Book picks similar to
Died On The Vine by Joyce Harmon
mystery
mystery-cozy
first-in-a-series
cozy-mysteries
Baking is Murder
Kathy Cranston - 2016
Luckily for Jessie, Springdale is every bit as quirky and idyllic as she remembers, and Bee’s baking is just as mouth-watering. Then the unthinkable happens and there’s a murder on the outskirts of town. Worse still, Jessie’s new friend is the prime suspect. The cops think the case is cut-and-dry, but Jessie’s gut tells her there’s more going on than meets the eye. Can she get to the bottom of it? Baking is Murder is the first book in the Bee’s Bakehouse Cozy Mystery series. Each book is a standalone mystery.
Playing At Murder
Gillian Larkin - 2017
Now that she’s retired, she makes that dream a reality and sets herself up as an investigator. With reluctant help from her sister-in-law, Sable, Connie takes on her first client. What starts out as a simple case of tracking down a missing person soon turns into an intriguing case of deception, phone hacking and murder.
Death of a Cozy Writer
G.M. Malliet - 2008
At an engagement dinner, he announces his secret marriage to beautiful Violet, once charged with her husband's murder. Within hours, eldest son and hated appointed heir Ruthven is found cleaved to death by a medieval mace. When Detective Chief Inspector St. Just arrives, a deadly calm goes beyond the usual English reserve. Soon Sir Adrian is found slumped over his writing desk – an ornate knife thrust into his heart. Using a Cornish brusqueness and brawn, can St. Just find the killer before another victim falls?
Twelve Drummers Drumming
C.C. Benison - 2011
The Reverend Tom "Father" Christmas, the newest vicar of Thornford Regis, an idyllic rural town in England, turns detective when one of his parishioners turns up dead in a drum, and everyone in town seems to have something to confess. Tom Christmas came to picturesque Thornford Regis with his young daughter to escape the terrible experience of losing his wife in the city. Her murder sent him packing to the bucolic and charming town, where violent crime isn't supposed to happen and the greatest sin is supposed to be nothing a member of the clergy can't handle. Then, at the town fair, a woman is found murdered. Tom soon learnsthat everyone in Thornford Regis has a secret to hide--infidelity, theft, even past murders. Twelve Drummers Drumming showcases a lovely place to live and/or die, and marks the debut of a planned twelve-book mystery series featuring the brilliant Father Christmas.
Entangled
Barbara Ellen Brink - 2010
One summer of her childhood is a mystery she intends to solve. But digging up her past also lays bare the skeletons of others, including her mother’s. Entangled between what she once believed and a new reality, will she be able to live with the consequences of full disclosure?
Bed and Breakfast and Murder
Patti Larsen - 2017
Instead, I forced myself to smile and swallow and remind myself the elbow length yellow rubber gloves grasping the handle of the standard issue plunger were all that stood between me and Pooageddon.Suck it up, Fee. Big girl panties and adulting and all that."At what point," I waved the dripping plunger, wincing as droplets of yuck flew, "did I think owning a bed and breakfast was going to be glamorous and romantic?"Fiona Fleming hasn't lived in Reading, Vermont in over a decade, her escape from small town living leading her to New York City and a life of adventure. An adventure that has left her with no career, an ex who cheated on her and zero plans for the future. Her grandmother's death grants her a new chance--inheriting Petunia's, Iris Fleming's bed and breakfast, seems like the ideal fresh start. But when Fee finds out ownership of the property Iris willed her might be in question, she's drawn into the seedy underbelly of the cutest town in America after being singled out as the main suspect in a murder.
From Garden To Grave
Rickie Blair - 2017
It’s a perennial problem. Verity Hawkes is a shut-in. After two years bunkered in her apartment, the only thing that gets her out is the disappearance of her beloved but eccentric aunt. As she takes over her aunt’s landscaping shop, she’ll need to go from hoarder to horticulturist in a hurry…Her new home of Leafy Hollow is quaint, except for her most obnoxious client. When a series of freak accidents kills the customer, all signs point to Verity as the killer. The hunt for answers is on, and Verity must question a tipsy carpenter, a bacon-peddling vegan baker, and her dreamy landscaping competitor to keep her new life afloat. Failure to find the truth could put her back in a confined space for much more than two years…If you like lovably quirky characters, deceptively idyllic Canadian villages, and twists you won’t see coming, then you’ll love Rickie Blair’s Leafy Hollow Mysteries series.
BlueBuried Muffins
Lyndsey Cole - 2015
She’s scared of the mess her boyfriend, Max Parker, is in the middle of and she has to get out of his house. She puts a whole state between them and drives like a madwoman from Cooper, NY to her hometown of Catfish Cove, NH where she hopes she’ll be safe. She decides to start a new life, a life she ran away from two years ago but is finding herself missing as soon as she gets home. Annie immediately has a place to live, a job at her Aunt Leona’s new café—Black Cat Café—and plenty of boyfriend prospects. Unfortunately, she also has plenty of bad things follow her. Like Max Parker. Only the next time she sees him he’s dead. Suddenly everyone she runs into turns into a potential suspect. There are ghosts from her past and new neighbors that make her hair stand on end. And right in the middle of everything is Annie with Max’s last warning to her—Don’t trust anyone. Will those words prove to keep her safe or put too much distance between Annie and those trying to help her? ***Blueburied Muffins is approx. 200 pages and is volume 1 in the Black Cat Cafe Cozy Mystery Series. Lyndsey’s books can be read and enjoyed in any order.
A Beeline to Murder
Meera Lester - 2015
Raising chickens, harvesting honey from her bee colony, and growing heirloom vegetables on her farmette in the beautiful Bay Area town of Las Flores, Abby has embraced all the benefits of a peaceful life. But when she attempts to deliver her trademark honey to local pastry chef Jean-Louis Bonheur and finds him dead in his shop, her old investigative instincts kick in. After the coroner rules the death a suicide, the chef’s handsome French-Canadian brother insists on hiring Abby to find out who really killed Jean-Louis. With the patience of a farmer and the industriousness of a bee, Abby sorts through a swarm of suspects, including the chef’s landlord, his protégé, an eccentric homeless woman, loan sharks, and a brawny biker. But as she closes in on the truth, she’ll need more than her beekeeper suit to protect her from a killer’s sting… Includes farming tips and delicious recipes!
Clammed Up
Barbara Ross - 2013
But that was before a catered wedding on picturesque Morrow Island turned into a reception for murder. When the best man’s corpse is found hanging from the grand staircase in the Snowden family mansion, Julia must put the chowder pot on the back burner and join the search for the killer. And with suspicion falling on her old crush, Chris Durand, the recipe for saving her business and salvaging her love life might be one and the same.
Digging Up Bones
Aimee Gilchrist - 2016
Helen Harding is a genius at picking losers. Her exes run the gamut from merely lazy to legitimately criminal, making all the stops in between. After her fourth, and absolutely final, fiancé is carted off to prison for making time with the underage honeys, Helen is mortified and desperate to get out of town. The perfect solution seems to be a last minute call to arms from her aunt Penny, a beer swigging chain smoker from backwoods Texas who has three-inch press-on nails, a love of men from truck stops, and a life or death problem...that, unfortunately, ends in death before Helen even has a chance to arrive. Helen believes in atonement—or maybe it's revenge. Either way, she owes it to Penny to find out who ended her life in violence. Much to the annoyance of the local volunteer sheriff, Aodhagan MacFarley—who Helen is most definitely not getting involved with no matter how hot he may look in his fitted suit and polished wingtips. With or without his help, Helen vows to tracks a trail of suspects who may have more than one foul deed to account for. As the days drag on, the nights heat up, and the danger grows closer, if Helen isn't careful, she may just end up six feet under and the latest casualty of Birdwell, Texas! What critics are saying about Aimee's books: "Great characters and witty dialogue. There are enough twists and turns to keep you guessing until the end. I look forward to reading more." —A Cozy Booknook "An awesome, fun and funny read. Highly recommended for mystery readers, cozy readers...chick-lit, humor. Highly recommended!" —Bear Mountain Books "Clever, witty, and heartfelt! I was with Helen every step of the way, and I wish I could visit Birdwell, Texas myself. You know, without the dead bodies and stuff." —Gemma Halliday, New York Times bestselling author
If Looks Could Kill
Kate White - 2002
Smart and savvy, she's got a sixth sense when it comes to seeing the truth in a story-especially if it's murder. Bailey's in bed with her commitment-challenged lover K.C. when she gets a frantic call from her high-maintenance boss at Gloss magazine. Grabbing coffee and a cab outside her Greenwich Village apartment-the consolation prize in her divorce settlement-Bailey reluctantly heads uptown. At Cat Jones's Upper East Side town house, she finds something that seriously clashes with the chic décor: the dead body of the family's live-in nanny. As Bailey-unofficially-delves into the murdered girl's past, she finds no shortage of A-list suspects. But when a startling discovery suggests that Cat may have been the intended victim, Bailey is suddenly up to her bed head in high-profile investigation that's perfect fodder for a tabloid headline: Is someone trying to kill the editor's of women's magazines? With the spotlight on New York's glitzy media world, Bailey interviews back-stabbing editors, straying husbands, and one sexy, six-feet two psychologist who could make her decide to kick K.C. to the curb. Sporting her pair of red slingbacks and armed with the investigative skills she's honed as a true crime reporter, she sets out on a search that takes her from Manhattan's exclusive Carnegie-Hill area-the nanny heartland of America-to the ritzy weekend estates of Pennsylvania and Connecticut. Bailey will need all her street smarts and some lightning-fast detective work to catch a killer who could end up deleting her name from the masthead for good.
How to Leash a Thief
Cat Clayton - 2017
Normally.But nothing is pleasant or normal about murder.I never thought, in my wildest dreams at 26-years-old, I would see my first dead body. Or take over my grandmother’s floundering pet grooming business, without a lick of experience aside from managing the shop’s (Stone Age) back office, drain my savings account for the shop’s renovations, begin hearing my Chihuahua’s voice inside my head, and wind up a possible suspect in the murder of one of my employees.Now, if I can clear my name, discover the real killer—without getting whacked myself, come to terms with hearing my chatty pup, all while keeping the family business afloat, my life won’t slip down the proverbial drain.♥Author’s Note: Some, more mature, readers in the humorous, cozy mystery genre may love to hate my main character, Steely Lamarr, and that’s okay. But as the writer, it is my duty to remain true to her character and her story. Steely doesn’t claim to have all the answers, nor does she always make the wisest of decisions. Her character is loosely based on a few of my own experiences married to a law enforcement officer in my 20’s, and coupled with inspiration drawn from our oldest daughter’s personality, whose steely attitude and tenacious spirit kept her feet on the ground and her head held high during the difficulties in her young adult life. As with my own daughter, I have a deep appreciation for Steely’s growth, maturity, and her willingness to own and learn from her mistakes as the series progresses. My hope is readers will acknowledge and appreciate this as well. If not, remember, there’s always pie, and pie makes everything better.~Publisher's note: This is the 2nd edition of How to Leash a Thief. Many readers of the 1st edition stated it read like a "cozy" mystery. Although it does contain many cozy mystery elements, we at Pigasus Publications do not want to mislead readers. Our readers’ happiness is top priority. How to Leash a Thief does not contain explicit sex or excessive violence. Some cozy mystery fans might enjoy the story. But we want to inform readers, the book does contain minimal use of curse words and sexual innuendos. Thank you for your interest!
Murder And Grits: A Piper Sandstone Savory Mystery Series (A contemporary Gulf Coast mystery with recipes), Book 1
Karen McSpade - 2021
Invisible
Lorena McCourtney - 2004
So when vandals romp through the local cemetery, she takes advantage of her newfound anonymity and its unforeseen advantages as she launches her own unofficial investigation.Despite her oddball humor and unconventional snooping, Ivy soon becomes discouraged by her failure to turn up any solid clues. And after Ivy witnesses something ominous and unexplained, she can't resist putting her investigative powers to work again. Even the authorities' attempts to keep Ivy out of danger and her nosy neighbor's match-making schemes can't slow her down. But will the determination that fuels this persistent, quirky sleuth threaten her very safety?