I kill people for fun. In books.
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Fabric shop owner Polyester Monroe can get tangled up in textiles, but it’s murder that really throws her for a loop in the latest mystery from the national bestselling author of Crushed Velvet.
The time has come for San Ladrón, California’s annual Miss Tangorli beauty pageant, and Poly has agreed to use Material Girl’s inventory of shimmery silks to create embellished gowns fit for a crown. But when millionaire Harvey Halliwell—the man who revived the city’s citrus trade with his imported tangorli tree—is found dead days before the pageant contestants are announced, something sour takes over the town.
To make matters worse, her friend, mechanic Charlie Brooks, is soon caught up in the crime, having been seen in the company of the case’s prime suspect. Now Poly’s on a mission to squeeze out the truth. But as she searches for a pattern, the killer seems intent on cutting up the evidence…
I’m a former fashion buyer turned mystery writer, trading fashion accessories for accessories to murder. I was bit by the mystery bug as a kid reading Trixie Belden, Connie Blair, and The Three Investigators. Now I’m writing three series: the Style & Error Mysteries, the Mad for Mod Mysteries, and the Material Witness Mysteries. Coming in Feb 2016: The new Costume Shop Cozy Mysteries!
The Material Witness mysteries feature Polyester Monroe, who inherits the fabric shop where she was born. Books include SUEDE TO REST and CRUSHED VELVET. The third, SILK STALKINGS, will be out in August 2016.
The Style & Error Series features former fashion buyer turned amateur sleuth Samantha Kidd. Books in that series include DESIGNER DIRTY LAUNDRY; BUYER, BEWARE; THE BRIM REAPER; and SOME LIKE IT HAUTE. (A short story, “Just Kidding,” tells the story of how Samantha first met shoe designer Nick Taylor). Book 5, GRAND THEFT RETRO, will be out in 2016.
The Madison Night Mysteries feature a modern day interior decorator who specializes in midcentury design (studying Doris Day movies to get the look right). Books are PILLOW STALK,THAT TOUCH OF INK, and WITH VICS YOU GET EGGROLL. A prequel novella, “Midnight Ice,” can be found in OTHER PEOPLE’S BAGGAGE.
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Planted (The Penningtons Investigate)
1st in Series
Cozy Mystery
Asdee Press (July 22, 2016)
Print Length: 309 pages
ASIN: B01FOVMCPK
Synopsis:
Planted is book one of the new mystery series, The Penningtons Investigate, from award-winning author C. T. Collier. The Penningtons, Lyssa and Kyle, are both PhD’s, and when their clever minds start asking questions, clever killers can’t hide.
It’s Monday of spring break when Professor Lyssa Pennington’s backyard garden project unearths a loaded revolver. With no record of violence at their address and no related cold case, the Tompkins Falls police have no interest. But the Penningtons and a friend with the State Police believe there a body somewhere. Whose? Where? And who pulled the trigger?
The Penningtons’ canvass of their quiet neighborhood turns up disturbing secrets about the family who lived in their house for decades and another ill-fated family a few doors away. No one seems to know how to contact the only sons of either family. The few facts they have about them don’t add up and, since the gun was buried about the time both young men disappeared from Tompkins Falls, the Penningtons feel compelled to find them and make sure all is well.
Lyssa follows the money story and finds twenty million dollars, a neighbor who’s not what he seems, and a long-buried rivalry. Kyle goes after homicide data in six states and finds a body. Their next surprise is a murderer who will go to any length to conceal the crime.
About The Author
C. T. Collier grew up in Seneca Falls, NY, left the area for college and jobs, and always wanted to return to the Finger Lakes. Today she lives in a beautiful small city on one of the prettiest of the Finger Lakes, not unlike fictional Tompkins Falls on lovely Chestnut Lake. Most days you’ll find her writing in her tiny office looking out on a woods populated with fox, deer, wild turkeys, and songbirds. In her career as a tech-savvy college professor she has been endlessly fascinated with campus intrigue. Entirely fictional, Tompkins College is no college and every college.
Author Links:
Website: https://drkatecollier.wordpress.com
Facebook: kate.collier.315
Twitter: @TompkinsFalls
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JULY 22, 2016
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Books, Movies, Reviews. Oh my!
Satisfaction for Insatiable Readers
Escape With Dollycas Into A Good Book
Mandy Hemphill is living her dream, running the successful Rose Cottage Cafe in Orchardville, Texas, from the ground floor of a converted, old—and possibly haunted—downtown home. She even had plans to grow her business with a new outdoor patio…if only the mayor wouldn’t have turned her down.
So when the beloved mayor is found murdered, Mandy finds herself among the suspects. And now business at the cafe is dropping faster than a fallen soufflé. How can she prove her innocence and save the Rose Cottage Cafe?
Thankfully Ben, the new owner of The Orchardville Gazette, doesn’t believe she’s guilty. As the two of them set out to find the real killer, they uncover one small-town lie after the next. But the closer they get to learning the truth about who killed the mayor, the more in danger they find themselves.
About The Author
After her twenty-year career in magazine publishing came to a screeching halt faster than you can say “print is dead,” Lori Stacy decided it was time to finally turn the many stories she had been crafting in her head over the years into books.
Lori has authored a number of fiction and nonfiction books for young adults, has written articles for both print and online publications, and has written about hotels for one of the world’s leading search engines.
She lives in Texas with her husband and three children. When she is not writing, you can usually find her in the kitchen baking treats (which she says are for her children) or trying to train their hundred-pound golden retriever, an obedience school dropout.
You can find out more about Lori and her latest books at www.loristacy.com, provided she didn’t forget to pay her web hosting bill.
Paramedic Zoe Chambers and the rest of rural Monongahela County’s EMS and fire personnel are used to wading into the middle of trouble to rescue the sick and the injured.
But when someone with an ax to grind seeks retribution by staging accident scenes and gunning down the first responders, Zoe finds herself forced to not only treat her own brethren of the front lines, but also, in her role as deputy coroner, seek out whoever is killing her friends. At the same time, Vance Township Police Chief Pete Adams races to track down a gun, a mysterious all-terrain vehicle, and the sniper before Zoe goes back on duty, placing herself—and Pete—firmly in the gunman’s crosshairs.
When I started writing the Zoe Chambers mystery series a few years back, one of the first things I decided on—besides the main characters of Zoe and Pete—was the location. I knew I wanted to set the series here in rural southwestern Pennsylvania, but I opted against using the real towns and municipalities.
My reasons for setting the stories locally were numerous. I know the area. No need to travel for research. No need to learn about quirky customs or manners. I grew up around them! And although we’re in the middle of farm country, crime exists. I liked the idea of writing about small town crime being as deadly as anything you’ll find in the city. I can write about corrupt politicians. I can also write about a body discovered in a bin of potatoes in a farmer’s root cellar.
My reasons for creating a fictionalized version of my corner of the world are less numerous. One: I wanted to be able to move things around and merge three different townships into one. If I had done this using the correct names for places, my readers who live around here would have nailed me to the wall. As is, they take great pleasure in announcing that they recognize that store or that road! Two: I’m not a police officer, but I write police procedure. While I try to stay accurate, if I do get something wrong, I can always say, “That’s how it’s done in Monongahela County!”
One thing that’s very real is the Kroll farmhouse, where Zoe lives in the first three books. It’s the house in which I grew up. My grandparents’ house. While the real structure was razed years ago, having Zoe live there has allowed me to keep my memories alive. Having said that, let me tell you I had not intended for Bridges Burned to end the way it did. Sometimes we authors write the stories. Sometimes they take over and write themselves. Such was the case, and I wasn’t at all happy about it. However, I’ve gone through the seven stages of grief and have moved on.
Zoe’s still working on it.
In With a Vengeance I bring back a number of locations that have shown up or been talked about in earlier books. The reclaimed strip minds known as the Cuts are real. I’ve always thought there was something vaguely sinister about them. A great place for a murder! Same with the State Game Lands. Easy access, and yet desolate. It’s one of my favorite places to drop a body.
Fictionally, of course.
Locations aren’t the only reason I chose to write about this area. The people are as varied as the topography. In With a Vengeance, the characters range from attorneys to mechanics to farmers to survivalists. Hunting is big business around here, so even knowing the murder weapon is a specific kind of deer rifle doesn’t narrow down the list of suspects.
Finally, I admit I’m obsessed with setting. I love reading books that take me someplace I’ve never been—or take me someplace I know quite well. I hope my readers have the same experience with my series, whether they’re experiencing Pennsylvania for the first time, or whether they think of Pete and Zoe as their neighbors.
About The Author
Annette Dashofy is the USA Today best-selling author of the Zoe Chambers mystery series about a paramedic and deputy coroner in rural Pennsylvania’s tight-knit Vance Township. CIRCLE OF INFLUENCE, published by Henery Press, was afinalist for the Agatha Award for Best First Novel and for the David Award for Best Mystery of 2014. LOST LEGACY, was released in September 2014 followed in April 2015 by BRIDGES BURNED, which has been nominated for the Agatha for Best Contemporary Novel. WITH A VENGEANCE, the fourth in the series, will be available May 3.
Keep up with Annette
Hey, Cozy Wednesday readers. This is Emma Nakamura, Molly Barda’s best friend. We both teach at Mahina State University, in Mahina, Hawai`i. I teach intro bio, and she’s in the College of Commerce, poor thing. Yeah, I know you never heard of Mahina State. Neither did Molly, before she moved here. Our motto is “Where Your Future Begins Tomorrow.”
So like I said, Molly’s my best friend, and I don’t wanna talk stink about her, but I gotta say, sometimes she misunderstands my good intentions. You ever heard the expression, “no good deed goes unpunished?” Yeah, that’s me. For example, I unselfishly fixed her up with my brother Jonah…
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Max Tobin brings his all-male dance company to Steeple Martin, with his new ballet Pendle, based on the infamous Pendle Witch Trials, due to be performed at the Oast Theatre. There have been unpleasant incidents during rehearsals in London, and Max asks Libby Sarjeant and her friend Fran Wolfe to look into them. To everyone’s surprise, the seriousness of the incidents escalates until, inevitably, someone is murdered.
While the police look into the murder, Libby and Fran wonder why someone seemed so set against the ballet. Were occult forces at work, or was there a more worldly, personal motive?
Today Leslie joins us with a guest post on cosy (known in these parts as cozy) mysteries.
First, thank you for hosting me on your blog – I’m delighted to be here.
When I first started writing Murder Mysteries, they weren’t called “cosies” in the UK. Eventually, with the rise of Amazon and the appearance of ebooks, the term came into general use as all books had to be categorised, and my books were never going to bear comparison with any of the grittier stuff.
Luckily, there proved to be a market for this type of story, and particularly the series crime novels. I followed in the great tradition of the Golden Age mysteries, and having read several US published authors, decided that it was a model I could adopt. When my publisher bought the first book – unfinished – she asked if it could be a series, and I delightedly agreed.
So far, there are sixteen full-length novels in the Libby Sarjeant series, one Christmas long/short story and a short story in an anthology. It appears, from the responses I receive from readers, that the main appeal of the books is the characters. One of the most frequent sentences I read is “It’s like visiting old friends.” That delights me, obviously, and I sometimes wonder if I could forget the murders altogether, and just send my little group of main characters off on non-criminal exploits, but one of my most popular characters is my police officer, Ian Connell. When he first appeared, in Book 2 of the series, I never realised how essential he would become. In fact he gets an awful lot of fan mail, mostly asking me not to marry him off!
I think this is the appeal of the series mystery. Each little world is lovingly created and peopled, and as long as the main characters are sympathetic, readers are willing to suspend disbelief. After all, how many murders can one civilian stumble across in their lifetime?
What is more difficult, in my opinion, are the further constrictions placed on the author by setting the stories in a very specific environment. I’m thinking particularly about, for instance, Quilting Mysteries, Crafting Mysteries, Coffee Shop Mysteries and others of their ilk. That seems awfully difficult to me. I have enough trouble finding legitimate situations for my eponymous sleuth to barge into, without tying her to a particular trade or hobby. She does run a local theatre, and once or twice, murders have been loosely connected to that, but mostly I just try and find something new for her to investigate. Occasionally, I send her and her friends off on holiday somewhere, but have to bring them back half way through the book. And I always get comments on the next book saying how nice it is to be back in Steeple Martin, Libby’s home village.
For, of course, in the best English tradition, Libby lives in a typical English village in my home county of Kent. There is also the local seaside town of Nethergate, and several other villages dotted between, which over the years have housed murderers, victims, and scenes of crime. So, if you’d like to see what goes on in the British countryside, do pay Libby a visit. We’d love to see you.
About The Author
A former actor, model and freelance journalist, Lesley Cookman lives on the Kent coast in the UK, has four musicians as children, two small grandchildren and two cats, Lady Godiva and Gloria. All 14 of her Libby Sarjeant books have reached number one in their genre charts on Amazon UK.
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In The Musubi Murder, new assistant professor Molly Barda is using her top-ten literature Ph.D. to teach resume-writing to business majors at remote Mahina State University, “Where Your Future Begins Tomorrow!”
Keenly aware of the brutal realities of the academic job market, Molly just wants to keep her head down and stay out of trouble until she gets tenure. Naturally she ends up getting dragged into the middle of a grisly murder case.
The Musubi Murder is a lighthearted murder mystery that affectionately portrays small-town life and big academic egos in rural Hawaii.
Frankie Bow knows academia. As they say, “You couldn’t make this stuff up!” You’ll laugh at Bow’s satirical sense of humor and the (almost) unbelievable lengths her university goes to in order to retain any breathing student.
—Kathleen Kelley Reardon, author of Shadow Campus and several bestselling business books.
21 ratings averaging 4.76 stars on Goodreads
19 reviews averaging 4.3 stars on Audible.com
6 reviews averaging 4.8 stars on Amazon.com
Frankie Bow’s first novel, THE MUSUBI MURDER , is available at Audible.com, Amazon.com, and iTunes.
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