Historical Cozy

Join Posie Parker, London’s premier female Private Detective, and Chief Inspector Lovelace of New Scotland Yard as they spend Christmas Eve at Rebburn Abbey, home of the Earl and Countess of Cardigeon. Each house guest is invited to share a personal mystery, but what unfolds turns out to be less a cozy cornucopia of fire-side Christmas cheer than a series of curiously interlinked and unsettling mysteries.

It's 1763. Career diplomat Alec Halsey returns to London and the shocking news his estranged elder brother, the Earl of Delvin, has not only killed his friend in a duel but become engaged to the woman he had hoped to marry. When Alec reluctantly attends a weekend house party to celebrate his brother's engagement he gets more than he bargained for when a lady's maid is murdered, the bride-to-be is attacked, and a guest is shot dead.

It's Christmastime in 1905 New York City, and for once Molly Murphy Sullivan is looking forward to the approaching holidays. She has a family of her own now: She and Daniel have a baby son, and 12-year-old Bridie is living with them as their ward. As Molly and the children listen to carolers in the street, they hear a lovely voice, the voice of an angel, and see a beggar girl huddled in a doorway, singing "Away in a Manger". Bridie is touched by the girl's ragged clothes and wants to help her out if they can.

Charming and feisty Poppy Redfern stumbles into murder in this exciting new World War II historical mystery series from critically acclaimed author Tessa Arlen. In a remote English village, two popular women who are dating American servicemen are found strangled, and Poppy must team up with a pilot to unearth chilling secrets before she becomes the next victim.

London, 1815. Lady Petra Forsyth, daughter of the Earl of Holbrook, has made a shocking proclamation. After losing her beloved fiancé in an accident three years earlier, she announces in front of London’s loosest lips that she will never marry. A woman of independent means—and rather independent ways—Petra sees no reason to cede her wealth and freedom to any man now that the love of her life is gone. Instead, she plans to continue enjoying the best of society without any expectations.

The thirty-fourth mystery in Peter Tremayne's long-standing and much-loved series, Revenge of the Stormbringer features 7th-century Irish super-sleuth Sister Fidelma.

Works by best-selling author Susan Wittig Albert have been nominated for the Agatha and Anthony awards. In The Tale of Oat Cake Crag, Miss Beatrix Potter is frustrated by distractions near her home. As the noisy test flights of a hydroplane disrupt her concentration, Beatrix investigates a string of bizarre letters threatening a friend’s reputation. Then life becomes even more complicated when the body of the hydroplane project funder is found at the foot of Oat Cake Crag.

With her third London season drawing to a close, the shy Eliza Malcolm seems unlikely to find any husband, let alone a titled one. But when the hunting-crazed Duke of Brockenhurst invites the Malcolms to visit Harrowhaven, Eliza's father jumps at the chance to gain a wealthy son-in-law. Surrounded by quarreling parents, tactless acquaintances, the aloof dowager, and the unsettling duke, Eliza looks for one person kind enough to help her navigate the murky waters of Harrowhaven's secrets.

Evelyn Christie has resigned herself to another long, boring weekend at Hessleham Hall, the home of her husband, Tommy's, family. However, it turns out to be anything but dull when his uncle, the Earl of Northmoor, is shockingly murdered! Evelyn must use all of her sleuthing knowledge, gained whilst she was a member of the Police force during the war, to find out who the murderer is before the bungling local police force decide the Earl was bumped off so Tommy could inherit his title.

London, 1918. Fiona Figg finds herself back in Old Blighty saddled with shuffling papers for the war office. Then a mysterious card arrives, inviting her to a fancy house party at Mentmore Castle. This year’s Ascot-themed do will play host to a stable of animal defense advocates, and Fiona is tasked with infiltrating the activists and uncovering possible anti-war activity. Disguised as the Lady Tabitha Kenworthy, Fiona is more than ready for the “mane” event, but the odds are against her when both her arch nemesis and would-be fiancé arrive unexpectedly and “stirrup” her plans.

The summer of 1926 brings high fashion to Hyde Park. Ginger's Regent Street dress shop, Feathers & Flair, is a major sponsor, and when top designer Coco Chanel makes an appearance, the London fashion scene lights up. Until a model drops dead and Miss Chanel is suspected of murder. The fashion icon hires Lady Gold Investigations to clear her name, but can Ginger discover the murderer before becoming a lifeless mannequin herself?

Beloved author Mary Stewart's long-lost novella, now available again for the first time in 40 years. In 1879 a wealthy young woman elopes with an impoverished fisherman, leaving her family, who live on the volcanic island of Lanzarote, distraught. In 1968, 23-year-old Perdita West, secretary to the famous author Cora Gresham, visits Lanzarote, the strangest and wildest of the Canary Isles, on a research trip. They meet Cora's estranged son, Mike, and fall in love with the unusual, beautiful little island.

Plagued with guilt, Freda Simonson, the only witness to the murder of the landlord of Langcliffe's tavern, believes that her testimony may have convicted the wrong man, but when she passes, the case seems closed. It just so happens, though, that Freda's nephew is courting the renowned amateur sleuth Kate Shackleton, who has decided to holiday in Langcliffe with her teenage niece, Harriet.

What happens when a bride says no? He is the bastard son of a duke, arrogant, handsome, a little bit dangerous, and, of course, one of the most sought-after bachelors in London. He is also about to be publically jilted by some chit of a girl! Blake Stephens' pride isn't about to let him be humiliated, so he charges after his bride to the wilds of Scotland, determined to bring her to the altar. What happens when the heart says yes? He is promised to one woman, but discovers his soul stirred by…the chit's sister!

Seth, the seven-year-old Earl of Woodridge, is spending Christmas at Halton House and he would like nothing better than to help trim the tree with the Christmas decorations his father had carved for him. But no one has any idea where these decorations are. Determined to make the young Earl's wish come true, Evie and her bodyguard, Tom Winchester, set out to a nearby village where the young Earl had lived in the hope that they might recover the lost decorations. They find themselves among a group of people who might all be suspects in the murder of a local villager.

When amateur sleuth Augusta Peel receives a mysterious letter about a missing young woman, she can’t resist helping with the search. But the case takes a turn when an art student is found dead in a Bloomsbury square. Could the murder have something to do with Augusta’s investigation? The more questions she asks, the fewer answers she receives. Someone’s hiding something.

Maple Bishop is ready to put WWII and the grief of losing her husband, Bill, behind her. But when she discovers that Bill left her penniless, Maple realizes she could lose her Vermont home next and sets out to make money the only way she knows how: by selling her intricately crafted dollhouses. Business is off to a good start—until Maple discovers her first customer dead, his body hanging precariously in his own barn.

Sarah Brandt is shattered when she learns that a woman has inquired at Hope’s Daughters Mission for Catherine, the abandoned child she has taken as her daughter. The woman claims she was Catherine’s nursemaid, now acting on behalf of the girl’s mother to reunite them. Unwilling to simply hand Catherine over to a complete stranger, Sarah asks Malloy to investigate. But when he goes to interview the woman at her tenement in Chelsea, he finds she has been murdered. Though her death leaves Sarah’s claim to Catherine unchallenged, her sense of justice compels her to work with Malloy to find the killer.

In this Gaslight Mystery from the national best-selling author of Murder in Murray Hill, midwife Sarah Brandt and Detective Sergeant Frank Malloy investigate foul play in the secretive high-society world of 19th-century New York City....

Frank Malloy has never known any life other than that of a cop, but his newfound inheritance threatens his position within his department. While trying to keep both his relationship with Sarah and his fortune under wraps, he' s assigned to a new case - finding a missing young woman for her worried father, Henry Livingston. It seems the girl had been responding to "lonely hearts" ads in the paper for months before she disappeared.