Book picks similar to
Bells, Tails & Murder: A Cozy English Animal Mystery by Kathy Manos Penn
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Cappuccinos, Cupcakes, and a Corpse
Harper Lin - 2015
She spends her days making delicious artisan cappuccinos, until she stumbles upon her neighbor’s dead body. When the police discover Mr. Cardosi was poisoned, Francesca becomes a suspect. The victim’s son, Matty, happens to be Francesca’s old high school friend. Together, they uncover the secrets of the locals in order to find the killer in their idyllic beach town. Includes two special cupcake recipes!
Cutie Pies and Deadly Lies
Addison Moore - 2018
One too many suitors. And a killer. Living in Honey Hollow can be murder. A HILARIOUS cozy mystery from the New York Times bestselling author Addison Moore My name is Lottie Lemon and I see dead people. Okay, so I rarely see dead people, mostly I see furry creatures of the dearly departed variety. And for some reason those sweet, fluffy albeit paranormal cuties always seem to act as a not-so-great harbinger of deadly things to come for their previous owner. So when I saw that sweet orange tabby twirling around my landlord’s ankles, I figured Merilee was in for trouble. Personally, I was hoping for a skinned knee—what I got was a top spot in an open homicide investigation. Throw in a hot judge and an ornery detective that oozes testosterone and that pretty much sums up my life right about now. Have I mentioned how cute that detective is? Lottie Lemon has a bakery to tend to, a budding romance with perhaps one too many suitors and she has the supernatural ability to see the dead—which are always harbingers for ominous things to come. Throw in the occasional ghost of the human variety, a string of murders and her insatiable thirst for justice and you’ll have more chaos than you know what to do with. Living in the small town of Honey Hollow can be murder.
Murder on the SS Rosa
Lee Strauss - 2017
When the ship’s captain is found dead, Ginger is only too happy to lend her assistance to the handsome Chief Inspector Basil Reed.The SS Rosa delivers a convincing array of suspects - the wife, the mistress, a jealous crew mate. To Ginger’s dismay, her name has been added to the list! With a little help from Ginger’s dog Boss, Ginger and Haley navigate the clues (those wartime operative skills come in handy.) They must solve the case and clear Ginger’s name before they dock–and oh, whatever shall she wear!
Wine's Up?
Wendy Meadows - 2019
They have been struggling with money and regular blow-ups – except this time, one snick of a match to light a candle causes Reginald to go up in flames.Rumors circulate in the small community of Rosemary Harbor. Was it an accident, or was there more to it? Chief Preston is sent out to investigate: the first step, tracing where the gift basket was purchased.Sometimes the best cure for a broken heart is a fresh start.Hilary Sheridan is a widow who has just opened her shop with her daughter, Annabelle, to lead a normal life out of the spotlight after so many years caring for her late husband. Being questioned about a possible murder case is not a welcome she expected. It doesn’t stop her curiosity, especially when the whole town is talking about it – inside and outside – of her shop.For Chief Preston, everything must be conducted by the book, but Reginald’s past comes back to haunt him. He was a man who had many debts, making investments that his body couldn’t insure.Debt wreaks havoc with people’s hearts and minds – even to commit the unthinkable. In this cozy mystery, expect more than one blow up!
Death Turns a Trick
Julie Smith - 1982
That dirty job done, a lovely evening turns even more delightful when she’s picked up by the cops and spends the next two hours at the Hall of Justice. Could this day get any worse? Of Course! Guess who arrives home to find a dead hooker on her living room floor?Handsome Parker Phillips, Rebecca’s new beau and the most attractive man she’s met in ages, is arrested for the murder. (Worse, she suspects he might actually have done it.)On the plus side, another very attractive man is following the case--reporter Rob Burns of the San Francisco Chronicle, a possible ally. And there are other possibilities.Fans of Janet Evanovich, Joan Hess, and Elizabeth Peters will get a kick out of this one.
The Sleuth Sisters
Maggie Pill - 2014
They agree that Retta, their baby sister, will NOT be included, since she tends to take over any organization she's part of. Sweetly but firmly, Retta will tell you what you should do, could do, and will do.The sisters finally get a decent case: finding a man who apparently murdered his wife years ago and has been on the run ever since. As they try to investigate what happened, they're opposed at every turn.
Sweet Masterpiece
Connie Shelton - 2010
But her real dream is to open her own pastry shop, Sweet's Sweets.Life is a little crazy for Sam right now. At one of her break-in properties a dying woman insists that she take a small wooden box. Sam doesn't realize that the old woman was known locally as a bruja, a witch, until she begins to feel some strange effects from the box, herself.Meanwhile, at another property, she finds an unmarked grave and the authorities come to investigate. The property owner disappeared a few months earlier and Sam wonders--who is the body in the grave? A small mural in the house leads to a connection with a famous artist; a bogus will points to possible fraud; and the handsome deputy investigating the case seems completely enchanted with Sam.While Sam scrambles to fill bakery orders and keep her properties in order, she's equally intrigued with the idea of a new romance. It all makes for a delightful romantic mystery with elements of the paranormal.
Skeletons in the Closet
Jennifer L. Hart - 2008
As the wife of retired Navy SEAL, and the adoptive mother of two little hellions, Maggie is constantly looking for ways to improve her family’s financial situation. She accepts a cleaning position for her new neighbors (who redefine the term ‘eccentric’), never imagining she will end up as the sole alibi for a man with a fascination for medieval torture devices when he is brought up on murder charges.While Maggie struggles to prove the man’s innocence, her deadbeat brother arrives, determined to sell Maggie and Neil on his next great scheme and to mooch with a vengeance. If that isn’t bad enough, her in-laws, (the cut-throat corporate attorneys) descend on the house, armed with disapproval and condemnation, for the family’s annual Thanksgiving celebration.As the police investigation intensifies, Maggie searches for the killer among the upper echelon of Hudson, Massachusetts in the only way she can— by scrubbing their thrones.Of the porcelain variety, that is…
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?
Alas, She Drowned
Monica Knightley - 2016
Betrayal. Tea and Scones. When ex-novice nun, turned steamy romance writer, Maggie O’Flynn moves to the charming village of Stratford Upon Avondale to open a tea room she expects plenty of murders, betrayal, and duplicity. On the stages of the town’s renowned Shakespeare Festival. But when a theater critic is found murdered on the town’s riverbank and the prime suspect turns out to be the sexy bookshop owner Maggie has had her eye on, she takes matters into her own hands. Will she be able to dig through the layers of betrayal and duplicity to find the true murderer before that handsome bookseller, Nate Larimer, finds himself behind bars? With the help of her loud, brash, spitfire of a friend, Gina Mattucci, Maggie plans to do just that. With a bit of Shakespeare, copious amounts of tea, and a faux-English setting to rival anything the real England has to offer, ALAS, SHE DROWNED is the first book in THE STRATFORD UPON AVONDALE mystery series. Lovers of cozy mysteries will find a cozy home in Stratford Upon Avondale.
On the Chopping Block
Jenny Kales - 2016
The 36-year-old Greek-American proprietor of “Callie's Kitchen,” a meals-from-scratch business in an idyllic small town, has been busy creating a post-divorce life for herself, her young daughter and her Yorkie, Koukla. After a lot of hard work (including staving off her father’s continual advice), she’s got the locals and tourists clamoring for her delicious Mediterranean dishes and Midwest comfort food classics. Recently, she’s started a budding romance with a fellow foodie, the wealthy owner and chef of Crystal Bay’s most popular bistro. However, success is as fleeting as one of Wisconsin’s glorious autumn days. As local businesses begin to shut down due to a slow economy, Callie is struggling not to become another statistic. A contest with a hefty cash prize seems like the perfect chance to fix her financial woes, until a shocking murder threatens not only her livelihood – but her life. When she’s targeted as a prime suspect by an attractive expat British detective, Callie’s situation becomes more delicate than her Greek egg-lemon soup. She’s got to find the killer and fast if she wants to protect her daughter, save her business and stay alive.
The Witch who Couldn't Spell
Katie Penryn - 2016
Despite her reading disability, she's qualified as a lawyer in London and raised her two brothers on her own. But she doesn't have the skills to hunt down a murderer.True Mpenzi's a white witch, so she could use magic, and she does have her mother's Book of Spells, but she's hit a stumbling block. Try as she may, Mpenzi cannot decipher the grimoire's medieval script. She needs help desperately if she's to save her mother from a life in prison.Will the High Council of the Guild of White Witches listen to her plea and allow her an assistant in time to free her mother? An assistant with supernatural powers of their own?If you love stories about witches, magic, and talking cats and dogs, all spiced up with a dollop of danger, you’ll love following along with Mpenzi and Felix, her shape-shifting sidekick, as they fight the good fight against evil in the small French seaside town of Beaucoup-sur-Mer.
Crime and Nourishment
Miranda Sweet - 2017
Neither does the island of Nantucket. A NEW RELEASE cozy mystery perfect for fans of Agatha Frost, Cynthia Ellingsen, Cindy Bell and CeeCee James When Agnes Mary Clarissa Christie Prouty, a.k.a. Angie, abandons her fiancé and her analyst job at a big Manhattan investment firm, she doesn’t expect to end up back where she started—the island of Nantucket. It’s not every day you get a chance to open a bookstore, complete with bookmark-eating cats and cantankerous great-aunts. Especially when your childhood friends agree to provide you with the world’s best pastries from their bakery down the street. Everything goes great until one of the locals turns up dead on the fourth of July, the sound of the gunshots covered by the local fireworks display. But did it have to happen right after Angie delivered a book to his home making her a prime suspect? Angie and every gossip on the island, including her great-aunt and her friends, are on the case. But trying to discover the truth is going to take more than a simple murder investigation. Someone’s guilty and the deadly secret might cut closer to home than anyone wants to admit.Being an amateur detective is harder than it looks, even when you’ve been named after the Queen of Crime.
This cozy mystery/amateur sleuth novel is book one in the Angie Prouty Nantucket Cozy Mystery Series
The Book Club Murders
Leslie Nagel - 2016
Charley Carpenter has poured heart and soul into her clothing store, Old Hat Vintage Fashions. She’ll do anything to make it a success—even join the stuffy Agathas Book Club in order to cultivate customers among the wealthy elite of Oakwood, Ohio. Although mixing with the most influential women in town has its advantages, Charley finds the endless gossip a high price to pay. But after two women with close ties to the Agathas are brutally murdered, everyone falls under threat—and suspicion. When key evidence indicates that both murders are the work of the same hand, Charley realizes that the killer has arranged each corpse in perfect imitation of crime scenes from the Club’s murder mystery reading list. She uses her membership in the Club to convince Detective Marcus Trenault to use her as an inside informant. Not that he could stop her anyway. Intelligent, fearless, and every bit as stubborn as Marc is, Charley soon learns the Agathas aren’t the only ones with secrets to protect. Passions explode as she and Marc must race against time to prevent another murder. And if Charley’s not careful, she may find herself becoming the killer’s next plot twist.
Secrets in a Bottle
Shelly West - 2019
She's been struggling to make it in Boston when a call beckons her down to the cozy seaside town of Wallace Point. Now's her chance to meet a grandmother she never knew--if Grandma survives, that is!Grandma is in a coma after an apparent break-in at her antique store, leaving Abigail to run Whodunit Antiques in her absence. The locals are very protective of Grandma, their de facto town matriarch, making Abigail wonder... just who is this woman?When Grandma wakes up, a mystery unfolds, starting with a dead body, a broken ship in a bottle, and a historical maritime rivalry. Will Abigail uncover the centuries-old secret that put Grandma in the hospital? And will Abigail learn why her mother kept her away from Grandma for all these years?The Whodunit Antiques series is fun, quirky, and, most importantly, cozy! So settle into your favorite chair, preferably with a cup of hot cocoa in hand, and get ready to escape into a town whose residents are always up to mischief, and where pirates run amok.