holidays have arrived, and Hannah and her good pal Lisa have agreed to provide all the goodies for the town’s annual production of A Christmas Carol. But before anyone can say “Bah, humbug!” a Santa-sized sackful of trouble ensues. Like the fact that Lisa’s husband will be playing Mr. Claus to his ex-girlfriend Phyllis Bates’ Mrs. Claus. Or that before the curtains even go up Phyllis is found dead in the snow—wearing a costume that the real Mrs. Claus would put on the naughty list. Soon after the suspects pile up faster than snowdrifts in a blizzard, while a merry murderer remains on the loose. With clues even harder to find, it might take a visit from ghosts of Christmas past to wrap up this mystery in time for the holidays . . .
Includes Over a Dozen Holiday Recipes from The Cookie Jar! (Goodreads)
New York Times bestselling author J.A. Jance brings her trademark breakneck pace to this fun and exciting e-novella, where fan favorite Ali Reynolds takes on double responsibilities as both sleuth and bride.
Ali Reynolds is finally getting married to her longtime love B. Simpson. They wanted a simple Christmas Eve wedding, but nothing is ever simple with Ali. Even as a motley crew of her friends—Leland Brooks, Sister Anselm, and others—descend on Vegas, the bride-to-be finds herself juggling last-minute wedding plans and a mystery in the form of a stray miniature dachshund. Ali’s grandson rescues the little dog, but Ali’s not in the market for a new pet right before her honeymoon, and leaves no stone unturned in hunting for the dog’s owner. But what she finds is more than just a shaggy dog story…Bella’s elderly owner has vanished, and her son seems to be behind it. So it’s Ali and B. to the rescue—and still making it to the church on time! (Goodreads)
Murder takes center stage . . .
It’s a Christmas miracle for the Happy Hoofers—Tina, Janice, Pat, Mary Louise, and Gini. They’ve scored a gig at New York City’s Radio City Music Hall with the legendary Rockettes, complete with sexy Santa suits and microphones on their shoes. But when a dazzling diva of a dancer is found dead under the stage, there’s quite a lineup of suspects. In between rehearsals and seasonal sightseeing—and the discovery of a multi-talented, multi-colored cat—the toe-tapping troupe has to sort out the intrigue before another victim kicks the bucket . . .
INCLUDES COOKING TIPS AND TASTY RECIPES (Goodreads)
Bailey’s Farmers’ Market is this season’s go-to holiday destination, but not all the vendors are feeling the Christmas spirit…
Jam and preserve maker Becca Robins is excited about the extra business that the Ridgeway Christmas Tree Farm is bringing to the market this holiday season. But when a competing tree farmer, Reggie Stuckey, arrives with a truck full of trees, angrily barking that he has exclusive selling rights at the market, Becca finds herself pining for more goodwill toward men.
After Reggie is found with a tree stake in his chest, she wonders when the Christmas tree business turned so deadly. Now Becca has to use the only clues she has to the killer’s identity—mysterious ornaments that begin to show up in her stall—to hook a sinister Scrooge who will go to any lengths to drive home a point… (Goodreads)
The psych ward’s Christmas tree is artificial…
but the bomb concealed in its trunk is alive and
tick…tick…ticking!
It was nobody’s fault, unless you counted the mice, and even they didn’t mean to start trouble. A forgotten candy cane lured them to the Christmas tree stored in the basement of St. Anne’s Hospital. The nibbling and gnawing just went on from there. Now there are holes in the trunk where none should be and not a single branch will stay in place. Despite this disaster, the nurses of Psychiatric Ward One are determined to deck the blues by decking the halls. When an anonymous donor sends them an artificial balsam, they happily press their patients into decorating it. But lighting the new tree ends with a bang!
Who planted the bomb that wrecks havoc in the little town of Rhineburg? A frustrated employee fired by St. Anne’s despised administrator? A student terrorist from Bruck University? Or Caroline Rhodes, a nurse with a suspicious past who survived the explosion but refuses to discuss it?
Tagged as a suspect by the FBI, Caroline must prove her innocence by unraveling a devilish plot devised to eliminate one man’s nemesis. Aided by history professor Carl Atwater, Caroline cuts through a maze of conflicting stories, red herrings, and downright lies to bring a killer to justice. (Goodreads)
Christmas Books
Every day between now and Christmas I will spotlight some Christmas books for your reading pleasure. I hope you find some that you will enjoy. Happy Reading.
While Kay attends a Christmas tea at Hawthorne Hills Retirement Home, a beloved caretaker dies from an allergic reaction to peanuts. When the official coroner’s report rules the cause of death to be accidental, a small group of residents suspect foul play and call upon Kay to investigate.
Kay uncovers sinister plots of fraud, revenge, and corruption at the Home. During this season of peace on earth, good will to men, additional murders occur. Despite multiple attempts on her life, and with the support once again of her best friends, Elizabeth and Deirdre, Kay continues her quest for bringing justice for the victims.
Kay’s first Christmas in Sudbury Falls is an unforgettable one, with equal amounts of celebration and danger. Tis the season to be sleuthing! (Goodreads)
It’s Christmas in Ashton Falls and the entire Zimmerman household is gearing up for their first Christmas as a newly formed family unit. While Zak is busy decking the halls, Zoe is busy tracking down a killer while still taking the time to make certain a little girls Christmas wish comes true. It’s funny, it’s family, it’s a Zak and Zoe Christmas. (Goodreads)
THE GIFT THAT GIVES ON GIVING. . .
With Farberville’s college on holiday break, Claire Malloy’s bookstore is quiet . . . deadly quiet. Breaking the silence is a little old lady looking for volumes on pagan rituals, applied magick, and Celtic mysticism. Claire is intrigued and—miffed that her lover, Farberville police Lieutenant Peter Rosen, says she’s in a rut—happily accepts an invitation to welcome the winter solstice at dawn.
HOMICIDE FOR THE HOLIDAYS
Showing up at the Sacred Grove, Claire expects wild chanting or even nude dancing. Instead she ends up sitting on a stump watching the Arch Druid clean her bifocals. Then winter arrives and so does a dead man. Someone has shot the wealthy benefactor of Farberville’s neo-pagans. Now Claire is mixing some snooping with her Christmas shopping. But instead of wrapping up the case, she finds out ‘tis the season for ho- ho- homicide . . . and she may be the next victim. (Goodreads)
Cecily Sinclair Baxter hosts a holiday party at the Pennyfoot Hotel where the children of Badger’s End can meet Father Christmas. Unfortunately, the jolly old man is found dead along with one of his helpers.
The role of St. Nicholas had previously been played by a notorious village drunkard, and the police believe the two men killed each other. But Cecily has her doubts, as the murder weapon was never recovered. And since no one has left the hotel since the crime, she’s making a list of suspects-and checking it twice. (Goodreads)
Book 3: Sedona O’Hala Mysteries. Steve Huntington had a way of offering jobs that were too good to be true. Mark Huntington made offers too good to turn down. Sedona had a habit of being caught in the middle; somewhere near bad guys with guns and family members she was trying to avoid. (Goodreads)
Myrtle Crumb, the sassy, sixty-something sleuth from BETWEEN A CLUTCH AND A HARD PLACE and WHEN GOOD BRAS GO BAD, is suspicious when the mall Santa is found dead “on the throne”–the Santa Land throne, that is. The police are saying it was suicide, but Myrtle knows no self-respecting Santa Claus would let himself die in front of the children! She goes undercover to investigate the suicide and uncovers more than she bargained for! (Goodreads)
Christmas Books
Every day between now and Christmas I will spotlight some Christmas books for your reading pleasure. I hope you find some that you will enjoy. Happy Reading.
It’s Christmas time, and for Raine Stockton and her Search and Rescue dog, Cisco, Hansonville, North Carolina is just like a Norman Rockwell painting– except for the rash of thefts of baby Jesus figurines from nativity scenes, an abandoned box of golden retriever puppies that someone leaves beside her mailbox, and a mysterious gift from one of Cisco’s a grateful admirers. Raine already has her hands full with her own misbehaving pooches, unexpected house guests, and a complicated new relationship. But when a newborn is abandoned in the manger of the town’s living nativity and Raine walks in on what appears to be the scene of a murder, she has more to worry about than keeping the Christmas spirit alive. (Goodreads)
‘Tis the season to be jolly, but in Moosetookalook, Maine, Christmas cheer is in short supply due to a snowless winter that’s keeping skiers and shoppers at a distance. Fortunately, Liss MacCrimmon of the Scottish Emporium has a plan…
Liss’s brainstorm focuses on Tiny Teddies, the new “hot” toy of the season. Every store across the country is out of stock—except a few wee establishments in good ol’ Moosetookalook. It’s easy enough to drum up approval for the idea of luring consumers to town and keeping them there with a stockingful of New England holiday charm. Liss’s real challenge lies in contending with bickering businesspeople and—once America learns of Moosetookalook’s Tiny Teddy cache—doggedly determined shopaholics.
The first sign of something amiss occurs when the last Tiny Teddy is summarily executed: shot through the heart in the display window of greedy toy store owner Gavin Thorne. But the Teddy’s demise is just a precursor to the eerily similar murder of Gavin himself…
The two men in Liss’s life want her far from the case, but she can’t help feeling guilty for starting the fur frenzy that seems to have led to Gavin’s death. Besides, how can she ignore the lengthy list of suspects, not the least of whom include Gavin’s vindictive ex-wife, an unscrupulous selectman, a ski shop owner with an axe to grind, and a rabid toy collector packing heat in her purse..?
Now, with the Twelve (or, in Scots terms, the Daft) Days of Christmas rapidly approaching, Liss has a plate full of things worse than haggis to contend with, starting with a stockroom packed with poultry (don’t ask), and ending with a killer who’d like to see Liss’s goose well and fully cooked… (Goodreads)
When Jacobia “Jake” Tiptree plans a visit to Faye Anne Carmody’s house, she doesn’t expect to find it covered in blood. She also doesn’t expect to find Faye Anne dazed, yet alive. But she is. All looks fine, until Jake takes a trip to the butcher’s shop, and finds a bunch of meat packages wrapped in brown paper in the display case. Realizing that this is unusual, Jake investigates, only to find Faye Anne’s husband’s, Merle, body wrapped in those little packages. Then another person is found murdered, and Jake immediately decides that it’s up to her to solve the crime, instead of spending time with her family and working on rehabilitating her home. Who can get anything done during the holidays, when there’s a killer on the loose? (Goodreads)
Cinnamon Peters is one tough cookie.
Every year at Christmas River’s annual Gingerbread Junction Competition, pie baker extraordinaire Cinnamon aims to win, taking down any competitor who gets in her way. But when she finds a dead body in the woods behind her pie shop just days before the big competition, Cinnamon realizes that there’s much more to worry about than cookies, frosting, and gumdrops.
Someone’s out to bring Cinnamon down. And they’re playing dirty.
Only Cinnamon and a mysterious stranger who walks into her life one snowy evening can figure out the mystery.
But can they solve it before Cinnamon’s chances of gingerbread competition glory crumble? (Goodreads)
It’s Christmastime, and the Fairchild family is spending the holidays on idyllic Sanpere Island in Maine while the Reverend Thomas Fairchild recuperates from surgery. His caterer wife, Faith, is rejoicing in the rare, holiday family-time together—watching ice boaters, snowshoeing, and doing plenty of reading in front of the fire.
But Faith’s high spirits are dampened when she discovers the body of a young woman in an antique sleigh in front of the Sanpere Historical Society. The victim, Norah, was a teenage drug addict who apparently died by her own hand. Beloved by many, her untimely death rocks the isolated, tight-knit island community.
Meanwhile, Mary Bethany, a local spinster who raises goats, happens upon a newborn baby boy lying in the manger of her barn on Christmas Eve. The only clues to his identity are a note in the basket asking her to take care of him, as well as an alarming amount of cash. As Faith helps Mary locate the baby’s mother, she soon finds that the truth behind the abandonment is connected to Norah’s last days—and that, just as death and life are intertwined on Sanpere, so are evil and redemptive goodness. (Goodreads)
A humbug of a Shopping mystery…
From The Anthony and Agatha Award-Winning Author of Accessory to Murder
Includes insider shopping tips!
Mystery shopper Josie Marcus doesn?t get the appeal of the year-round Christmas shop. But when three such holiday houses pop up within two blocks, she?s assigned to rate them anonymously.
Easy enough, Josie thinks, until she realizes that shoppers at one store are finding a strange?even deadly?secret ingredient in their holiday cake. And Josie must get to the bottom of it all before someone else becomes a Christmas spirit. (Goodreads)
Happy Book Release
Happy Release Day to Kathi Daley. Murder At Christmas, the fourth book in her Sand And Sea Hawaiian Mystery is available know. Be sure to check it out.
Christmas Books
Every day between now and Christmas I will spotlight some Christmas books for your reading pleasure. I hope you find some that you will enjoy. Happy Reading.
Meg and Michael’s house is serving as the marshaling point for the annual Caerphilly Christmas parade. The theme is “The Twelve Days of Christmas,” and it features twelve drummers from the school marching band, eleven bagpipers, ten leaping lords costumed in medieval finery from the college drama department, etc. There are also assorted Christmas-themed floats, a live nativity scene on a flatbed truck, the Three Wise Men on Caerphilly zoo camels, and Santa Claus in a bright red horse-drawn sleigh (eight reindeer were beyond the zoo’s scope).
Meg has been volunteered to organize the parade, which is to proceed from her house to the local campus, where Santa will take up residence to hear the Christmas wishes of the town’s children. Of course, getting all the camels, pipers, leapers, and drummers in order is proving every bit as difficult as Meg feared it would be. Then her nephew Eric, wide-eyed and ashen-faced, whispers, “Meg, something’s wrong with Santa.”
The local curmudgeon, whose beard and belly made him a natural for the role, has been murdered. Now Meg and Chief Burke, who is playing one of the wise men, are faced with the two-fold mission of solving the murder and saving Christmas!
Readers can look forward to another zany Meg Langslow mystery—this one filled with outrageous Christmas spirit…and mayhem. (Goodreads)
Celebration Bay is full of yuletide cheer—but it’s hard to remain festive when someone’s out to slay Santa.
Tis the season, but no one in Celebration Bay is feeling jolly. The local holiday store has been taken over by the new Trim A Tree store, know as TAT by the locals. Their products are lewd, crude and plastic, not at all in keeping with the town’s tasteful, traditional celebration. The manager, Grace Thornsby, is a bitter middle-aged woman who gives new meaning to the name “Grinch”. And worst of all, she’s hired her own Santa to compete with the town’s official and beloved Santa.
But not for long . . . . someone is determined to get the town back to it’s good old fashioned values if it kills him . . . or anyone who stands in his way. (Goodreads)
All Izzy Chambers Perry wants for Christmas is to keep her brother out of jail—in this holiday yarn from the national bestselling author of A Finely Knit Murder…
In Sea Harbor the holidays mean cozy fires, festive carols, and soft skeins of yarn waiting to become hats and sweaters and scarves. And this year Izzy and the other Seaside Knitters are also knitting tiny ornaments to decorate a tree for the first annual tree-trimming contest.
Their holiday cheer is multiplied when Izzy’s younger brother, Charlie Chambers, unexpectedly arrives to volunteer at a local clinic. He brings with him outspoken hitchhiker Amber Hanson, who is returning to Sea Harbor to claim an inheritance. She quickly reacquaints herself with the area–and forms an unlikely friendship with Charlie. But their bond is shattered when her body is found beneath the undecorated trees on the Harbor Green.
With Charlie a suspect in the murder, Izzy and her fellow knitters step in to uncover the truth. It’s only by peeling away long-buried secrets that they can hope to restore joy to the season, and enjoy the shining lights of the newly decorated trees. (Goodreads)
Kathleen Paulson is snowed under running her library and caring for her extraordinary felines, Owen and Hercules. But when a fund-raiser turns deadly, she’ll have to add sleuthing to her already full schedule….
Winter in Mayville Heights is busy and not just because of the holidays. Kathleen is hard at work organizing a benefit to raise money for the library’s popular Reading Buddies program. She has her hands full hosting the event. And when a guest at the gala drops dead, her magical cats, Owen and Hercules, will have their paws full helping her solve a murder.
The victim is the ex of town rascal Burtis Chapman, but she hasn’t lived in the area in years. And though everybody is denying knowledge of why she was back in town, as Kathleen and her detective boyfriend, Marcus, begin nosing around, they discover more people are connected to the deceased than claimed to be. Now Marcus, Kathleen, and her uncanny cats have to unravel this midwinter tale before the case gets cold. (Goodreads)
Ziggy Breener, the town eccentric, has pedaled his decrepit bicycle around Burnt Cove, Maine for nearly a decade, picking up empty cans and bottles for the deposit. In all that time, he has avoided talking about his previous life, being satisfied to live in a one-room shack amidst a rag-tag collection of junk and livestock. The fact is that few people notice Ziggy riding the roads, and those who do have little interest in where he came from. All that changes when “The Can Man” inherits a valuable piece of waterfront land on the prestigious Squirrel Point Road. Sadly, his newfound wealth brings with it newfound enemies, and worse, old enemies from his past as well. When Ziggy is nearly killed, amateur sleuths Sarah Cassidy and Oliver Wendell step in to help, but who is the real Ziggy Breener? He won’t give them a straight answer, and it turns out that unraveling their friend’s tortured past is a dangerous job, especially when powerful people are out to give Ziggy the gift of death for Christmas. (Goodreads)
The family has gathered to celebrate Christmas at Jillian’s house in Clover Hills, but Jillian’s plans for a lovely Christmas Eve are rudely interrupted by a power failure. And a homicide. Not only does Aunt Jillian find herself with a house full of company to entertain in the dark, but she also receives a call from Detective Walter Montoya who finds himself in the dark trying to solve the bizarre murder of a worker found dead in a maintenance shed at the power station. With Teddy at her side, Jillian is determined to solve the mystery. (Goodreads)
Christmas Books
Every day between now and Christmas I will spotlight some Christmas books for your reading pleasure. I hope you find some that you will enjoy. Happy Reading.
“If you like dogs, you’ll love Laurien Berenson’s Melanie Travis mysteries!” —Joanne Fluke, New York Times bestselling author
Ever wonder what Melanie and Aunt Peg were up to before solving murders? Let’s step back in time, when college-aged Melanie and her indomitable Aunt Peg were little more than strangers…
It’s Christmas in Connecticut, and Peg Turnbull can’t wait to spend her favorite holiday cozying up to husband Max and their clan of pedigree Poodles in Greenwich. But Peg’s spirits drop when the family of Max’s estranged brother Michael invites the pair over for Christmas dinner. Could her in-laws want to settle the long-standing feud over Nana’s will? Peg isn’t expecting any miracles, but it’s been ages since Peg last saw her niece and nephew. Little Melanie must be out of pigtails by now…
When they arrive at the Turnbulls, Peg is not just surprised by how much Melanie has grown up. The family has spared no expense in preparing for the festivities—unusual, considering Michael blew his inheritance after years of financial troubles. Peg suspects there’s an awful secret tucked beneath her brother-in-law’s ostentatious good cheer, and she’s determined to get to the bottom of it. Once she does, someone’s ending up in the doghouse… (Goodreads)
A Scrooge steals presents right from under Sophie Winston’s family Christmas tree. Then her sister-in-law’s father show’s up with a diva girlfriend just a month after his separation. More than one person is thinking of committing a merry murder-until it actually happens! With many under suspicion for the deadly deed, can Sophie find the murderer and restore the Christmas spirit before it’s too late? (Goodreads)
It’s getting to look a lot like Christmas on the sea island of Broward’s Rock, South Carolina. At the popular Death on Demand mystery bookstore, owner Annie Darling’s energetic Yuletide preparations have to be put on hold thanks to several rather inconvenient distractions including a slew of family woes … and murder.
Annie’s mother-in-law Laurel, not normally the straightest of arrows anyway, has taken to chatting up ghosts in the local graveyard. Across the island in a spacious, spooky mansion, ancient onetime movie star Marguerite Dumaney Ladson has called together all her living kin and their multitude of exes for her gala combination Xmas/birthday bash. Among the honored guests are two that Annie could well do without: her errant father, whom she hasn’t seen in twenty five years, and Dr. Emory Swanson, Laurel’s guide down “The Golden Path.”
Like Laurel, wealthy old Rita Dumaney Ladson has fallen for Swanson’s new-age-pseudo-occult gobbledygook. The question is: how are the gathered relatives going to react to the grande dame’s announcement that she’s leaving her fortune to the charismatic charlatan’s Evermore Foundation? Not well, apparently,since a murder follows right on the heels of Rita’s shocking revelation. And the finger of suspicion seems to be pointing straight at Annie Darling’s recently arrived deadbeat dad.
Annie can feel no loyalty toward the father she’s never really known, but she doesn’t believe for a minute he’s guilty. And when a second murder puts her conflicted emotions into an even more chaotic tailspin, Annie realizes that she will need all the help her easy-going PI. husband Max can offer to solve a related pair of homicides. Because, in this season of giving, fate is giving her more major headaches and a killer is giving her more corpses than even the normally unflappable Annie Darling may be able to handle. (Goodreads)
Lucy Resnick’s nerves are as tight as a tea cozy. Her new goats, Hot Lips and Gidget, keep making a break for the town square, her truck is dying, and her boyfriend’s gorgeous ex-wife is in town for the holidays. Worse, someone’s digging holes on her land…and uprooting her peach orchard and dewberry patch in the process. Lucy needs additional holiday stress like she needs a blow to the head—which she receives one night, courtesy of the mystery digger.
When the dim-witted sheriff arrests one of Lucy’s best friends, the former reporter puts her own problems on the back burner and starts investigating. What she finds is a patchwork of clues—an injured puppy, a sapphire necklace gone missing, and a string of poison-pen letters—that draws her deep into a web of small-town secrets.
Word travels fast in Buttercup. When the killer learns Lucy’s on the trail, Lucy finds she needs more than her reporting skills to save her friend—she needs a Christmas miracle.(Goodreads)
Super-crafter Kiki Lowenstein is cramming as much into the ho-ho-holiday season as she can. But Kiki’s ambitious plans come to a crashing halt when her student, Eudora Field, drops dead at the start of one of Kiki’s community center classes. An overeager security guard is convinced that Eudora didn’t make her transition without help. Now it’s up to Kiki to determine who was nice, and who was very, very naughty, indeed. (Goodreads)
Antique print dealer Maggie Summer has come to Maine for a storybook Christmas with her beloved Will Brewer and his Great-Aunt Nettie, who has gathered together her longtime friends for holiday celebrations. Maggie and Will love each other, although Maggie is determined to adopt children and Will has misgivings. But this problem is put on hold when Maggie hears cryptic references by Aunt Nettie s old friends to buried secrets from their youth. One elderly woman suffers from dementia, remembering those past events better than the gifts she just opened. Will she blurt out information about an old crime so dangerous that someone would commit murder to prevent its being revealed? Blackmail and murder are only the beginning. It may be a Merry Christmas but who will still be around to see in a Happy New Year?” (Goodreads)
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