Category: #NewReleases | Page 3

May 30, 2021May 30, 2021

IF PAT FLANAGAN WROTE A CAREER HANDBOOK, THIS WOULD BE IT

In The Black Thumb, composition instructor and newsblogger Patrick Flanagan lands a book publishing contract. His job is to produce a career advice manual. The only problem? Pat’s publisher wants him to keep it upbeat, and Pat knows firsthand how bleak the job market really is.

No, You Can’t be an Astronaut is the book Pat might have come up with. It contains practical career advice, self-assessments, links to job search resources, and up-to-date research. For the right person it can make a great graduation gift. The audiobook is on introductory promo for 99 cents through June 5!

No You Can’t be an Astronaut | Why you shouldn’t follow your dreams and what to do instead

May 12, 2021April 29, 2021

Treasure Most Deadly by Terry Ambrose

Seaside Cove Bed & Breakfast owner Rick Atwood is again called on to assist his friend, Chief of Police Adam Cunningham, with a murder investigation. The case seems straightforward enough.

Clive Crabbe, who has a quick temper and a strong jealous streak, was found hunched over the victim after the man made advances toward Clive’s ex-wife.

A murder investigation is the last thing Rick wants right now. The B&B is booked solid. The town is inundated with tourists and news reporters chasing stories about treasure thieves. And Rick’s
wedding to Marquetta Weiss is just weeks away. As if that wasn’t enough, Rick’s eleven-year-old daughter Alex is not only itching to help the cops solve another murder, but she’s forming an
unhealthy friendship with a B&B guest.

The worst part is that Alex may be the one person capable of cracking the case.

Terry Ambrose

Trouble in Paradise and Seaside Cove Mysteries

Once upon a time, in a life he’d rather forget, Terry Ambrose tracked down deadbeats for a living. He also hired big guys with tow trucks to steal cars-but only when negotiations failed. Those years of chasing deadbeats taught him many valuable life lessons such as-always keep your car in the garage. Today, Terry likes fast, funny mysteries and cool photography. He writes the Trouble in Paradise McKenna Mysteries and organized an anthology to benefit Read Aloud America. He fondly likens his efforts to those of a blind man herding cats.

Header Image by Judith Scharnowski from Pixabay

May 5, 2021April 18, 2021

Whole Latte Murder by Lena Gregory #MidweekMystery

Ex-New Yorker and local diner owner Gia Morelli is still getting used to the sweltering Florida sun. But this summer she’ll have to deal with a more dangerous kind of heat—when she’s hot on the trail of another murderer . . .

Summer in Boggy Creek has arrived, and Gia’s best friend, successful real estate agent Savannah, is getting hitched. Now she’s enlisted Gia’s sleuthing talents in a desperate search for the perfect wedding dress. But when Savannah mysteriously vanishes after showing a mansion to a bigwig client, Gia investigates the house Savannah was trying to sell. The first clue she finds is Savannah’s car in the driveway. Inside the house, they stumble on Savannah’s potential buyer—dead. Someone had apparently closed the deal—with a two by four full of nails to the client’s head. Soon afterward, a woman’s body is fished from the lake near the same house. The townsfolk are now sweating bullets over the murders, and the heat comes down on poor Gia to find her missing friend, and track down the killer . . .

Lena Gregory

About the Author

Lena Gregory is the author of the Bay Island Psychic Mysteries, which take place on a small island between the north and south forks of Long Island, New York, and the All-Day Breakfast Café Mysteries, which are set on the outskirts of Florida’s Ocala National Forest.
Visit her website and sign up for her newsletter.

Amazon Barnes & Noble Kobo Kensington Apple Google Play

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March 17, 2021March 11, 2021

The latest Professor Molly Mystery is available now!

Celebrate St. Patrick’s Day with a new Professor Molly mystery! Newsblogger Pat Flanagan returns to Mahina to help Molly and Emma investigate the disappearance of Molly’s tenant, social media sensation Jandie Brand. The irepressible business law instructor Harriet Holmes volunteers her expertise as well, while Molly’s curious neighbors on Uakoko Street jockey to get a close-up peek at fame.

The Influencer

Author: Frankie Bow
Series: The Professor Molly Mysteries, Book 11
Genre: Mystery

There's no such thing as bad publicity. Until it happens to you.

Professor Molly's new renter is a social media star seeking privacy in remote Mahina, Hawaii. The arrangement seems to be working out...until the celebrity influencer vanishes. Molly and her best friend Emma Nakamura call in the Mahina PD and try to stay out of the way. But the unthinkable happens: The saturnine Detective Medeiros actually asks for Molly and Emma's help. As they confront nosy neighbors, fanatical followers, and the missing woman's has-been husband, Molly and Emma find themselves at the center of the story. And when fame creates its own reality, that's a dangerous place to be.

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March 10, 2021February 25, 2021

Long Island Iced Tina | A Catering Hall Mystery | by Maria DiRico

Mia Carina is back in the borough of Queens—in charge of the family catering hall, Belle View Banquet Manor, and keeping her nonna company. But some events—like murder—are not the kind you can schedule . . .

Mia’s newly pregnant friend Nicole plans to hold a shower at Belle View—but Nicole also has to attend one that her competitive (and mysteriously rich) stepmother, Tina, is throwing at the fanciest place in Queens. It’s a good chance for Mia to snoop on a competitor, especially since doing a search for “how to run a catering hall” can get you only so far.

Mia tags along at the lavish party, but the ambience suffers at Nicole’s Belle View shower when a fight breaks out—and then, oddly, a long-missing and valuable stolen painting is unwrapped by the mom-to-be. Tina is clearly shocked to see it. But not as shocked as Mia is when, soon afterward, she spots the lifeless body of a party guest floating in the marina . . .

INCLUDES ITALIAN RECIPES!

Maria DiRico is the pseudonym for Ellen Byron, author of the award winning, USA Today bestselling Cajun Country Mysteries. Born in Queens, New York, she is first-generation Italian-American on her mother’s side and the granddaughter of a low-level Jewish mobster on her father’s side. She grew up visiting the Astoria Manor and Grand Bay Marina catering halls, which were run by her Italian mother’s family in Queens and have become the inspiration for her Catering Hall Mystery Series. DiRico has been a writer-producer for hit television series like Wings and Just Shoot Me, and her first play, Graceland, appears in the Best Short Plays collection. She’s a freelance journalist, with over 200 articles published in national magazines, and previously worked as a cater-waiter for Martha Stewart, a credit she never tires of sharing. A native New Yorker who attended Tulane University, Ellen lives in Los Angeles with her husband, daughter, and two rescue dogs.

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Header image Valeria Aksakova

March 3, 2021February 25, 2021

Haunted Hibiscus | A Tea Shop Mystery by Laura Childs

Tea maven Theodosia Browning brews up trouble in the latest Tea Shop Mystery from New York Times bestselling author Laura Childs.

It is the week before Halloween and Theodosia Browning, proprietor of the Indigo Tea Shop, and her tea sommelier, Drayton, are ghosting through the dusk of a cool Charleston evening on their way to the old Bouchard Mansion. Known as the Gray Ghost, this dilapidated place was recently bequeathed to the Heritage Society, and tonight heralds the grand opening of their literary and historical themed haunted house.

Though Timothy Neville, the patriarch of the Heritage Society, is not thrilled with the fund-raising idea, it is the perfect venue for his grandniece, Willow French, to sign copies of her new book, Carolina Crimes & Creepers.

But amid a parade of characters dressed as Edgar Allan Poe, Lady Macbeth, and the Headless Horseman, Willow’s body is suddenly tossed from the third-floor tower room and left to dangle at the end of a rope. Police come screaming in and Theodosia’s boyfriend, Detective Pete Riley, is sent to Willow’s apartment to investigate. But minutes later, he is shot and wounded by a shadowy intruder.

Timothy begs Theodosia to investigate, and shaken by Riley’s assault, she readily agrees. Now, she questions members of the Heritage Society and a man who claims the mansion is rightfully his, as well as Willow’s book publisher and her fiancé, all while hosting a Sherlock Holmes tea and catering several others.

But the Gray Ghost holds many secrets, as do several other key suspects, while this murder mystery plays out on the eve of Halloween.

INCLUDES DELICIOUS RECIPES AND TEA TIME TIPS!

About the Author

Laura Childs is the New York Times bestselling author of the Tea Shop Mysteries, Scrapbook Mysteries, and Cackleberry Club Mysteries. In her previous life she was CEO/Creative Director of her own marketing firm and authored several screenplays. She is married to a professor of Chinese art history, loves to travel, rides horses, enjoys fundraising for various non-profits, and has two Chinese Shar-Pei dogs.

Laura specializes in cozy mysteries that have the pace of a thriller (a thrillzy!) Her three series are:

The Tea Shop Mysteries – set in the historic district of Charleston and featuring Theodosia Browning, owner of the Indigo Tea Shop. Theodosia is a savvy entrepreneur, and pet mom to service dog Earl Grey. She’s also an intelligent, focused amateur sleuth who doesn’t rely on coincidences or inept police work to solve crimes. This charming series is highly atmospheric and rife with the history and mystery that is Charleston.

The Scrapbooking Mysteries – a slightly edgier series that take place in New Orleans. The main character, Carmela, owns Memory Mine scrapbooking shop in the French Quarter and is forever getting into trouble with her friend, Ava, who owns the Juju Voodoo shop. New Orleans’ spooky above-ground cemeteries, jazz clubs, bayous, and Mardi Gras madness make their presence known here!

The Cackleberry Club Mysteries – set in Kindred, a fictional town in the Midwest. In a rehabbed Spur station, Suzanne, Toni, and Petra, three semi-desperate, forty-plus women have launched the Cackleberry Club. Eggs are the morning specialty here and this cozy cafe even offers a book nook and yarn shop. Business is good but murder could lead to the cafe’s undoing! This series offers recipes, knitting, cake decorating, and a dash of spirituality.

Laura’s Links:

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Featured Image by Jill Wellington from Pixabay

January 27, 2021January 16, 2021

#MidweekMystery: A Tourist’s Guide to Murder by V. M. Burns

Interview with V.M. Burns

Aloha, and welcome to Island Confidential! I really enjoy your protagonist, Samantha Washington, and envy what I consider to be her dream career. Can you tell the readers a little bit about her?

Samantha Washington was a high school English teacher who dreamed that one day, she and her husband, would open a mystery shop. When her husband dies, she decides life is too short not to follow her dreams. She quits her job and opens the mystery bookshop. She also dreamed that she would write British historic cozy mysteries, which she does.

There is a lot of me in Sam. She dreams of quitting her job and opening a mystery bookshop and writing British historic cozies because that’s my dream. Unfortunately, I’m not courageous enough to go “all in” like Sam. So, there’s no mystery bookshop (yet).

But fortunately for us readers, there are the cozy mysteries! If you met your protagonist in real life, how do you think you and she would get along?

If I met Samantha Washington in real life, I think we’d hit it off. We’d probably spend hours drinking tea, eating sweets, and talking about mysteries.

A Tourist’s Guide to Murder is the 6^th book in the Mystery Bookshop series. Has Samantha changed as the story has progressed, or has she stayed the same? On a scale of Kinsey Millhone to Amelia Peabody.

My characters evolve. When the series started with, The Plot is Murder, Sam was still grieving for her husband, and just starting out with the bookshop. Her desire to write British historic cozies was such a closely held secret, not even those closest to her knew about that dream Over the course of the series, she has gained confidence, her bookshop is thriving, she is sharing her writing with others, and she has opened up her heart to the possibility of love.

Have you ever contemplated killing someone that you know in real life–on the pages of your books, I mean?

Actually, I find it therapeutic to murder people I know (in the pages of my books). Whenever someone makes me angry, I kill them in my books. I change the names to protect the guilty, but I usually keep the same initials. My friends and coworkers read my books to see if they recognize themselves in the victim.

The book’s setting, North Harbor, Michigan, feels like a real place. Is it? I can’t find it on Google Maps.

North Harbor is based on the town of Benton Harbor, Michigan which is on the shores of Lake Michigan in the Southwestern corner of the state. People from the area will recognize the locale, so while I change the names, the setting is true to life.

When the movie or TV series is made, who plays the major roles?

I’d love to see Janelle Monae (Hidden Figures) as Samantha Washington. When I first started writing the series, I envisioned Della Reese as Nana Jo, but unfortunately, she has died. However, I believe Jackée Harry would also do an amazing job in the role.

What’s the worst and best advice you’ve heard or received as an author

The best advice I’ve received is to write the book that will keep your butt in the seat. Writing takes time and unless the book is something you feel passionate about, you won’t finish. I’ve been fortunate and haven’t had a lot of bad advice, but the worst advice is when people believe there is only one right way to do things—theirs. Just because something works for one person, doesn’t mean it will work for everyone. I believe each writer needs to figure out what works for them, and do that.

A Tourist’s Guide to Murder

Sam joins Nana Jo and her Shady Acres Retirement Village friends Irma, Dorothy, and Ruby Mae on a weeklong trip to London, England, to experience the Peabody Mystery Lovers Tour. The chance to see the sights and walk the streets that inspired Agatha Christie and Arthur Conan Doyle is a dream come true for Sam—and a perfect way to celebrate her new publishing contract as a mystery author.

But between visits to Jack the Ripper’s Whitechapel district and 221B Baker Street, Major Horace Peabody is found dead, supposedly of natural causes. Despite his employer’s unfortunate demise, the tour guide insists on keeping calm and carrying on—until another tourist on their trip also dies under mysterious circumstances. Now it’s up to Sam and the Shady Acres ladies to mix and mingle among their fellow mystery lovers, find a motive, and turn up a murderer . . .

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About the Author

V.M. (Valerie) Burns was born and raised in the Midwestern United States. She currently resides in the warmer region of the country in East Tennessee with her two poodles. Valerie is a member of Mystery Writers of America, Dog Writers of America, Crime Writers of Color, International Thriller Writers, and Sisters in Crime. Valerie is the author of the RJ Franklin Mysteries, the Dog Club Mysteries, and the Agatha Award-nominated Mystery Bookshop Mystery series.

Author Links

Bookbub: https://www.bookbub.com/authors/v-m-burns

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/vmburnsbooks/

Goodreads: https://www.goodreads.com/burnsvm

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/vmburnsbooks/

Twitter: https://twitter.com/vmburns

Website: vmburns.com

Purchase Links

Apple – Amazon – Google – Kobo – Nook – BAM – Bookshop.org – Hudson Booksellers – IndieBound – Target

December 9, 2020November 26, 2020

#MidweekMystery: The Secret on Rum Runner’s Lane

The Lane women are bibliomancers, but Cassie sees her gift as a curse
The Secret on Rum Runner’s Lane: A Book Magic Mini Mystery by Melissa Bourbon

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The Lane women are bibliomancers, but Cassie sees her divination not as a gift, but as a curse–one from which she desperately wants to escape. It turns out, though, that running from her fate isn’t as easy as she thought it would be. When a woman goes missing, and a neighbor turns up dead, Cassie turns to the books she’s always avoided to help her find the truth.

About the Author

Melissa Bourbon is the national bestselling author of nineteen mystery books, including the brand new collaborative Book Magic mysteries, the Lola Cruz Mysteries, A Magical Dressmaking Mystery series, and the Bread Shop Mysteries, written as Winnie Archer. She is a former middle school English teacher who gave up the classroom in order to live in her imagination full time. Melissa, a California native who has lived in Texas and Colorado, now calls the southeast home. She hikes, practices yoga, cooks, and is slowly but surely discovering all the great restaurants in the Carolinas. Since four of her five amazing kids are living their lives, scattered throughout the country, her dogs, Bean, the pug, Dobby, the chug, and Jasper, a cattle dog/lab keep her company while she writes. Melissa lives in North Carolina with her educator husband, Carlos, and their youngest son. She is beyond fortunate to be living the life of her dreams.

December 3, 2020December 4, 2020

#MidweekMystery | On Deadly Tides by Elizabeth Duncan

With a picturesque black and white lighthouse, pebble beaches and stunning views of sea and mountains, the island of Anglesey off the coast of North Wales is the perfect place for an idyllic mid-summer painting holiday.
On Deadly Tides: A Penny Brannigan Mystery

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Watercolour artist, businesswoman, and amateur sleuth Penny Brannigan is enjoying the retreat enormously – until she discovers the body of a New Zealand journalist on a secluded beach just as the tide is going out, threatening to take the body with it.

The post mortem reveals the victim died from injuries “consistent with a fall from a great height,” and the death is ruled accidental. But Penny thinks there’s more to the story. Curious how the victim came to such an untimely end at this most inhospitable spot, she uncovers a link to a mysterious disappearance several years earlier.

And as her holiday romance with a wildlife photographer turns to love, she learns some truths about herself, too, that surprise her.

As the winds of change blow through Penny’s own life, she sets sail on a friendly tide for a future she never dreamed possible, in a beautiful place she never imagined.

About the Author

A two-time winner of the Bloody Words (Bony Blithe) Award for Canada’s best light mystery, Elizabeth J. Duncan is the author of two series: the Penny Brannigan mysteries set in North Wales and Shakespeare in the Catskills featuring costume designer Charlotte Fairfax. A former journalist, public relations practioner, and college professor, Elizabeth is a faculty member of the Humber School for Writers. She divides her time between Toronto, Canada and Llandudno, North Wales.