Cozy Mystery Humor

As the chief problem solver for Babylon, Las Vegas’ most over-the-top destination, murder is a bit outside of her normal. But armed with a wicked wit and an even more wicked right-cross, Lucky takes it all in stride. But tonight taxes even Lucky’s formidable skills. Lucky’s former lover, Teddie, shows up, hat in hand. A gaggle of egomaniacal chefs appear for a televised cook-off. And Lucky’s current lover, Jean-Charles, stops answering his phone. Since trouble comes in threes, Lucky is sure this is the extent of tonight’s trouble. As usual, she’s a tad optimistic.

For all those craving more adventures of their favorite bookseller-by-day and burglar-by-night, The Burglar in Short Order for the first time ever collects all of Bernie Rhodenbarr's short-form appearances in one complete volume. From the story in which a prototype of Bernie first appeared (“A Bad Night for Burglars”) to his appearances in Playboy and (maybe? It's kinda complicated) Cosmopolitan...from an essay discussing Bernie's misadventures in Hollywood to a piece commissioned by a European publisher for a tourist guide to New York....

When Izzy Spellman, PI, is arrested for the fourth time in three months, she writes it off as a job hazard. She's been (obsessively) keeping surveillance on a suspicious next door neighbor (suspect's name: John Brown), convinced he's up to no good - even if her parents (the management at Spellman Investigations) are not.

Isabel Spellman's life consists of 24-hour surveillance, routine investigations into her acquaintances, and listening devices planted in her deadbolt-locked room. For a 28-year-old in a family composed almost entirely of private investigators or former cops, the tools of the trade turn typical family dysfunction into commonplace espionage.

Everyone adores Miss May, except the guilty. In a small town where neighbors know each other, lawn chairs come out in the spring; if you sit around chatting long enough, someone brings you pie; and there are still skeletons in every closet. Luckily for Pine Grove, Miss May has a nose for crime. The body was found face-down in the orchard.

Nothing sets the gossips of Tequila Key on fire as much as a new mystery to solve, and word on the street is that a flamingo statue for the new mini-golf course has been stolen. When the Flamingo King himself arrives in town to investigate, no one is more shocked than Althea when Miss Elva takes a shine to the man. Despite her protests, Althea is dragged into chaperoning Miss Elva on their dates, all while doing her best to not to cringe every time she hears Miss Elva giggle.

Maplemead Castle is crawling with ghosts, and the new owners need them gone. When Melody Bittersweet and the Girls' Ghostbusting Agency arrive on scene, they quickly identify the troublemakers swinging from the chandeliers...literally. A century ago, stunning trapeze artist Britannia Lovell plunged to her death, and has done every night since. But did she really just fall, or was there something more to her demise?

This year, all Melanie wants for Christmas is a dull moment. Between her son Davey, her teaching job, and showing her Standard Poodle puppy, Eve, there just aren't enough hours in the day. But when Davey's usual bus driver, Henry Pruitt, disappears and is replaced by a surly, pierced, twentysomething, Melanie is concerned. The elderly, amiable Henry was a friend to all in the neighborhood, so she decides to check on him.... only to find that he died two days earlier, under suspicious circumstances.

On the edge of the Navajo Nation, rookie paralegal Naomi Manymules pauses on a lakeside clifftop to enjoy a moonlit moment. She hears someone swimming in the darkness far below her, and a boat drifts out of the shadows. When she glimpses something that might be a naked butt shining in the moonlight, she decides to head for home. What she saw was the bare behind of a murdered local sleaze. His passing upsets exactly no one, but his wife can offer only a coyote for an alibi.

Leave it to me, Lexi Carmichael, to become a target for an elite organization of cybercriminals simply by being in the wrong place at the right time. As if I weren't already freaking out about planning my best friend's bachelorette party, I now have to keep my eyes peeled for people trying to kill me. After accidentally intercepting a dangerous hack into the NSA and discovering the involvement of a foreign country in said hack, things begin to get seriously complicated. Diplomats, danger, and spies, oh my!

After a series of high-profile cases at my cyberintelligence firm, I was looking forward to a simple job. All I had to do was personally deliver a revolutionary microchip to a manufacturing plant in Indonesia. Easy, right? Wrong. Someone else wants the design and is willing to kill to get it. A failed hijacking attempt lands me; my best friend, Basia; and our boss, Finn, in the middle of the jungle.

When Houston reporter Lucy Resnick cashes in her retirement to buy her grandmother's farm in Buttercup, Texas, she's looking forward to a simple life as a homesteader. But Lucy has barely finished putting up her first batch of Killer Dewberry Jam when an oil exploration truck rolls up to the farm and announces plans to replace her broccoli patch with an oil derrick.

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.

After a long winter, spring has finally hit Hemlock Cove, and Bay Winchester thinks things are finally settling down in the town - and with her family. Unfortunately, just the opposite is true. As a way to distract Aunt Tillie, the Winchester family has decided to give her a new project: her own greenhouse. As construction starts, though, Bay is approached by a young girl - one she quickly realizes is no longer among the living - and given a task. The little girl wants her mother - and she wants Bay to find her.

At any moment a perfect summer day in Crozet, Virginia - nestled within the Blue Ridge Mountains - might turn stormy and tempestuous, as Harry knows too well when a squall suddenly sweeps in. In a blink Harry's pickup nearly collides with a careening red car that then swerves into a ditch. Harry recognizes the dead driver slumped over the vehicle's steering wheel: Barbara Leader was nurse and confidante to former Virginia governor Sam Holloway.

SWFG: Single, White, Female, Geek. "That's me, Lexi Carmichael, a reformed hacker who was gainfully employed by the National Security Agency. But a series of extraordinary events led me to leave government life behind for a fresh start with a brand-new company and an incredibly sexy boss, Finn Shaughnessy. It may not be kosher to have the hots for your boss, but he seems to have the hots for me, too. If only things didn't get so complicated...."

Italy might seem like a long way to go to hide after a disastrous date. But when sexy uberhacker Slash (no, that's not his real name) asks me to go with him to Rome on an investigation, the timing is sort of perfect. My messed-up love life becomes the least of my worries, though, after the dead body, the near-kidnapping and the discovery of a top secret encrypted file that even I can't hack.

Eli’s asked to perform his magic act at a swanky charity gala, the Zombie Ball - a former zombie pub crawl which has grown into an annual high-class social event. What begins as a typical stage show for Eli turns deadly when two of the evening’s sponsors are found murdered under truly unusual circumstances. Compounding this drama is the presence of Eli’s ex-wife and her new husband, Homicide Detective Fred Hutton. Under pressure to solve the crime before the 800 guests depart, Eli and his detective nemesis go head-to-head.

Callahan Garrity has her hands full trying to expand her House Mouse cleaning business. So she's reluctant to take on a client in need of detective services, especially when that client is the most notorious woman in Atlanta - Whitney Albright Dobbs. Whitney is a wealthy socialite who, while under the influence, hit and killed a young black girl and just kept driving. Whitney's light sentence has set the city's racial tensions ablaze, and Callahan is not especially keen on helping track down Whitney's soon-to-be-ex-husband's hidden assets.

Easy's getting harder every day for Tara. A tax-evading pet groomer managed to buzz off a big chunk of her hair...just in time for her strictly-business meeting with country-music heartthrob Brazos Rivers. Of course Tara shouldn't care - she's devoted to Special Agent Nick Pratt, after all - but Rivers does know how to steal a woman's heart with a song....