Book picks similar to
Potion Problem by Linnea West


mystery
paranormal
cozy-mystery
fantasy

Tomes and Terriers


Hillary Avis - 2020
    Actually, it has everybody’s secrets. In a hidden library on Rosemary Street, the memories of all the town's citizens are recorded on the pages of magical books.Every happiness. Every lie. Every crime.Allison Rye’s husband lost his memory overnight. They went to bed married and woke up strangers—twenty-five years of marriage gone, poof. He can’t remember her name, let alone the home they’ve shared for decades.Forced to sell the family bakery to pay for his care, Allison is left broke, unemployed, with no hope of recovering her old life. What choice does she have but to move in with her daughter in Portland?But when a resident at her husband’s care facility is murdered—and a sweet old lady is blamed—Allison finds herself drawn into the investigation. She knows something that police don’t…something she can’t reveal without becoming a murder suspect herself.With her intrepid foster dog, a Yorkshire terrier named Pogo, Allison sets out to prove that more than one person in Remembrance had it out for the victim. Too bad she only has a few days to dig up the evidence before she has to leave town.Hope comes in the form of a friend who offers Allison a place to live for free, with just one little catch. Allison must become the sworn guardian of library of memories.Reading the memory books is the perfect way for Allison to learn who committed murder at Golden Gardens Memory Care. But as she uncovers the true story of what happened that night, she learns other truths that make her question everything she knows about her own life.First in the Magic Library series, Tomes & Terriers is a bittersweet magical realism mystery that will change the way you think about memory and magic, fidelity and friendship.

Scent of a Killer


Lisbeth Reade - 2015
    Which turns out to be a nice surprise, after all.But just as she’s getting to know her eccentric Aunts and learn to harness her newfound magic, a shocking murder threatens the entire world she’s just uncovered. Her mother’s best friend is found dead, with her Aunts’ fingerprints all over the murder weapon, and Ella must act to save her family.Combining forces with Rory, the cute mailman she’s been crushing on, Ella uses her skills of scent and sense to track the killer. But when clues cross social classes, Ella realizes that catching the killer could alienate Rory.Will Ella catch the killer and still get her man?

A Friend In Knead


Judith Jackson - 2018
     It is springtime in Vermont, and Harriet’s life is finally on a roll. The Bluebell Café, her pride and joy, is a success, and someday soon it may even be solvent. In her scant free time she ghost writes her gran’s wildly popular advice column and tends to her beloved one-eyed, cross dressing, English Bulldog. But then Sevenoaks experiences its first murder in as long as anyone can remember, and the police investigation hits way too close to home. In order to save her café, Harriet and her best friend, Claire, are forced to conduct their own search for the killer. To further complicate matters, Harriet’s long-ago boyfriend – the love of her life – has moved back to town, and if her legs would just stop wobbling every time the two of them are together it would be easier to pretend she’s completely over him. A Friend in Knead is a cozy mystery full of tasty food, lots of laughs and a hit of romance. Includes some of The Bluebell Café’s most-loved recipes.

Deadly Spells and a Southern Belle


Amy Boyles - 2019
     Only Witch’s Forge isn’t a supernatural paradise—here spells backfire, kudzu bites and magic is broken. That is, until Charming Calhoun arrives. Charming has everything a Southern Belle could ask for—a thriving matchmaking business and great employees. But when one of her employees goes missing in Witch’s Forge, she quickly realizes there’s something sinister afoot. Once she arrives, Charming discovers a world of strange. Her house has a mind of its own—adding rooms and coughing up objects. There’s also a broomstick that likes to spank and a pot-bellied pig with an appetite for chocolate. Then she butts heads with the local vampire chief of police. What? A handsome vampire cop in a town full of witches? Vampires and witches are mortal enemies. But Charming better stay on the vampire’s good side because when someone winds up dead, everyone’s a suspect. She’s got her work cut out for her. Can Charming solve the mystery and return to her old life? Or will she discover that in the Smoky Mountains her life truly begins? And if so, can Charming survive long enough to enjoy it, or will she become the murderer’s next victim? FIND OUT NOW!

All I Got Was The Headache


Anne Avery - 2016
    Literally. Life, for Maxie, has never been the same since. Amelia has rotten taste in clothes, a fondness for single malt scotch, and an annoying penchant for meddling where she’s not wanted. As far as Maxie’s concerned, her fairy godmother’s “assistance” isn’t wanted anywhere, at any time, for any reason whatsoever. Unfortunately for Maxie, when it comes to heeding hints (not to mention demands and outright threats), Amelia has the hide of a rhinoceros—nothing gets through! Maxie is the owner and sole employee of Maxie Peterson Investigations. When she discovers her newest, richest, and (sadly) only client dead on her office floor with her letter opener through his heart, she isn’t surprised to find Amelia’s already on the job—Amelia can always be counted on to be in the middle of things, making them worse. What Maxie isn’t prepared for is the hunky new detective in charge of the case. Ben Trueblood is as hard-nosed as Maxie, and just as determined to find the killer, but he’s got a major advantage—he doesn’t have a fairy godmother making a mess of everything before he even gets started!

The Gossiping Gourmet


Martin Brown - 2014
    But for love of his caramel chicken and cherry fudge brownies, everyone has a story to share regarding their fellow citizens—Stories that too often find their way into his weekly gossip-filled newspaper column, "Heard About Town." When the great chef and his admirers, the Sausalito Ladies of Liberty, take offense to a newly arrived Manhattan power couple, their insular world of tasty sauces and stinging insults leads to deadly results.Everyone has their own theory about who killed Warren. But it takes the combined efforts of Rob Timmons, the local newspaper publisher, and Eddie Austin, his childhood friend and Marin County’s top detective, to unravel this tale of delicious dishes and malicious deception.

Poodle Versus the Assassin


Anne Shillolo - 2020
    

Murder Above the Fold


ReGina Welling - 2018
     Turns out, keeping up with a thousand-year-old coven leader with a penchant for magical mischief isn’t the most exciting item on their agenda. When Mag and Clara stumble over the dead body of a local woman, they refuse to let the ruling of accidental death stand—not when they’re positive it was murder. If you like cantankerous old witches, concealed covens, and unsolved murders, you'll love this humorous magical story full of chaos and intrigue.

Who Killed the Ghost in the Library? (Ghost Writer Mysteries, #1)


Teresa Watson - 2014
    When she gets a reply and meets the client, she gets more than she bargained for. She's thrown into a 60-year-old mystery, but somebody doesn't want the truth to come out, and they are willing to go to any lengths to keep that from happening...even if it means killing Cam.

A Witchy Mistake


Rhonda Hopkins - 2020
    A misuse of powers. An Unexpected Consequence. Sixteen-year-old Charley Cooper is furious when her cousin Danu uses her powers to get back at a high school nemesis without considering the consequences. When someone attacks the other girl and she ends up in a coma, Danu becomes the prime suspect. As annoyed as she is at her cousin, Charley doesn't want her to go down for something she didn't do. Even though Charley has never had magical abilities of her own, when she has what she believes is a vision about an attack on Danu, she's forced to investigate. Can she find the guilty party before her cousin pays - one way or another?  If you enjoy magic, quirky characters, and small-town mysteries with a touch of romance, you're sure to enjoy A Witchy Mistake!

Witch's Tail


Melanie Snow - 2020
    Divorced and jobless, she relocates to the enchanting village of Witchland intent on solving the murder of her late mentor. But as she pursues clues buried in the man’s fight to save the endangered forest-dwelling lynx, she makes an enemy of a ruthless land developer.Encountering fairies in the woods, Sarah discovers she’s been repressing unique gifts passed down from her ancestor and founding witch, Lativia Spellwood. But though she can now hear her deceased friend’s dog speak, she isn’t sure her abilities are enough to expose the greed and corruption covering a killer’s lies.Can Sarah work with the magical beings to bring a murderer to justice?Witch’s Tail is the charming first book in the light-hearted The Spellwood Witches cozy mystery series. If you like paranormal puzzles, delightful canine companions, and environmental enlightenment, then you’ll love Melanie Snow’s wagging-ly fun whodunit. Buy Witch’s Tail to set a snare for an assassin today!

Murder Any Witch Way


N.M. Howell - 2016
    It’s even harder when you live in a town that doesn’t believe in witches. When young witch River Halloway moves to sleepy Brimstone Bay for her very first journalist job she doesn’t expect to cover anything ground-breaking, until a paranormal festival comes to town and a body is found on opening night. Now, with all evidence pointing towards a witch, River must find the true killer before she becomes the prime suspect, or worse, the next murder victim.

Small Town Murder


Patti Benning - 2017
    If not, enjoy this first book in the incredible series! Autumn Roth has a good job and a long-term boyfriend, whom she hopes will become her fiancé before the year is out. When she loses both in the space of a weekend, she is convinced that her life can’t get any worse…until she witnesses an innocent man’s death while visiting her aunt and uncle at their assisted living home. Trying to maintain her holiday cheer is difficult, especially when Autumn becomes the killer’s next target. With only weeks to go before Christmas, she struggles to deal with the new direction her life is taking… and to catch a killer before someone else gets hurt.

But Wait, There’s Myrrh


Morgana Best - 2021
    Her husband has been playing cat and mouse, and soon Jennifer has a murder to solve. Yet it's all not cat and dried.Changes are happening. Is she simply hiss-terical, or will she take advantage of this new op-purr-tunity?The prequel novella to the Paranormal Women's Fiction Cozy Mystery series, MenoPaws Mysteries, from USA Today Bestselling author, Morgana Best.

Murder at the Filmore


Zelda White - 2018
    It looks cut and dry: a suspect fleeing the scene, a scorned wife, a mythical murder weapon. But then a retired detective by the name of Virginia Holmes arrives. There's more to this mystery than meets the eye ... and the murderer might still be inside the hotel.