Smith, Jean Steffens, and Elizabeth Ashby...In this dog eat dog world, it’s people you have to keep your eye on.When Lizzie Jones, pet sitter extraordinaire, is asked to watch over her best friend's two spoiled dogs at the posh gated community of Craggy Hill Estates, the last thing she expects is to wind up in the middle of a homicide. But that's exactly what happens when she finds her best friend's cheating husband and Danger Cove’s celebrity bodybuilder champ, Mr. Jupiter, floating facedown in his hot tub. To make matters worse, the police aren’t looking any further than the wife for a suspect—isn’t it always the wife? Well, not in this case—at least Lizzie refuses to believe it.Between dealing with Craggy Hill's hot security guard, Tino Morales—who also just happens to be the man who broke Lizzie’s heart in high school, caring for her grieving friend, and watching three rambunctious dogs, Lizzie has her hands full. So she recruits her famous granddad, retired network field correspondent, Jimmy John Jones, to help her put two and two together to find the real killer. Was Mr. Jupiter murdered by one of his women on the side? A jealous, disgruntled employee? Or someone with a bitter and deep-seated hatred of the superstar? It's up to Lizzie, Jimmy John, and Lizzie's own pug, Vader, to crack the case before the killer claims another victim...this one much closer to Lizzie’s own heart!The Danger Cove books:Secret of the Painted Lady (a Danger Cove Renovation Mystery)Murder and Mai Tais (a Danger Cove Cocktail Mystery)Death by Scones (a Danger Cove Bakery Mystery)Four-Patch of Trouble (a Danger Cove Quilting Mystery)Deadly Dye and a Soy Chai (a Danger Cove Hair Salon Mystery)Killer Closet Case (a Danger Cove B Mystery)Tree of Life and Death (a Danger Cove Quilting Mystery)A Killing in the Market (a Danger Cove Farmers' Market short story in the "Killer Beach Reads" collection)Killer Colada (a Danger Cove Cocktail Mystery)Passion, Poison Puppy Dogs (a Danger Cove Pet Sitter Mystery)A Novel Death (a Danger Cove Bookshop Mystery)Robbing Peter to Kill Paul (a Danger Cove Quilting Mystery)Sinister Snickerdoodles (a Danger Cove Bakery Mystery)Hurricanes and Heroes (a Danger Cove Cocktail Mystery)A Death in the Flower Garden (a Danger Cove Famers' Market Mystery)Divas, Diamonds Death (a Danger Cove Pet Sitter Mystery)A Slaying in the Orchard (a Danger Cove Famers' Market Mystery)A Secret in the Pumpkin Patch (a Danger Cove Famers' Market Mystery)Deadly Dirty Martinis (a Danger Cove Cocktail Mystery)A Poison Manicure and Peach Liqueur (a Danger Cove Hair Salon Mystery)About Danger Cove:Danger Cove is a sleepy little town in the Pacific Northwest and home to renowned mystery novelist, Elizabeth Ashby. While Elizabeth swears the stories she writes are fiction, you can find the inspiration for her murderous tales all over Danger Cove...from the intriguing cast of local characters to the places to eat, play, and explore in Danger Cove. Don't let our name fool you—we're the friendliest (even if deadliest) town in the Pacific Northwest!

    For Margot, divorced amid scandal (hint: her husband was a fertility doctor) and then made Ponzi-poor, it’s a chance to shake Gwen out of her grief and help make ends meet. To further this effort she enlists a third boarder, the handsome, cupcake-baking Anthony. As the three swap money-making schemes and timid Gwen ventures back out into the dating world, the arrival of Margot’s paroled ex in the efficiency apartment downstairs creates not just complications but the chance for all sorts of unexpected forgiveness. A sister story about love, loneliness, and new life in middle age, this is a cracklingly witty, deeply sweet novel from one of our finest comic writers. “Her worldview? Her enthusiasm, her effortless wit? Just a few of the reasons we love Elinor Lipman.”–Boston Globe

    None more so than Grace Holliday. After all, it's not every day she gets invited to the annual costumed bash at the Dragon's Lair, the premier magic theater in Manhattan.What promises as a night of magic and mystery, quickly turns into a night of mayhem and murder when the boss' equally tyrannical wife dies on stage.According to the police, it was an obvious suicide. Now it's up to Grace to discover which one of her co-workers pulled off the trick of the year before she becomes the killer's next victim.

    Now the friends feel bound to uncover whatever secrets a classmate is hiding before someone else's goose gets cooked. Original.

    Jude, Ohio, mourning the loss of the woman who raised her—her grandmother, June. But a knock on the door forces her out of isolation. Cassie has been named the sole heir to legendary matinee idol Jack Montgomery's vast fortune. How did Jack Montgomery know her name? Could he have crossed paths with her grandmother all those years ago? What other shocking secrets could June’s once-stately mansion hold?Soon Jack’s famous daughters come knocking, determined to wrestle Cassie away from the inheritance they feel is their due. Together, they all come to discover the true reasons for June’s silence about that long-ago summer, when Hollywood came to town, and June and Jack’s lives were forever altered by murder, blackmail, and betrayal. As this page-turner shifts deftly between the past and present, Cassie and her guests will be forced to reexamine their legacies, their definition of family, and what it truly means to love someone, steadfastly, across the ages.

    Edwold’s in the idyllic village of Nether Monkslip. Wanda Batton-Smythe, highly vocal and unpopular president of the Women’s Institute, turns up dead at the Harvest Fayre. Peanut allergy looks accidental, but Max has many suspects for murder.

    Her deceitful co-worker, Tiffany Roberts, has other ideas, and she always manages to get what she wants. Tired of being manipulated, Cindy tells her to back off - or else! But when Cindy stumbles upon Tiffany’s lifeless body, she suddenly finds herself front and center in a deadly investigation. Now everyone from her kids' classmates to her monstrous mother-in-law is sold on the idea that Cindy's guilty. Determined to find out who's trying to frame her, Cindy enlists the help of her best buddy, Jacques, to negotiate a slew of suspects, a host of clues, and an office full of cutthroat agents...before the next contract is out on her!

    Not only has she got a meddling mother, a wacky staff, and a dying business, but now she’s got a dead client who was strangled while awaiting her facial.With business the way it is, combing through this mystery may be the only way to save her salon. Until a second murder, an explosion, a kidnapping, death threats, and the hard-nosed Detective Romero complicate things. But Valentine will do anything to untangle the crime. That’s if she can keep her tools of the trade in her bag, keep herself alive, and avoid falling for the tough detective.In the end, how hard can that be?

    Now blonde L.A. sophisticate Buffy Arden arrives in Nowhere Junction, Texas, to introduce her cute little girl to the infant’s unprepared father, no-nonsense auto mechanic Carter Murchison.Carter has only a vague memory of his experiences while attending a conference in the City of Angels. Thanks to the effects of spiked punch, he thought he was making a donation to benefit his favorite charity. A very strange donation…He’s not sure how to deal with this smart-mouthed lady who happens to have the same name as his cat and who quickly turns his life upside-down, opening a boutique in his garage and matchmaking for his reclusive widowed father. And what about this sweet baby daughter who lays claim to his heart? Worst of all, her mother appears to be doing the same.

    But here he was--lost amid the crops and cursing his grandfather for emotionally blackmailing him into marrying an old friend's daughter, a promise the old man had made decades ago. And just like it happens in Bollywood movies, he meets Nikki in those luscious fields. Nikki is a bubbly girl and manages to crack Arvind's forehead with a cricket ball on their first meeting. She must have hit him in the right place for Arvind falls in love with her. But trust his grandfather to make his life miserable by choosing the wrong daughter! While his heart was given to the younger daughter Nikki, it seemed he would have to tie the knot with the elder one.Caught between familial ties and love, Arvind has only two choices: kill the old friends under the same Peepal tree where they made promises about his life, or run away with Nikki. But can he do either?Dear Readers, The Confused Bridegroom is my first romantic comedy, and I hope you will smile as much reading it as I did while writing it.

    Cassie is consumed with trying to make her life work as a Manhattan wife and mom to twin toddlers, while her bighearted sister, Sid, lives an expat's life of leisure in far-off Singapore. So Sid, who shuns social media, challenges Cassie to reconnect through old-fashioned letters.Soon, the letters become a kind of mutual confessional that have real and soul-satisfying effects. They just might have the power to help Cassie save her marriage, and give Sid the strength to get her life back on track.But first, one of Cassie's infamous lapses in judgment comes back to bite her, and all of the letters wind up in the one place you'd never, ever want to see them: the Internet . . .READERS GUIDE INSIDE

    Her refusal to back down from a challenge has made Nikki Bryant a top investigative journalist.When an online friend nudges her to join him in a pact to reconnect with their first loves, Nikki and her boxer dog Elmo leave the bright lights of Las Vegas for the charming town of Pine Grove. There, she must face the biggest challenges in her career and life—the first love she had left behind and her father’s unsolved murder.But before she has time to unpack her car, Nikki stumbles upon the dead body of local news anchor, Ashleigh Addison, her childhood rival. Could Ashleigh’s death be connected to an explosive news story that she had teased about airing live? Did that explosive story have anything to do with the murder of Nikki’s father?With the clues in her father’s cold case hot again, Nikki intends to chase down the story of her life until she catches his killer—no matter what it takes.

    The rest of the year, Lee and his mother serve Memory, while Felix and his father assist Death. This is the Agreement.But one Halloween, Gretchen Whipple smashes her way into their lives. Her bargain is simple: If the twins help her solve the murder of local girl Essie Hasting, she’ll help them break the Agreement. The more the three investigate, however, the more they realize that something’s gone terribly wrong in their town. Death is on the loose, and if history repeats itself, Essie’s might not be the last murder in Poplar Wood.Simultaneously heartwarming and delightfully spooky, The House in Poplar Wood is the story about a boy’s desire to be free, a girl’s desire to make a difference, and a family’s desire to be together again.

    Throughout high school, they were inseparable…until a vicious rumor about Olivia— a rumor too close to the truth—ended their friendship. Now, on the eve of their twentieth high school reunion, Allie, a temp worker, finds herself suddenly single, a little chubby, and feeling old. Olivia, a cool and successful magazine beauty editor in New York, realizes she’s lonely, and is finally ready to face her demons. Sometimes hope lives in the future; sometimes it comes from the past; and sometimes, when every stupid thing goes wrong, it comes from a prettily packaged jar filled with scented cream and promises. Beth Harbison has done it again. A hilarious and touching novel about friendship, Love’s Baby Soft perfume, Watermelon Lip Smackers, bad run-ins with Sun-In, and the healing power of “Gee Your Hair Smells Terrific.” Hope in a Jar: we all need it.

    Told from the point of view of a woman who has just shot her grandmother, this harrowing tale challenges those brave enough to step inside her world to answer one burning question: What would you have done?