Amateur Sleuth Cozy

Almost everyone in Excelsior, Minnesota - craftsy and non-craftsy alike - has turned out for the art fair. So when an artisan is murdered there, the list of suspects is practically endless. Betsy Devonshire wants to help out in the police investigation. Her best friend, Officer Jill Cross, confides that they have a lead: A bloody footprint in the woodcarvers' booth matches that of a local youth. But when Betsy can't keep the news to herself, Jill gives Betsy the cold shoulder. Everyone's on pins and needles - and when the family of the kid in question asks Betsy to prove his innocence, she must first regain Jill's trust.

My tiny town of Fig Harbor's just recovering from our last tango with murder, only to be faced with yet another - and this time, it sure looks an awful lot like a vampire's on the loose in the PNW. Vampires are just Twilight fiction, right? I'm not so sure after a murder victim is found in my koi pond right next to my favorite fish, Koi George, (not good!), with bite marks on her neck and a gothic antique chalice next to her body with blood residue.

Mae West is getting settled into the RV lifestyle as the owner of a Happy Trails Campground in Normal, Kentucky. Betts Hager is desperate for help with her cleaning business, and Mae offers her services. Heiress Tammy Jo Bentley's mansion is the first one on her schedule, and Mae makes sure Tammy Jo's house is spotless because the Kentucky Kennel Association's annual meeting is going to be held at the mansion. Fifi, Tammy Jo's high pedigree, insured poodle, is going to be on display, but before the annual meeting, Camille Braun, Fifi's nanny, is stabbed to death.

September 1909, and Lady Hardcastle and her maid, Florence, have been invited to Lord Riddlethorpe’s country estate for a week of motor racing and parties. They both agree that it sounds like a perfectly charming holiday. But when one of the drivers dies in a crash during the very first race, they discover that what seemed like an uncharacteristic error in judgement may have a more sinister explanation...

Retired teachers Pat, Liz and Thelma are happiest whiling away their hours over coffee, cake and chat at the Thirsk Garden Centre café. But when their good friend tells them about unsettling experience she had in a sinister-feeling charity shop, they simply can’t resist investigating. Because the entire shop has vanished into thin air. Before long, our trio of unlikely sleuths find themselves embroiled in a race against the clock to get to the bottom of this mystery – but who has a secret to hide and how far will they go to keep it concealed?

Juliet's personal and professional lives have recently received an extra jolt of energy. Her romance with the hunky detective Ryder Hamilton continues to simmer, and business at Java Jive has never been better. But her good mood quickly turns as stale as day-old espresso when she finds out that Ryder has been promoted to his precinct's homicide division. With him risking his life to catch the worst kind of criminals, Juliet's growing sense of unease ignites when a local college student goes missing.

Daphne Templeton's sister Piper is getting married - and their mother is getting carried away. She insists on hiring Sylvan Creek's top event planner, Abigail Sinclair, who proposes an Independence Day theme complete with Statue of Liberty-inspired bridesmaid dresses. With all the bickering among the families, Daphne's glad her only duty right now is pet-sitting for Abby's cat, Ms. Peebles. But there are some fireworks coming that aren't part of the ceremony. The Poconos will never be the same....

Miss Marple meets Oscar Wilde in this new series of cosy mysteries set in the picturesque Cotswolds village of Bunburry. Here, fudge-making and quaffing real ale in the local pub are matched by an undercurrent of passion, jealousy, hatred and murder - laced with a welcome dose of humour. This compilation contains episodes 4 - 6.

January 1910. A journalist has been killed in a suspicious blaze. Everything points to a group of suffragettes, but the apparent culprit insists she is innocent. When Lady Hardcastle receives a letter from a suffragette requesting her urgent help, the retired spy turned sleuth knows only she stands between an accused young woman and the gallows. Evidence at the scene makes Lizzie Worrel’s innocence difficult to believe, and with the police treating it as an open-and-shut case of arson, Lady Hardcastle faces a barrage of resistance as she tries to dig out the truth.

Jessica Sterling's candlelight-themed nuptial promises to be the perfect kick-off to the summer's first official holiday weekend. Stella's thrilled to have been chosen to provide the decorative centerpiece for the wedding ceremony: a two-foot tall scented unity candle - a symbol of the happy couple's love. But it looks like the bride-to-be's uncle won't be walking his niece down the aisle after he's found dead. The murder weapon is Stella's seemingly indestructible candle, now split in two.

School psychologist Skye Denison-Boyd had hoped that her maternity leave would be at least a little relaxing, but when she and her husband, Wally, meet with the priest to discuss their newborn twins' christening, an explosion at the nearby bowling alley rocks the rectory. And although the business was closed at the time of the blast, there's a body inside. As police chief, Wally is inevitably drawn into the investigation, which seems to indicate that foul play is afoot again in Scumble River, and Skye can't help but do a bit of her own sleuthing.

If Emily has learned anything from her past as a 911 operator, it's to stay calm during stressful situations. But that's a tall order when one of her regulars, Georgia Treetor, goes missing. Georgia never skips morning cappuccinos with her knitting circle. Her pals fear the worst - especially Lois, a close friend who recently moved to town. As evening creeps in, Emily and the ladies search for Georgia at home. And they find her - murdered among a scattering of stale donuts....

A number-one New York Times best-selling author, Charlaine Harris penned the addictive Sookie Stackhouse series. In Day Shift psychic Manfred Bernardo is hounded by the press after a client drops dead during a reading. Turning to the local vampire's lover for help, Manfred hopes she can put the squeeze on the scandal before someone else is put on ice.

When Hannah learns that her sister Michelle's boyfriend, Detective Lonnie Murphy, is the prime suspect in a murder case, she goes straight from a movie studio sound stage to the Los Angeles airport. Back in frigid Minnesota, she discovers that proving Lonnie's innocence will be harder than figuring out what went wrong with a recipe. Lonnie remembers only parts of the night he went out to a local bar and ended up driving a very impaired woman home.

Pamela Paterson and Bettina Fraser call their crafting group Knit and Nibble, in honor of its two main activities. But on a stormy Halloween night, their peaceful chat over spiced cider and cookies is interrupted by homicide . . . With the houses of Arborville, New Jersey, decked out in festively frightening decorations, it's easy to mistake a real dead body for a fake. But Pamela and Bettina are alerted by the screams of teenage trick-or-treaters to the corpse next door. Their neighbor Adrienne's sister, visiting from New York City, is slumped on the porch, fatally stabbed.

Young Tom French was found dead, lying in a marsh on the Norfolk coast, with his head bashed in and his binoculars still around his neck. One of the best birders in England, Tom had put the village of Rushy on the birdwatching map. Everyone liked him. Or did they? George Palmer-Jones, an elderly birdwatcher who decided quietly to look into the brutal crime, discovered mixed feelings aplenty. Still, he remained baffled by a deed that could have been motivated by thwarted love, pure envy, or something else altogether.

Late October 1909, and the season of ghouls and things that go bump in the night has descended on the village of Littleton Cotterell. Lady Hardcastle and her trusted lady’s maid, Florence, find themselves hosting a colorful cast of actors whose spooky moving picture, The Witch’s Downfall, is being shown to mark Halloween. But things take a macabre turn when the first night’s screening ends with a mysterious murder, and the second night with another. One by one the actors turn up dead in ways that eerily echo their film.

A visit to the local village fete for a spot of fun and relaxation turns into a nightmare for Agatha Raisin when she discovers the body of the local landowner in the woods with an arrow in his chest and trousers round his ankles. Agatha’s old adversary, Detective Chief Inspector Wilkes, declares the death a tragic accident, believing the victim has been hit by a stray arrow from an archery demonstration. Agatha is convinced of foul play, however, and is shocked when Wilkes eventually agrees … with her as his prime murder suspect.

During the most wonderful time of the year, famous author Helen Monroe arrives in Briar Creek to be the writer in residence, but her “bah humbug” attitude excludes her from the many holiday celebrations the town residents enjoy. To try to spread some Christmas cheer, library director Lindsey Norris invites the new writer in town to join her crafternoon club. Helen politely refuses and when an altercation happens between Helen and another patron, Lindsey begins to suspect the author has been keeping to herself for a reason.

Finlay Donovan and her nanny/partner-in-crime Vero are in sore need of a girls’ weekend away. They plan a trip to Atlantic City, but odds are—seeing as it’s actually a cover story to negotiate a deal with a dangerous loan shark, save Vero’s childhood crush Javi, and hunt down a stolen car—it won’t be all fun and games. When Finlay’s ex-husband Steven and her mother insist on tagging along too, Finlay and Vero suddenly have a few too many meddlesome passengers along for the ride.