Womens Mystery Fiction

Suffering from bald patches thanks to a hair conditioner spiked with depilatory cream - supplied by the murderess in her last investigation - Agatha escapes to the coastal resort of Wyckhadden to allow her crowning glory to recover in privacy. A local witch provides her with hair tonic and Agatha’s lost locks begin to grow - but then the witch is found bludgeoned to death. The elderly residents at Agatha’s faded hotel seem innocuous enough, if a little odd. But, as she enquires into the murder she turns up an alarming number of secrets....

In England in the late 1920s, the Honourable Daisy Dalrymple Fletcher, on a convalescent trip to the countryside, goes to visit three old school friends in the area. Daisy and her husband Alec - Detective Chief Inspector Alec Fletcher, of Scotland Yard - go for a Sunday lunch with Daisy’s friends, where one of the women mentions a wine cellar below their house, which remains curiously locked, no key to be found. Alec offers to pick the lock, but when he opens the door, what greets them is not a cache of wine but the stench of a long-dead body.

Emily “vacations” at an opulent Swiss resort in the hope of locating nine pounds of hijacked plutonium intended for an atom bomb.

Eleanor Trewynn is a widow of some years living in Port Mabyn, a small fishing village in Cornwall, England. In her younger days, she traveled the exotic parts of the world with her husband. These days, she's retired and founded the local charity shop. Her niece, Megan Pencarrow, transferred nearby and was recently promoted to the rank of Detective Sergeant.

Promoting her latest books brings best-selling mystery writer Jessica Fletcher to New York for Christmas. Her schedule includes book signings, chat-show appearances, department store shopping...and murder. But it all begins with a sidewalk Santa staring at Jessica with fear and recognition.

When missing teens begin turning up dead in a small Southern town, the FBI sends in Special Agent Samantha Cash to help crack the case. Her methods are invisible, and she never quits until the case is closed.

Everyone knows the dead woman under the lighthouse, but no one seems to know why she died. What brought the folk-rock star back to Exham on Sea after so many years? Who wanted her dead? Does the key to her murder lie in the town, or far away across the Atlantic? Libby Forest arrives in Exham to build a new life making cakes and chocolates, and discovers a talent for solving mysteries, helped by Bear, an enormous Carpathian sheepdog, and a cast of local characters.

A former CIA operative turned art dealer waits in Italy, wounded and in hiding, for the cavalry. According to his SOS, only Mrs. Pollifax will do....

With my life back to normal - normal being a very relative word - one would think I’d catch a break. One would be very wrong. With an angel gunning for me and a demon in my bed, life couldn’t be more complicated. Not to mention, I’m going to have to make a rather large life choice. Do I want to live forever? Does anyone? Forever is a very long time. Whatever. I’ll think about it tomorrow...or next week...or next month. As long as I have my girlfriends, my dogs, a super-sized case of merlot, and my deceased squatters, I’m good to go.

Superintendent Duncan Kincaid is called to investigate the shocking death of a woman found burned beyond recognition in a Victorian warehouse in south London. When his lover and partner, Gemma James, is asked to trace a friend's missing roommate, she and Duncan discover that their cases have several disturbing links. Set against a backdrop of Dickensian Southwark, repository of old secrets, the case plunges Duncan and Gemma into the dark recesses of human relationships. Two women are missing, a little girl is abducted, and no one is really what they seem.

Even though Agatha Raisin loathes amateur dramatics, her friend Mrs. Bloxby, the vicar's wife, has persuaded her to support the local pantomime. Stifling a yawn at the production of Babes in the Woods, Agatha watches as the baker, playing an ogre, struts and threatens on the stage. Then a trapdoor opens… followed by a scream and then silence. Surely, this isn't the way the scene was rehearsed?

Agatha has fallen head over heels in love - again. This time, she has her eye on the local gardener, George Marston, but so do other women in their little Cotswold village. Shamelessly determined, Agatha will do anything to get her man - including footing the bill for a charity ball just for the chance to dance with him. And then George doesn't even show up. Only partly deterred, Agatha goes looking for him, and finds his dead body in a compost heap. Murder is definitely afoot, but this killer chose no ordinary weapon: A poisonous snake delivered the fatal strike.

Detective George Elms is out of prison, and the police force that put him there is in chaos. Now they want him back to lead the hunt for vicious cop killer Kane Forley. Only George can put together a team that will bring this criminal to justice. Are his superiors using George as bait? They have their own very dark secrets to hide. But this is personal, and things spin out of control fast. Soon George will face one last race against time to save everyone who is close to him. Who can he trust to help him?

Back in college, Jane Lewis would have given anything to be like homecoming queen Connie Bryan. Instead she was just Plain Jane - overweight, frumpy, and painfully shy. That was then. Today, a lovely and confident Dr. Jane Lewis has a thriving psychotherapy practice, her own radio talk show, a beautiful old Louisiana mansion, and her affectionate, nutty dog, Olive, to keep her company. The only thing missing is someone to share her life.

In this batch of sweet, short murder mysteries, three cooks don’t spoil the broth. New York Times best-selling author Joanne Fluke pens the title story, in which a box of Hannah Swensen’s gingerbread cookies is found near the corpse of her neighbor. Popular co-authors Laura Levine and Leslie Meier offer “The Dangers of Gingerbread Cookies” and “Gingerbread Cookies and Gunshots”, respectively.

When a maid in the upper class Ellison household is strangled, Inspector Pitt is called in to investigate. He finds a world ruled by strict manners and social customs, where the inhabitants of the Ellison's neighborhood appear to be more outraged by the thought of scandal than they are by murder. Inspector Pitt finds a most unlikely ally in Charlotte, the Ellison's spirited daughter. But as the murders continue, Charlotte and Pitt find themselves drawn together by more than the investigation.

Molly Appleby loves her job at Collector's Weekly covering auctions and estate sales all over the South. When her latest assignment takes her to Richmond, Virginia, to interview the staff of the hit TV show Hidden Treasures, she's expecting a quick, fun trip. But when one of the show's appraisers is found murdered, Molly realizes that once again she'll have to put on her detective's cap until the culprit is captured.

Deputy Mattie Cobb is in a dark place and has withdrawn from Cole Walker and his family to work on issues from her past. When she and her K-9 partner, Robo, get called to track a missing junior high student, they find the girl dead on Smoker's Hill behind the high school, and Mattie must head to the Walker home to break the bad news. But that's only the start of trouble in Timber Creek because soon another girl goes missing - and this time it's one of Cole's daughters.

A serial killer is on the loose in San Diego, and he has a most unusual M.O.: with each kill, he leaves behind objects with unclear meanings. Most of the recent killings are centered near Kendra Michaels' home and office, so it comes as no great surprise when the FBI shows up at her door. The investigators soon make a startling discovery: the left-behind objects are actually souvenirs of other unsolved serial murder cases in various US cities.

When Jessica receives a call that her old friend Tillie Mortelaine passed away, she is surprised to learn that Tillie bequeathed her a million dollars. All Jessica has to do is solve a decades-old mystery - the murder of Tillie's fiancé Wanamaker Jones. There is no shortage of suspects. Many in Savannah stand to benefit from Tillie's will or are looking to prosper from her death. With people opposing her at every turn in her investigation, will Jessica be able to solve the crime or will she fail her friend?