Southern Fiction Mystery

Mae West, a far cry from the Hollywood actress, has been thrown for a loop. Her plush lifestyle in the big city of New York comes to a screeching halt after the FBI raids her mansion and arrests her husband, Paul West, for a Ponzi scheme that rips people out of millions of dollars. Mae finds herself homeless, friendless, and penniless. All hope isn't lost... the only thing Mae got to keep that the government didn't seize is a tourist camp ground, Happy Trails, in Normal, Kentucky.

For as long as she could remember, Susannah Faulkner knew that even though she lived a dangerous and violent life, she would try her best to do some good in the world. She’s hunted down evil men before, but the one man that puts fear into her heart, the one man who could destroy everything she loves, is the one man she cannot track down. And worst of all, she doesn’t know what will happen when she finds him...or if he finds her first.

It's Halloween season in Mississippi as Sarah Booth and the gang gather to decorate and gush over Tinkie's new baby, Maylin. Sarah Booth is just about to refresh the cocktails when she hears a knock on the door and opens it to find a woman named Frankie, distraught at the disappearance of her daughter, Christa, a young journalist. Christa had been investigating the disappearance of young women in New Orleans over a five-year period—one every year around Halloween. Now Christa herself is missing, and Frankie fears it may be connected to a cult based in the Garden District.

For Southern girl Verity Long, friendship means sitting down to stories and sweet tea on the front porch. For her gangster ghost housemate, it means dragging Verity out to a remote haunted asylum during a raging thunderstorm to do a favor for a long-dead mob boss. But Verity is always ready to help out a friend, even one as eternally eccentric as Frankie. And in the case of Mint Julep Manor, the stakes are too high to refuse.

Legal investigator Finley O’Sullivan has dealt with her share of shady characters, but the firm’s latest client has an even darker past than most. In fact, Nashville Metro Police seems to think he’s a murderer. Finley isn’t so sure. Her investigation into Ray Johnson’s history focuses on the unsolved murder of a teenager who died thirteen years earlier. The case went cold, but questions remain. After the girl’s death, people close to her started disappearing—Ray’s brother first, then the girl’s mother. But why?

As Sarah Booth sees it, Easter weekend is a time to celebrate life in all its many forms. So when the newly-pregnant Tinkie invites her and Cece on a girls’ trip to Lucedale, Missisippi to celebrate that spring has official sprung, Sarah Booth can’t resist. Plans include facials, food, and a trip to the incredible Garden of Bones - a miniature Holy Land with recreations of all parts of the Middle East - for their Sunrise Easter Services led by biblical scholar, gardener, and creator of the Gardens Daniel Reynolds.

When her husband dies unexpectedly, Maggie Royal is struck with sinister visions that foretell danger for her and for her five-year-old daughter. Her mother and grandmother were said to have “the sight,” but it was never like this. With no one alive to turn to, Maggie must move quickly to uncover the meaning of her visions before her candle is snuffed out.

Former Vegas star and witch in hiding, Birdie Devaine, is ready for a vacation away from all of the stresses of an ongoing (and haunted) house renovation. Lucky for her, she's got a first-class ticket aboard one of the swankiest cruise ships in the world. Along with her best friends, Birdie's ready to set sail through the warm Caribbean waters, soak up some much needed sun, and sip on some much needed fruity drinks....But a trip to paradise comes with a price. And on a ship full of magical beings, the price is steep.

Sunset Jones has just killed her husband. Never mind that he was raping her. Pete Jones was constable of a small sawmill settlement called Camp Rapture where no woman refuses her husband. So everyone is angrily surprised when Sunset becomes the new constable and investigates murders in which her late husband might be implicated. Yet, no one is more surprised than Sunset when the murders lead her, not only to the conclusion of the case, but to a well of inner strength she never knew she had.

It's Christmastime, and the ladies of Witch Hazel Lane are going all out. Caroling, bonfires, Christmas parties, not to mention the decorating! But in the midst of all the fun, Birdie Devaine is given a gift she can't seem to get rid of - the presence of her old flame, Lucifer. Yes, that Lucifer. He's come to do some bargain shopping himself...for souls. And when the town's fake Santa is found keeled over only days away from Christmas, the whole town is left in a wintry shock.

What's a witch to do when the meanest man in the county drops dead in his coleslaw during her shift at the local barbecue joint? Noelle does what any good Southern girl would do: She flicks a wrist to clean up the mess, then thanks the stars for doing the world a favor. Until she becomes a suspect.

Private Investigator Liz Talbot thinks she’s seen another ghost when she meets Calista McQueen. She’s the spitting image of Marilyn Monroe. Born exactly fifty years after the iconic bombshell, Calista's life is a déjà vu of Hollywood tragedy. And with the anniversary of Marilyn's death looming, Calista fears she's next in line for a tragic finale.

Maggie Crozat, proprietor of a historic Cajun Country B&B, prefers to let the good times roll. But hard times rock her hostelry when a new cell phone app makes it easy for locals to rent their spare rooms to tourists. With October-and Halloween-approaching, she conjures up a witch-crafty marketing scheme to draw visitors to Pelican, Louisiana.

Everyone thinks fourteen-year-old Violet is a murderer. After a summer-night swim with her best friend, Ainsley, Violet is found confused, wandering in the forest - and Ainsley’s never seen again. But without a body, murder charges won’t stick, so Violet is sent away. After more than a decade in a psychiatric ward, Violet returns to her broken-down hometown of Normal, Alabama, to claim her dead mother’s inheritance and help her overworked sister care for their unstable, alcoholic father.

After a decade of exile precipitated by the tragic death of his mother, Will Seems returns home from Richmond to rural Southside Virginia, taking a job as deputy sheriff in a landscape given way to crime and defeat. Impoverished and abandoned, this remote land of tobacco plantations, razed forests, and boarded up homes seems stuck in the past in a state that is trying to forget its complex history and move on.

It’s a stormy summer day when Ottawa coroner Dr. Cate Spencer is called to the scene of an alleged suicide. Inside a narrow vault in the Dominion Archives’ nitrate film storage facility—kept separate from the rest of the collection due to its dangerous combustibility—officers pressure her to rule the death a suicide. When parts of the scene don’t add up and a deliberately set spark threatens her life, she suspects that this death might be a murder.

Southern girl Verity Long needs a Christmas miracle...Verity is ready to deck the halls, jingle some bells, and maybe, just maybe have a merry Christmas with her boyfriend’s stuffy family. Truly, if she doesn’t extend the proverbial olive branch to the overbearing Wydells, she’s afraid she’ll hit them over the head with it. But when her boyfriend’s mother pulls a shocking stunt, Verity finds herself with a big decision to make. And if that’s not enough, there’s an unexpected guest at her door.

Alicia Becker shows up at the screen door of The Milkery beaten, bruised, and claims to be one of Mary Elizabeth Moberly's foster children. Mae West's suspicion of why Alicia is there turns to an investigation after Alicia is found on a nearby hiking trail standing over the lifeless body of Craig Sutton. Who is Craig Sutton?

Verity Long doesn't want to see ghosts, and she'd rather not let anyone know her little secret, either. But when a restless spirit stirs up trouble in her friend's resale shop, Verity and her very new, very dead gangster friend team up to learn what is really happening. They discover an age-old secret and must learn the truth behind a mysterious disappearance...before it's too late.

For Max and the gang, the idea that dead is not the end has become second nature. But the idea that a ghost who has moved on could be ripped back into the world? That is new. And terrifying. When a woman hires the Porter Agency to help with this very problem, she doesn’t know half of what she’s roping them into. Now, it is up to Max, Sandra, and Drummond to find who is behind this atrocity and stop them. Plus, there’s a spirit to return to the Beyond, a missing girl who might have been murdered, and a possible murderer who happens to be the new client.