Rural Town Mystery

Ike Schwartz, former spook and erstwhile sheriff of Picketsville, has his vacation interrupted when an old CIA buddy asks him to look into a pilot's disappearance. What looks like a simple missing person's case soon catapults Ike into an international thriller with intimations of terrorism that might threaten the nation and its leaders.

The high-school principal asks China to secretly investigate the popular football coach who led the Panthers to six state championships. Soon after China confirms the coach's predilection for teenage girls, one of his victims turns up dead and suspicion falls upon the lecherous coach.

In October of 1967, the Summer of Love is history, rock and roll is dark and revolutionary, and people in the small east Texas community of Center Springs simply want to live their lives as quietly as possible. But a handsome darkness in the form of Las Vegas gangster Anthony Agrioli has left the business to hide out in their tiny backwater settlement with his blond bombshell girlfriend.

Between juggling lunchboxes, piano lessons, and baby-sitters, public defender turned stay-at-home mom Juliet Applebaum promises to help her famous friend clear her brother's name of murder. But what will she do when she begins to suspect her friend may not be as innocent as she seems?

Sam Blackman is an angry man. A chief warrant officer in the criminal investigation detachment of the U.S. military, he lost a leg in Iraq and has been outspoken in his criticism of his medical treatment. Then, ex-marine and fellow amputee Tikima Robertson walks into his hospital room, hinting that she has an opportunity for Sam to use his investigative skills. But before she can return, Tikima is murdered.

In the summer of 1916, a big twister brings destruction to the land around Boynton, Oklahoma. Alafair Tucker's family and neighbors are not spared the ruin and grief spread by the storm. But no one is going to mourn for Jubal Beldon, who made it his business to know the ugly secrets of everyonei n town. It doesn't matter if Jubal's insinuations are true or not. In a small town like Boynton, rumor is as damaging as fact.

At Crewel World - the needlework shop in Excelsior, Minnesota, run by Betsy Devonshire - an array of beautifully hand-dyed yarns are supplied by Hailey Brent, an avid hand-dyer as well as a customer. But shortly after her most recent delivery of yarn, Hailey is found dead in her home, with a gunshot wound to the head. Betsy can't imagine who might have killed Hailey, but she is determined to find out.

When a corpse is discovered by a mountain, Lacey McCrae must trade in her Christmas shopping for Victim Services in order to find the killer before they strike again.

The residents of the small town of Artemis are suspicious when a community called The Drummers moves into a local abandoned church. Their leader, Gideon, claims their aim is simple: to live peacefully off the grid without government interference. But when local power substations are sabotaged and the whole of West Texas loses electricity, all fingers point to them. Forced to intervene, Police Chief Josie Gray and her team try to enter the church only for gunshots to be exchanged. Inside the church, one young girl is killed, with Gideon claiming Josie's stray bullet hit her.

It's December in White Eagle, and Tess and Tony are preparing for a huge Christmas celebration. The town is planning their annual festival, which has Tess and Tony struggling to stay ahead of things. In addition to their work with the festival, Tess fills in for the mail carrier who took over her route, and Tony spends long days with Shaggy working to finish the development of their most recent video game. In spite of their busy schedules, things seem to be going smoothly until an unexpected visitor comes to town with an unusual request.

Get ready to solve yet another fun mystery alongside Sophie Sayers! When a dead body is found in the school’s lost property over the summer holidays, it’s up to Sophie Sayers to get to the bottom of it – or face the threat of closure. But when the body disappears and the police refuse to investigate, a complex web of deceit causes trembles throughout the village.

Tess fills in at the post office after the woman who took over her route broke her leg. While on route for the first time in a year, she discovers that her father has left her brother Mike with a baby to hide and protect. Tess has never really been one to go all gooey over babies, but when she discovers this particular little darling in need, she enlists Tony's help to make sure she is well-hidden, and to look for the baby's mother. Meanwhile, Tess' mother has a new boyfriend her father isn't too happy about and Mike has a new murder to solve.

Harry Jacobsen is a disgraced failure of a foreign correspondent. Fired from a respected New York City paper, he takes refuge as editor for a small weekly in a quiet town on the Chesapeake. It’s not quiet for long. A trio of children come across the sunken hulk of a Black man’s racing boat, lost 30 years ago. The captain, Walker John Douglas, had crashed his vessel after killing two white women and burning down half the town in a period of racial unrest. Harry's investigative reporter instincts kick in, and he begins to delve into the history of Walker and the infamous inferno.

Already suffering the privations of the 1930s Dust Bowl, an Oklahoma town is further devastated when a passenger train derails—flooding its hospital with the dead and maimed. Among the seriously wounded is Etha, wife of Sheriff Temple Jennings. Overwhelmed by worry for her, the sheriff must regain his footing to investigate the derailment, which rapidly develops into a case of sabotage.

For one brief hour on a sunny Texas morning, amateur baker Rosie Hart glimpses the life she’s always dreamed about - thanks to a surprise inheritance from the late Miss Alice. But her benefactor is barely cold in the ground when Rosie is accused of her murder. As the only stranger in the tight-knit Airlie Falls community, and the only person with an obvious motive, all eyes turn to Rosie. Especially when more bodies begin to pile up and mysterious letters from the grave start circulating faster than Rosie can pull a tray of cherry nut clusters out of the oven.

A drifter wanders into the small town of Anson and finds himself in the middle of a feud with the neighboring town of Brandon. Who is this drifter and why is he here? Find out in the action-packed adventure 'This is My Town.

In her Food Lovers' Village Mysteries, Agatha Award-winning author Leslie Budewitz introduces us to Jewel Bay, a tight-knit Montana community that thrives on tourism and farm-to-table fare. Featuring Erin Murphy, beloved proprietor of the Merc—a century-old general store converted into a local foods market-each book brings us closer to the folks who call Jewel Bay home, and the cunning culprits in their midst.

Mack Peters is a self-made millionaire who was once a Los Angeles cop. When his friend suggested a trip to picturesque Leavenworth, Washington, she had an ulterior motive. He had no idea it would lead him to the little-known town of Watson Falls with a secret more deadly than he could ever imagine, and a search for a missing investigative reporter.

Can Jack untangle the murderous web of lies and solve the case before he gets trapped in the killer’s deadly scheme? Murder in the San Juans is a gripping tale of betrayal in the formidable San Juan Mountains around Telluride, Colorado, and the fourth book in the suspenseful Mountain Resort Mystery Series.

When Vermont antique and art dealer Edie Brown discovers an unsettlingly dark collage by the famed reclusive “outsider” artist known only as Vespa, she opens a Pandora’s Box of deception and danger. Edie teams up with Uncle Tuck and Kala to investigate the background of the collage, but they only uncover secrets that are more disturbing than the artwork itself. As Edie tracks down the validity of the piece, she stumbles into an art underground where some people are willing to kill to keep their schemes a secret.