Cozy Detective

A touring theatre company in New Zealand forms the basis of one of Marsh’s most ambitious and innovative novels. New Zealand theatrical manager Alfred Meyer wanted to celebrate his wife’s birthday in style. The piece de résistance would be the jeroboam of champagne which would descend gently into a nest of fern and coloured lights on the table, set up on stage after the performance. But something went horribly wrong. Chief Detective Inspector Alleyn witnessed it himself.

When Jack and Sarah are called in to investigate mysterious pranks at an exclusive girls' private school, it seems at first that it might be the work of a few mean pupils with a grudge. But things quickly turn serious when a popular teacher meets a sudden, violent death. Now, with murder in the air, Jack and Sarah have their own lessons to learn about the Cherringham Girls School, its dark secrets... and who wanted that teacher dead before they learned the truth.

Robin and Aurora have finally begun their adventure in parenting. With newborn Sophie proving to be quite a handful, Roe's mother pays for a partially trained nurse, Virginia Mitchell, to come help the new parents for a few weeks. One particularly stormy night, Roe wakes to hear her daughter crying and Virginia nowhere to be found. Roe's brother Philip helps her search the house, and they happen upon a body outside. But it isn't Virginia's. Who is this mystery woman dead in their backyard, and what happened to Virginia?

Aurora Teagarden is basking in the news of her pregnancy when disaster strikes her small Georgia town: four kids vanish from the school soccer field in an afternoon. Aurora's 15-year-old brother, Phillip, is one of them. Also gone are two of his friends and an 11-year-old girl who was just hoping to get a ride home from soccer practice. And then there's an even worse discovery - at the kids' last known destination, a dead body.

The powerful Lord complains loudly to the local bishop, who asks Father Max Tudor, vicar of Nether Monkslip and former MI5 agent, to investigate. Just as Max comes to believe the poisoning was accidental, a body is discovered in the cloister well. Can Max Tudor solve the case and restore order in time to attend his own nuptials?

What's a kitchen witch to do when her almost-fiance leaves her suddenly single and unemployed? For Mia Malone, the answer's simple: move to her grandmother's quirky Idaho hometown, where magic is an open secret and witches and warlocks are (mostly) welcome. With a new gourmet dinner delivery business - and a touch of magic in her recipes - Mia's hopes are high. But her first catering job takes a distasteful turn when her client's body is found stabbed and stuffed under the head table.

Max Tudor has adapted well to his post as vicar of St. Edwold's in the idyllic village of Nether Monkslip. The quiet village seems the perfect home for Max, who has fled a harrowing past as an MI5 agent. But this new-found serenity is quickly shattered when the highly vocal and unpopular president of the Women's Institute turns up dead at the Harvest Fayre. The death looks like an accident, but Max's training as a former agent kicks in, and before long he suspects foul play.

From deep in the heart of his 18th century English manor, millionaire Sir Adrian Beauclerk-Fisk writes mystery novels and torments his four spoiled children with threats of disinheritance. Gathering them all together for a family dinner, he announces his latest blow - a secret elopement. Within hours, eldest son and appointed heir Ruthven is found cleaved to death by a medieval mace. And soon Sir Adrian himself is found slumped over his writing desk - an ornate knife thrust into his heart.

In A Fatal Winter, Max Tudor - Anglican priest, former MI5 agent, and village heartthrob - investigates two deaths at Chedrow Castle. But his growing attraction to Awena Owen complicates his case, as does the recent arrival at Chedrow Castle of a raucous group of long-lost, greedy relatives, any one of whom has a motive for murder. With a cozy setting, intricate puzzles, and a handsome (non-celibate) priest doing the sleuthing, the books in this series are destined to become instant classics in the mystery world.

Caterer Goldy Schulz has been hired to host a hockey party. But the proceedings won’t be all fun and games. Unfortunately, her client won’t be satisfied until Goldy adds a hefty serving of revenge. Patricia McCracken is certain that her obstetrician and her penny-pinching HMO are responsible for the loss of her baby. Now she is suing both, and she wants Goldy’s advice on coming out on top. For Dr. John Richard Korman, aka the Jerk, is none other than Goldy’s abusive ex-husband.

Few were disappointed when Raoul Vernet was found with his head bashed in, dead in a pool of his own blood. On vacation in England, the Belgian seducer comes to visit Matilda, an old flame from a few years before. She agrees despite suspicions that Vernet has been deploying his legendary charm on another member of the family: young Rosie, who has returned from her Swiss boarding school carrying a child. None of the family members were in the house when Raoul was killed, but all were within a fog-choked London mile.

The Department of Sensitive Crimes is downsizing in light of a recent downturn of sensitive crime, and staff members are wondering who among them will be transferred elsewhere. As the bickering between colleagues intensifies, Ulf tries his best to stay above the fray. But when Anna, a longtime friend and coworker, appears to blame him for an old case that went sideways, it seems she may be putting her own job prospects above their friendship. In the midst of all this, Ulf embarks on an important inquiry: a man's cabin has disappeared and Ulf is tasked with finding out what happened.

Jo Jones has always had a little trouble fitting in. As a neurodivergent, hyperlexic book editor and divorced New Yorker transplanted into the English countryside, Jo doesn’t know what stands out more: her Americanisms or her autism. After losing her job, her mother, and her marriage all in one year, she couldn’t be happier to take possession of a possibly haunted (and clearly unwanted) family estate in North Yorkshire. But when the body of the moody town groundskeeper turns up on her rug with three bullets in his back, Jo finds herself in potential danger—and she’s also a potential suspect.

Sir Richard's family has spent years waiting for him to die, but despite his weak heart, the old man simply refuses to coopeate. In the meantime, he makes their lives miserable by changing his will every few months, depending on which of his strange brood he favors that moment. Now he calls them together to announce his most diabolical revision yet: complete disinheritance of all the wastrels who bear his name. But he never gets a chance to sign the papers—by morning, he's dead.

Willow Feathers McBeaver, aka Detective Duck, is a crime-solving (and very precocious) little duck. She and her animal pals live on Dogwood Pond, a beautiful pond in New England adjacent to Lazy Days, a human campground. Dogwood Pond has always been a pristine spot with clear water, abundant wildlife, and shady willow trees, but now it is encountering puzzling problems—mysteries that arise from human-caused disruptions in nature, such as water pollution, refuse, warming climate, and human encroachment.

Ella has discovered a secret room in the Yellow Cottage, but with it comes a ghost. Who was she? And how did she die? Ella needs to find the answers before either of them can find peace. But suddenly, things take a nasty turn for the worse.

Jessica Fletcher knows better than anyone that creativity is meant to be nurtured. So when a young lady from Cabot Cove shows promise as a country-and-western singer and songwriter, Jessica and a local citizens’ committee send the talented teen on a scholarship trip to Nashville, Tennessee, where she can benefit from professional instruction.

When bookstore event coordinator Molly Pink stumbles across the dead body of a crochet group's leader, her complicated past with the woman makes her a prime suspect. But while Molly's fending off a detective with a personal grudge and navigating the pitfalls of crochet group politics, the real killer remains at large. And it's up to her to catch the culprit - before she winds up in a tight knot....

On the day he retires, Inspector Ashwin Chopra inherits two unexpected mysteries. The first is the case of a drowned boy, whose suspicious death no one seems to want solved. And the second is a baby elephant. As his search for clues takes him across the teeming city of Mumbai, from its grand high rises to its sprawling slums and deep into its murky underworld, Chopra begins to suspect that there may be a great deal more to both his last case and his new ward than he thought.

Graham and Joan Bendix have apparently succeeded in making that eighth wonder of the modern world, a happy marriage. And into the middle of it there drops, like a clap of thunder, a box of chocolates. Joan Bendix is killed by a poisoned box of liqueur chocolates that cannot have been intended for her to eat. The police investigation rapidly reaches a dead end. Chief Inspector Moresby calls on Roger Sheringham and his Crimes Circle - six amateur but intrepid detectives - to consider the case.