Special Collections

Wish You Were Here

Curiosity just might be the death of Mrs. Murphy--and her human companion, Mary Minor "Harry" Haristeen. Small towns are like families: Everyone lives very close together. . .and everyone keeps secrets. Crozet, Virginia, is a typical small town-until its secrets explode into murder. Crozet's thirty-something post-mistress, Mary Minor "Harry" Haristeen, has a tiger cat (Mrs. Murphy) and a Welsh Corgi (Tucker), a pending divorce, and a bad habit of reading postcards not addressed to her. When Crozet's citizens start turning up murdered, Harry remembers that each received a card with a tombstone on the front and the message "Wish you were here" on the back. Intent on protecting their human friend, Mrs. Murphy and Tucker begin to scent out clues. Meanwhile, Harry is conducting her own investigation, unaware her pets are one step ahead of her. If only Mrs. Murphy could alert her somehow, Harry could uncover the culprit before the murder occurs--and before Harry finds herself on the killer's mailing list.From the Paperback edition.

Date Added: 09/14/2018

The Sweetness at the Bottom of the Pie

A delightfully dark English mystery, featuring precocious young sleuth Flavia de Luce and her eccentric family. The summer of 1950 hasn't offered up anything out of the ordinary for eleven-year-old Flavia de Luce: bicycle explorations around the village, keeping tabs on her neighbours, relentless battles with her older sisters, Ophelia and Daphne, and brewing up poisonous concoctions while plotting revenge in their home's abandoned Victorian chemistry lab, which Flavia has claimed for her own.

But then a series of mysterious events gets Flavia's attention: A dead bird is found on the doormat, a postage stamp bizarrely pinned to its beak. A mysterious late-night visitor argues with her aloof father, Colonel de Luce, behind closed doors. And in the early morning Flavia finds a red-headed stranger lying in the cucumber patch and watches him take his dying breath.

For Flavia, the summer begins in earnest when murder comes to Buckshaw: "I wish I could say I was afraid, but I wasn't. Quite the contrary. This was by far the most interesting thing that had ever happened to me in my entire life." Did the stranger die of poisoning? There was a piece missing from Mrs. Mullet's custard pie, and none of the de Luces would have dared to eat the awful thing. Or could he have been killed by the family's loyal handyman, Dogger... or by the Colonel himself?

At that moment, Flavia commits herself to solving the crime -- even if it means keeping information from the village police, in order to protect her family. But then her father confesses to the crime, for the same reason, and it's up to Flavia to free him of suspicion. Only she has the ingenuity to follow the clues that reveal the victim's identity, and a conspiracy that reaches back into the de Luces' murky past.

A thoroughly entertaining romp of a novel, The Sweetness at the Bottom of the Pie is inventive and quick-witted, with tongue-in-cheek humour that transcends the macabre seriousness of its subject.

Winner of the 2007 Crime Writers' Association Debut Dagger.

Date Added: 09/14/2018

Still Life

The CWA Dagger-winning first novel from worldwide phenomenon and number one New York Times bestseller Louise Penny, introducing Chief Inspector Armand Gamache.The discovery of a dead body in the woods on Thanksgiving Weekend brings Chief Inspector Armand Gamache and his colleagues from the Surete du Quebec to a small village in the Eastern Townships. Gamache cannot understand why anyone would want to deliberately kill well-loved artist Jane Neal, especially any of the residents of Three Pines - a place so free from crime it doesn't even have its own police force. But Gamache knows that evil is lurking somewhere behind the white picket fences and that, if he watches closely enough, Three Pines will start to give up its dark secrets...'Chief Superintendent Armand Gamache of the Quebec police is one of the most interesting detectives in crime fiction' The Times'A cracking storyteller, who can create fascinating characters, a twisty plot and wonderful surprise endings' Ann Cleeves

Date Added: 09/14/2018

Sprinkle with Murder

Melanie Cooper and Angie DeLaura are finally living out their dream as the proud owners of the Fairy Tale Cupcakes bakery. But their first big client is a nightmare. She's a bridezilla who wants 500 custom cupcakes for her wedding. When Mel stumbles upon the bride-to-be dead-by-cupcake, she becomes the prime suspect. To save themselves and their business, the ladies need to find the real murderer, before the cupcake killer ices someone else.

Date Added: 04/06/2020

Sex, Murder and a Double Latte

When a mystery writer cries bloody murder, everyone blames her overactive imagination...Thriller scribe Sophie Katz is as hard-boiled as a woman who drinks Grande Caramel Brownie Frappuccinos can be. So Sophie knows it's not paranoia or post-divorce, living-alone-again jitters, when she becomes convinced that a crazed reader is sneaking into her apartment to reenact scenes from her books. The police, however, can't tell a good plot from an unmarked grave.When a filmmaker friend is brutally murdered in the manner of a death scene in one of his movies, Sophie becomes convinced that a copycat killer is on the loose -and that she's the next target. If she doesn't solve the mystery, her own bestseller will spell out her doom. Cursing her grisly imagination (why, oh, why did she have to pick the ax?), Sophie engages in some real-life gumshoe tactics. The man who swoops in to save her in dark alleys is mysterious new love interest Anatoly Darinsky. Of course, if this were fiction, Anatoly would be her prime suspect....

Date Added: 09/14/2018

The Quiche Of Death and The Vicious Vet

The Quiche of Death

Putting all her eggs in one basket, Agatha Raisin gives up her successful PR firm, sells her London flat, and samples a taste of early retirement in the quiet village of Carsely. Bored, lonely, and used to getting her way, she enters a local baking contest. Despite the fact that Agatha has never baked a thing in her life, she is sure the pie she has secretly bought from an upper-crust London quicherie will make her the toast of the town. But her recipe for social advancement sours when the judge not only snubs her entry—but falls over dead!

The Vicious Vet

Agatha Raisin hasn't quite adjusted to the slow pace of village life, or to the failure of her overtures to her handsome neighbor, James Lacey. Since the new vet in town is young and good looking, Agatha's perfectly healthy tabby endures a nasty physical exam in the name of romance. Unfortunately, his sacrifice is all for naught when the vet is soon found dead. The police call the death a freak accident, but Agatha convinces James that playing amateur detective might be fun. Unfortunately, just as curiosity killed the cat, Agatha's inept snooping is soon a motivation for murder. . . .

Date Added: 09/14/2018

Pleating for Mercy

When her great-grandmother passes away, Harlow Jane Cassidy leaves her job as a Manhattan fashion designer and moves back to Bliss, Texas. But when she opens a dressmaking boutique in the turn-of-the-century farmhouse she inherited, Harlow senses an inexplicable "presence". Her old friend Josie orders a gown for her upcoming wedding, but when Josie's boss turns up dead, Harlow has to find the killer-with a little help from beyond. .

Date Added: 04/06/2020

On What Grounds

Ten years ago, Clare Cosi left an unhappy marriage along with a job she loved: managing the historic Village Blend coffeehouse in New York's Greenwich Village. For a decade, she was happy raising her daughter in the quiet suburbs of New Jersey; but now that Joy is grown and gone, life has gotten way too quiet for Clare. With a little cajoling from Madame, the Blend's flamboyant, elderly owner, Clare agrees to return to her old job, and right from the start she gets one heck of a jolt. On her first morning back as Village Blend manager, Clare unlocks the front door to find her beautiful, young assistant manager unconscious in the back of the store, coffee grounds strewn everywhere. As Anabelle is rushed to the hospital, police arrive to investigate, but Detective Mike Quinn finds no sign of forced entry or foul play, and he deems it an accident. Clare disagrees; and after Quinn leaves, there are a few questions she just can't get out of her mind, like why was the trash bin in the wrong place? If this wasn't an accident, are her other baristas in danger? And are all NYPD detectives this attractive?

Date Added: 09/14/2018

The No. 1 Ladies' Detective Agency

NATIONAL BESTSELLER • Fans around the world adore the bestselling No. 1 Ladies&’ Detective Agency series and its proprietor, Precious Ramotswe, Botswana&’s premier lady detective. In this charming series, Mma  Ramotswe—with help from her loyal associate, Grace Makutsi—navigates her cases and her personal life with wisdom, good humor, and the occasional cup of tea.This first novel in Alexander McCall Smith&’s widely acclaimed The No. 1 Ladies Detective Agency series tells the story of the delightfully cunning and enormously engaging Precious Ramotswe, who is drawn to her profession to &“help people with problems in their lives.&” Immediately upon setting up shop in a small storefront in Gaborone, she is hired to track down a missing husband, uncover a con man, and follow a wayward daughter. But the case that tugs at her heart, and lands her in danger, is a missing eleven-year-old boy, who may have been snatched by witchdoctors.The No. 1 Ladies&’ Detective Agency received two Booker Judges&’ Special Recommendations and was voted one of the International Books of the Year and the Millennium by the Times Literary Supplement.

Date Added: 09/14/2018

Murder with Fried Chicken and Waffles

Welcome to Mahalia's Sweet Tea--the finest soul food restaurant in Prince George's County, Maryland. In between preparing her famous cornbread and mashed potatoes so creamy "they'll make you want to slap your Momma," owner Halia Watkins is about to dip her spoon into a grisly mystery. . .Halia Watkins has her hands full cooking, hosting, and keeping her boisterous young cousin, Wavonne, from getting too sassy with customers. Having fast-talking entrepreneur Marcus Rand turn up in her kitchen is annoying enough when he's alive--but finding his dead body face-down on her ceramic tile after hours is much worse. Marcus had his enemies, and the cast iron frying pan beside his corpse suggests that at last, his shady business deals went too far. Halia is desperate to keep Sweet Tea's name out of the sordid spotlight but her efforts only make Wavonne a prime suspect. Now Halia will have to serve up the real villain--before the killer returns for a second helping. . .Features delicious recipes from Mahalia's Sweet Tea, including Sour Cream Corn Bread and Sweet Corn Casserole!

Date Added: 09/14/2018

Murder Past Due

There's a cat in the stacks... ...and he makes the purr-fect partner for a librarian-turned-sleuth. Everyone in Athena, Mississippi, knows librarian Charlie Harris-and his Maine coon cat named Diesel that he walks on a leash. They also know his former classmate-turned-famous bestselling novelist, Godfrey Priest. But someone in Athena took Godfrey off the bestseller lists- permanently, and with extreme prejudice. Now, Charlie and Diesel must browse through the history section of the town's past to find a killer.

Date Added: 04/06/2020

Murder Is Binding

The streets of Stoneham, New Hampsire are lined with bookstores...and paved with murder. When she moved to Stoneham, city slicker Tricia Miles met nothing but friendly faces. And when she opened her mystery bookstore, she met friendly competition. But when she finds Doris Gleason dead in her own cookbook store, killed by a carving knife, the atmosphere seems more cutthroat than cordial. Someone wanted to get their hands on the rare cookbook that Doris had recently purchased-and the locals think that someone is Tricia. To clear her name, Tricia will have to take a page out of one of her own mysteries-and hunt down someone who isn't killing by the book.

Date Added: 09/14/2018

Murder In C Major

The Oliver Civic Symphony is just another small-town orchestra, a gathering spot for local amateur musicians. It has weekly rehearsals, punch and cookies, and colorful gossip, and now it has murder.

Date Added: 09/14/2018

The Murder at the Vicarage

The Murder at the Vicarage is Agatha Christie’s first mystery to feature the beloved investigator Miss Marple—as a dead body in a clergyman’s study proves to the indomitable sleuth that no place, holy or otherwise, is a sanctuary from homicide.Miss Marple encounters a compelling murder mystery in the sleepy little village of St. Mary Mead, where under the seemingly peaceful exterior of an English country village lurks intrigue, guilt, deception and death.Colonel Protheroe, local magistrate and overbearing land-owner is the most detested man in the village. Everyone--even in the vicar--wishes he were dead. And very soon he is--shot in the head in the vicar's own study. Faced with a surfeit of suspects, only the inscrutable Miss Marple can unravel the tangled web of clues that will lead to the unmasking of the killer. 

Date Added: 09/14/2018

Her Royal Spyness

THE FIRST ROYAL SPYNESS MYSTERY!The New York Times bestselling author of the Molly Murphy and Constable Evan Evans mysteries turns her attentions to “a feisty new heroine to delight a legion of Anglophile readers.”*London, 1932. Lady Victoria Georgiana Charlotte Eugenie, 34th in line for the English throne, is flat broke. She's bolted Scotland, her greedy brother, and her fish-faced betrothed. London is a place where she'll experience freedom, learn life lessons aplenty, do a bit of spying for HRH—oh, and find a dead Frenchman in her tub. Now her new job is to clear her long family name...

Date Added: 09/14/2018

Death by Darjeeling

When a man is poisoned by tea, Theo is the prime suspect. Now she has to prove her innocence and track down the real killer-before someone else takes their last sip. Just the right blend of cozy fun and clever plotting.

Date Added: 09/14/2018

Crocodile on the Sandbank

Amelia Peabody is Elizabeth Peters' most brilliant and best-loved creation, a thoroughly Victorian feminist who takes the stuffy world of archaeology by storm with her shocking men's pants and no-nonsense attitude! In this first adventure, our headstrong heroine decides to use her substantial inheritance to see the world. On her travels, she rescues a gentlewoman in distress - Evelyn Barton-Forbes - and the two become friends. The two companions continue to Egypt where they face mysteries, mummies and the redoubtable Radcliffe Emerson, an outspoken archaeologist, who doesn't need women to help him solve mysteries -- at least that's what he thinks!

Date Added: 09/14/2018

The Christie Curse

In 1926, Agatha Christie disappeared--making headlines across the world--only to show up eleven days later at a spa under an assumed name. During those eleven days, did she have time to write a play? Jordan Kelly needs a new job and a new place to live. She's back in Harrison Falls, New York, living with her not so law-abiding uncles, in debt thanks to a credit card-stealing ex and pending grad school loans. Enter the perfect job, a research position that includes room and board, which will allow her to spend her days hunting down rare mysteries for an avid book collector. There's just one problem: her employer, Vera Van Alst--the most hated citizen of Harrison Falls. Jordan's first assignment is to track down a rumored Agatha Christie play. It seems easy enough, but Jordan soon finds out that her predecessor was killed while looking for it, and there is still someone out there willing to murder to keep the play out of Vera's hands. Jordan's new job is good...but is it worth her life?

Date Added: 04/06/2020

Chocolate Chip Cookie Murder

First in the New York Times-bestselling mystery series: &“A cleverly plotted cozy full of appealing characters and delicious cookie recipes.&”—Publishers Weekly Take one amateur sleuth. Mix in some eccentric Minnesota locals. Add a generous dollop of crackling suspense, and you've got the recipe for this mystery series featuring Hannah Swensen, the red-haired, cookie-baking heroine whose gingersnaps are almost as tart as her comments and whose penchant for solving crime is definitely stirring things up. While dodging her mother&’s attempts to marry her off, Hannah runs The Cookie Jar, Lake Eden&’s most popular bakery. But after Ron LaSalle, the beloved deliveryman from the Cozy Cow Dairy, is found murdered behind her bakery—with Hannah&’s famous Chocolate Chip Crunchies scattered around him—she&’s determined not to let her cookies get a bad reputation, so she sets out to track down a killer. But if she doesn&’t watch her back, Hannah&’s sweet life may get burned to a crisp. &“Culinary cozies don&’t get any tastier than this winning series.&”—Library Journal

Date Added: 09/14/2018

The Cat Who Could Read Backwards

The world of modern art is a mystery to many. But for Jim Qwilleran, it turns into a mystery of another sort when his assignment to the art beat for The Daily Fluxion leads down the path to murder. A stabbing in an art gallery, vandalized paintings, a fatal fall from a scaffolding--this is not at all what Qwilleran expects when he turns his reportorial talents to art. But Qwilleran and his newly found partner, Koko the brilliant Siamese, are back in their element--sniffing out clues and confounding criminals intent on mayhem and murder.

Date Added: 09/14/2018

Body Movers

Okay, so Carlotta Wren's life hasn't turned out as she'd planned. She didn't plan for her parents to skip bail for a white-collar crime, leaving her to raise her younger brother. She didn't plan on having the silver spoon ripped out of her mouth and forgoing college to work retail. She didn't plan on her blue-blood fiancé dumping her like last year's designer bag. And she didn't plan to still be single (with no prospects) ten years later, working at Neiman Marcus, with no idea where her fugitive parents are. But she's coping, sort of. Until. . . ;. . . ;her lovable brother is arrested and his loan sharks come calling. . . . ;the hunky cop who arrested her brother reopens her parents' case. . . . ;her brother becomes a body mover, transporting corpses from crime scenes. . . . ;her former fiancé's wife (a good customer) is murdered, fingering Carlotta. . . . ;her brother's sexy boss draws her into the bizarre world of body moving. Suddenly Carlotta realizes that she has to bag a murderer to keep her own well-dressed body from being next on the list!

Date Added: 09/14/2018

Aunty Lee's Delights

This delectable and witty mystery introduces Rosie “Aunty” Lee, feisty widow, amateur sleuth and proprietor of Singapore’s best-loved home cooking restaurant.After losing her husband, Rosie Lee could easily have become one of Singapore’s “tai tai,” an idle rich lady devoted to an aimless life of mah-jongg and luxury shopping. Instead she threw herself into building a culinary empire from her restaurant, Aunty Lee’s Delights, where spicy Singaporean home cooking is graciously served by Rosie Lee herself to locals and tourists alike. But when a body is found in one of Singapore’s beautiful tourist havens, and when one of her wealthy guests fails to show at a dinner party, Aunty Lee knows that the two are likely connected.The murder and disappearance throws together Aunty Lee’s henpecked stepson Mark, his social-climbing wife Selina, a gay couple whose love is still illegal in Singapore, and an elderly Australian tourist couple whose visit—billed at first as a pleasure cruise—may mask a deeper purpose. Investigating the murder is rookie Police Commissioner Raja, who quickly discovers that the savvy and well-connected Aunty Lee can track down clues even better than local law enforcement.Wise, witty and unusually charming, Aunty Lee’s Delights is a spicy mystery about love, friendship and home cooking in Singapore, where money flows freely and people of many religions and ethnicities co-exist peacefully, but where tensions lurk just below the surface, sometimes with deadly results.

Date Added: 09/14/2018

Aunt Dimity's Death

The first novel in the Aunt Dimity crime series, for fans of M. C. Beaton and Ann Granger. When Lori Shepherd was little she used to listen to stories of her inimitable Aunt Dimity from far-off England. Now Lori is newly divorced, down on her luck, and has long since realized her Aunt Dimity was just a character from a comforting bedtime story. Or was she? When Lori is summoned suddenly to a law firm, she learns Aunt Dimity was a very real person - a wealthy real person who has died and left a respectable bequest. Now Lori must visit her aunt's English cottage and find a secret hidden among the letters sent between her mother and Dimity over four decades. As Aunt Dimity's gentle spirit leads Lori on an otherworldly quest, she is about to discover a wealth of secrets that will open her eyes to the possibilities of life, and death. . .

Date Added: 09/14/2018

Abby Cooper, Psychic Eye

Abby Cooper is a P.I., psychic intuitive. But her insight failed her when she didn't foresee the death of one of her clients-or that the lead investigator for the case is the gorgeous blind date she just met. Now, with the police suspicious of her abilities and a killer on the loose, Abby's future looks more uncertain than ever.

Date Added: 09/14/2018