Book picks similar to
One Summer: ...at Charlie's Diner by Mary Jane Forbes
mystery
romance
cozy-mystery
chick-lit
Gone With The Ghost
Erin McCarthy - 2017
Except that’s exactly what happened. Ryan is very much dead, having shot himself with his own police-issued gun. Guilt and grief shouldn’t cause hallucinations though, but six months after Ryan went into the ground, Bailey is freaking out and swearing his ghost is standing in her kitchen. Which he is… Ryan claims he didn’t commit suicide, but was murdered, and he needs Bailey to help him find his killer so he can earn his ticket out of purgatory. Ryan’s counting on a stairway to heaven, as opposed to wings, since that might be a little unmanly for a cop, even a dead one. An expert in home design, with her own staging business, Bailey can tell you where to place a couch to improve flow and comfort, but solving a crime? Not her area of expertise. But with help from Ryan’s former partner, Marner, she is unraveling the mystery of what happened to Ryan that day… and unwittingly putting herself in grave danger. Murder By Design Series Book 1- Gone With The Ghost Book 2- Silence of The Ghost Book 3- Once Upon a Ghost Bestselling author Erin McCarthy offers her signature humor in this fun series about an uptight fashion-conscious home stager who finds herself stiletto-deep in murder...
The Case of the Love Spell
Amorette Anderson - 2018
Welcome to Hillcrest, a small box-canyon town snuggled high in the mountains of Colorado. It’s been Penny’s home for her whole life, and she’s always thought of it as a peaceful -- if boring -- place to live. All of that changes when the elderly Claudine Terra is killed, and a mysterious mountain pass behind her mansion opens up to through traffic. Could the new visitors to town, including a handsome vampire, have something to do with Claudine’s murder? Penny is intent on finding out. She wants to save her failing PI business, get her love-life in order, and prove the police department wrong, all in one fell swoop. But as Penny learns about her own witchy powers, things turn out to be a bit more complicated than she expected. For one thing, her ex boyfriend, Chris (a captain on the Hillcrest Police Department) is suddenly single. And then there’s the fact that her precious cat won’t stop throwing up. On top of that, Penny’s attempts at casting spells tend to go horribly wrong! This is the prequel to the Hillcrest Witch Cozy Mystery series. A full length, funny cozy mystery.
Murder, Curlers, and Cream
Arlene McFarlane - 2016
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?
Partners In Crime
Gallagher Gray - 1991
Sayers’ Murder Must Advertise has there been a more perfect cozy office murder--and not since Agatha Christie’s immortal Miss Marple has a more loveable geriatric sleuth been spawned. Gallagher Gray’s first Hubbert and Lil mystery’s got it all—a stuffy old firm with stuffy old routines disturbed by a few unaccustomed murders, a hilariously apoplectic boss, the indispensable brace of cats, and a clever amateur sleuths of a certain age. Break out the tea and cookies to welcome T.S. Hubbert and his unforgettable Auntie Lil! T.S. tells the story (and very wittily too), but it's Lil who steals the show—she’s eighty-four years young, with a taste for bloody Marys at any time of day, a fine-tuned appreciation of life’s other pleasures, and a remarkable talent for detecting. It begins, as so many things do, with a phone call: T.S. (Theodore to Auntie Lil) has been retired about eight hours when he’s summoned back to Sterling & Sterling, the bank where he served as personnel manager for most of his adult life. One of the bigwigs is lying stabbed to death in the Partner’s Room and his demanding former boss, forgetting he’s no longer boss, is demanding a favor—damage control. Well, that’s certainly more interesting, thinks Theodore, than “interviewing the slack-jawed sons of clients.” And besides, now he can talk back to the brass. He can even dress like it’s casual Friday and no one can say a word. Although they do. A big part of the fun’s watching him shock his former colleagues with his sudden assertiveness. Because who can boss around a person who’s doing a favor? What starts out as damage control quickly evolves into full-scale detecting as more and more partners bite the big one in unexpected ways. Aunt Lil’s all over it from the first, demonstrating not only the necessary smarts, street savvy, and moxie, but also a feminine way of looking at things that leads to a surprisingly contemporary conclusion. Fans of Golden Age mysteries will eat this irrepressible amateur detective team with a spoon, along with readers who just get a kick out of watching senior sleuths kick butt. If you like Miss Marple, Miss Silver, Miss Seeton, Mrs. Pollifax, Jessica Fletcher, Agatha Raisin, Henrie O, Hercule Poirot, and their many distinguished silver-haired colleagues, you’ll want to grab this one now. Aficionados of cozy authors like Dorothy Cannell, Carolyn Hart, M.C. Beaton, Joanne Fluke, Jana DeLeon, and Alexander McCall Smith will be equally captivated!
A Lime to Kill
Summer Prescott - 2015
Bad becomes worse when the shop owner's daughter is suspected.
The Loneliest Cottage
Melissa Storm - 2017
It shattered again when she found a box of old keepsakes commemorating a life she’d never even known he lead.Heartbroken but determined, she accepts a seasonal job in rural Alaska to look after an injured musher’s dogs while searching for the truth about her father’s hidden past. But her cantankerous new boss comes with dangerous secrets of his own.When a fire ravages part of the property, all will be revealed—and four-thousand miles away from the only home she’s ever known, Lauren will discover just how quickly everything can change.Don’t miss the chance to lose your heart to Lauren, Shane, and their courageous team of sled dogs in this unforgettable tale of love, loss, and finding where you belong.
Raina Sun Mysteries: Books 1-3
Anne R. Tan - 2016
For readers who like cozy mysteries, quirky characters, a dash of humor, and Chinese-American culture. Raining Men and Corpses Graduate student Raina Sun is trying to keep her head above water as the bills roll in when her dashing college adviser cons her out of several months of rent. But her quest to get her money back sets into a motion a streak of bad luck. First, she finds the dead body of an ex-lover and becomes the prime suspect to his murder. The only man she ever loved reappears as the lead detective to the case and wants to reignite their passion (or at least he’s sending out smoke signals). Her life careens out of control as her grandma moves into Raina’s postage-stamp-sized apartment, dragging a red suitcase and trouble. Raina summons her sleuthing skills to extract herself before things get dicey. There is no place for an amateur when it comes to murder. Gusty Lovers and Cadavers Graduate student Raina Sun thought she knew what she was getting herself into when she volunteered to take the new foreign exchange student shopping on the last weekend before Christmas. But between a riot for the last hot toy of the season and an abandoned baby, the holiday is a season for mayhem, and sometimes it doesn’t pay to be a Good Samaritan. She wants to reunite the infant with his family, but calling the mysterious phone number in the diaper bag leads to more questions than answers. A strange man claims to be the child’s father, and his alleged mother turns up dead. Raina summons her sleuthing skills to protect this baby and soon discovers everyone has a few skeletons in their closets. With her pimp-cane-toting grandma, she faces an ex-boyfriend bringing sexy back as well as a murderer determined to hide the truth. Breezy Friends and Bodies Raina Sun thought cleaning her grandma's house in San Francisco to prepare for Chinese New Year would be a breeze. Instead, she finds her deceased grandfather’s secret journal and ends up French kissing the train tracks in a mugging incident. After putting the move on her grandma, her grandfather’s BFF took an elevator ride straight to the Heavenly Gates. And the second time Raina ends up flat on her back without a man in sight, she suspects the Year of the Monkey would leave her skulking in cold damp places where family secrets are better off dying with the dead.
Scene of the Grind
Tonya Kappes - 2017
With the excitement of the Bean Hive opening and rush of business, Roxie is moving on with her life until she finds that one of her best customers, Lilia Walters, was found dead after eating one of Roxie's best-selling doughnuts after Roxie's aunt Maxine gave Lilia as a peace offering. Gossip in Honey Springs is as hot at the coffee served at the Bean Hive and Roxie has to uncover who is behind the murder not only to save her shop, her aunt, but her life.
Publishable By Death
A.C.F. Bookens - 2019
Quiet St. Marin’s has just gotten a little more lively . . . and a little less alive.All Harvey Beckett wants to do is read books, help the residents of St. Marin’s find the perfect book for that moment, and snuggle with her hound dog Mayhem. But when the small, waterside town’s newest resident discovers the body of the community’s persnickety reporter in her bookshop storeroom on opening day, Harvey finds herself bound and determined to figure out the crime. Her task won’t be easy, though, since the town is flooded with visitors for the first annual Harriet Tubman Festival to honor the community’s most famous resident. Plus, a quiet but charming mechanic named Daniel isn’t helping with her concentration at all.Publishable By Death is the first book in the St. Marin’s Cozy Mystery Series by ACF. Bookens.
Clocks Locks and Danger: A Button Up Detective Agency Cozy Mystery #1
Lizzie Lewis - 2020
Sam Jones was a detective with the local CID, and Janika is determined to prove he was murdered. Realising she has detective skills of her own, she trains to be a private investigator, and sets up an office above the Button Up coffee shop owned by Abi Wells, a girl she knew at school as Abi Button.Calling her business the Button Up Detective Agency, Janika sets out to find her own cases to investigate, having been warned by the police not to investigate her husband’s murder. But that’s something she can’t resist when the opportunity arises. When things turn nasty, who can she trust?Told by Janika Jones, this is a slightly darker cozy mystery spin-off from the series of six Abi Button Cozy Mystery Romance books, also by Lizzie Lewis. Although mainly about Janika, she interacts with many of the main Abi Button story characters.
The Madams of Mischief
Sherry M. Siska - 2012
I lifted the hinged lid of the trash can, swung it open, and tossed in the diaper. That's when Destiny not only called my name, she also spit in my face, thumbed her nose, and blew me a big old raspberry. Lucky me." Those crazy Madams of Mischief, Destiny, Lady Luck, and Fate seem to be out to get Marty Sheffield! Marty just wants to live her quiet life in her quiet town while recovering from being left at the altar by up-and-coming country music star, Ricky Ray Riley. The Doom Divas seem to have other ideas, though. While babysitting her sister's kids, Marty finds the body of a former classmate wedged in a ninety-gallon trash container at a local park. With the help of her sister, Marty sets out to solve the mystery and save her own hide before it's too late.
Also available in the Doom Divas series of humorous mystery novels for Kindle and in paperback: The Divas of Doom (Doom Divas Book 2) and The Floozies of Fate (Doom Divas Book 3)
A Trifle Dead
Livia Day - 2013
Which was fine when she was a tearaway teen, but not so useful now she’s trying to run a hipster urban cafe, invent the perfect trendy dessert, and stop feeding the many (oh so unfashionable) policemen in her life.When a dead muso is found in the flat upstairs, Tabitha does her best (honestly) not to interfere with the investigation, despite the cute Scottish blogger who keeps angling for her help. Her superpower is gossip, not solving murder mysteries, and those are totally not the same thing, right?But as that strange death turns into a string of random crimes across the city of Hobart, Tabitha can’t shake the unsettling feeling that maybe, for once, it really is ALL ABOUT HER.And maybe she’s figured out the deadly truth a trifle late…
A Body in the Bargain
Charlotte Moore - 2016
She writes, paints watercolor landscapes and reads Jane Austen over and over. Kylie’s been married since she was 19, has twin boys and loves hunting for bargains and selling her crafts on-line. Kate and Kylie have been best friends since third grade at River Valley Elementary School. When Kate inherits her grandmother’s old house and decides to move back to peaceful River Valley, she finds there’s anything but peace in the Valley. First, she arrives to find that all her late grandmother’s old furniture has been stolen. Kylie comes to the rescue, and just a few days later the two of them are right in the middle of a murder investigation. Through it all, with Kylie’s help, Kate’s turning the old house into her own home with yard sale and thrift shop bargains and getting to know two very different men. From the author of the Hunter Jones mystery series, A Body in the Bargain is about people you might know and one or two you might just want to avoid.
Better Off Wed
Laura Durham - 2005
Annabelle knows that even her trusted wedding emergency kit won't be able to salvage their careers if she and Richard can't find the real culprit.It's no easy task since the slain matron was perhaps the most hated socialite in DC, but Annabelle navigates through the city's colorful wedding industry and powerful social scene on the deadly trail of a killer. Always the bridal consultant and never the bride, she's seen her fair share of bouquet tosses. But there's no telling what surprises a ruthless killer will throw her way if she gets too close.
Parlez-Vous Murder?
Susan Kiernan-Lewis - 2017
I have lived through a few crappy moments in my life—and with a name like Hooker, you can just imagine—but nothing, nothing, compares to the two intensely and world-shatteringly crappy things that happened to me this last June. Three, I guess, if you count Gilbert. After my boyfriend dumped me on the day I thought he was going to propose, I’d have to say two other really bad things happened last June. The first would have to be the dead body I discovered in the rental house in France where I went to get over being dumped. The second—and very possibly I should have led with this—was the dirty bomb that exploded over the Riviera throwing me and everyone else in France back to the 1950s. So now I’m stranded here—trying to make a living by solving murders the old fashioned way — without help from DNA, databases, CSI crime labs or the police. And I’m doing it in France. Where I do not speak the language. During the apocalypse. Sound like fun?"