Mysteries
Wednesday’s Mystery eBooks
A Catered Cat Wedding
by Isis Crawford
Rating: 4.5 #ad
Susie Katz is known as the crazy cat lady of Longely, New York, and goes out of her way to earn the title, right down to her cat T-shirts and porcelain Hello Kitties. She’s a fanatic for anything feline. Humans, not so much.
So when she decides to put up a tent on her property and hold an extravagant wedding ceremony for her two Russian blues, she makes sure to include a few two-legged guests—primarily to raise some hackles. All her favorite enemies will be there: her bird-loving neighbor, a rival cat breeder, a local animal rights activist, and the niece and nephew who stand to inherit her considerable fortune…if she doesn’t spend it all on cat tchotchkes first.
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(A Mystery With Recipes Mysteries)
Rune of Secrets
by Kelly N. Jane
Rating: 4.0 #ad
She craves vengeance. He requires justice. Fate demands both.
Without enchanted powers and struck with a curse, Princess Rowena could not prevent her family’s murder or save herself from the fallout.
Vulnerable but determined, she dares to conquer her enemies and free her people. But secret deals force her into a betrothal, tempting her into a bold decision that could cost her life.
Rowena has nothing left but to avenge her family before she dies. Until the most terrifying, yet hauntingly handsome fae arrives, demanding she follows her destiny.
Rowena has the power to lead her people or destroy them.
The Uninvited
by Heather Graham
Rating: 4.6 #ad
1777: In the throes of the Revolutionary War, Landon Mansion is commandeered by British Lord “Butcher” Bedford. He stabs Lucy Tarleton – who spurned his king and his love – leaving her to die in her father’s arms. Now: After the day’s final tour, docent Allison Leigh makes her rounds while locking up…and finds a colleague slumped over Bedford’s desk, impaled on his own replica bayonet.
Resident ghosts may be the stock-in-trade of stately Philadelphia homes, but Allison – a noted historian – is indignant at the prospect of “ghost hunters” investigating this apparent murder.
Splinter Cell
by David Michaels
Rating: 4.5 #ad
In response to the growing use of sophisticated digital encryption to conceal potential threats to the United States, the National Security Agency has ushered forth the new dawn of intelligence-gathering techniques. The top-secret initiative is dubbed Third Echelon.
Its existence denied by the U.S. government, Third Echelon deploys a lone field operative. He is sharp, nearly invisible, and deadly. And he has the right to spy, steal, destroy, and assassinate to protect American freedoms.
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(Tom Clancy’s Splinter Cell Mysteries)
Her Last Breath
by Linda Castillo
Rating: 4.6 #ad
An extraordinarily beautiful Amish woman, a dangerous femme fatale, is the central figure in a story that reveals a dark side of Painters Mill and its seemingly perfect Amish world
A rainy night, an Amish father returning home with his three children, a speeding car hurtling toward them out of nowhere.
What at first seems like a tragic, but routine car accident suddenly takes on a more sinister cast as evidence emerges that nothing about the crash is accidental. But who would want to kill an Amish deacon and two of his children? He leaves behind a grieving widow and a young boy who clings to life in the intensive care wing of a hospital, unable to communicate.
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(Kate Burkholder Mysteries)
I Will Find You
by Amanda Rigby, Sally Rigby
Rating: 4.3 #ad
Three sisters…One terrible secret
Ashleigh: A creative, free spirit and loyal. But Ash is tormented by her demons and a past that refuses to be laid to rest.
Jessica: Perfect wife and loving mother. But although Jessica might seem to have it all, she lives a secret life built on lies.
Grace: An outsider, always looking in, Grace has never known the love of her sisters and her resentment can make her do bad things.
When Ashleigh goes missing, Jessica and Grace do all they can to find their eldest sister. But the longer Ashleigh is missing, the more secrets and lies these women are hiding threaten to tear this family apart.
The Last Time We Met
by Trisha Ridinger McKee
Rating: 5.0 #ad
As a member of the richest family in town, Willow understands the importance of reputation. Her stern grandmother has taught her that family secrets are to be buried, and as the most popular girl in school, Willow follows that lesson with a smile covering up the darkness.
But when Walden, the new guy from the wrong side of town comes to her school, Willow finds her image slipping and the secrets of her homelife in danger of being exposed. As a scandal tears the couple apart and throws Willow into a new, unfamiliar life, she must choose between saving Walden’s future or risking it all for love.
Tuesday’s Mystery eBooks
S’more Murders
by Maya Corrigan
Rating: 4.3 #ad
Managing a fitness club café and collaborating on a cookbook with her grandfather are Val Deniston’s usual specialties, but she’s about to set sail into nearby Chesapeake Bay—straight into a murder case . . .
Since catering themed events is a good way to make extra cash, Val agrees to board the Titanic—or at least cater a re-creation of the doomed journey on a yacht. The owner of the yacht, who collects memorabilia related to the disaster, wants Val to serve the last meal the Titanic passengers ate . . . while his guests play a murder-mystery game. But it is the final feast for one passenger who disappears from the ship. And that’s only the tip of the iceberg.
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(A Five-Ingredient Mysteries)
The Widow
by D.C. Brockwell
Rating: 4.1 #ad
Entomologist at the Royal Entomological Society, Aaron Pike is tasked with locating Professor Philip Jackson, a renowned arachnologist, who has gone missing.
Jackson is needed to help investigate a spate of black widow attacks in London. Reluctantly, Aaron takes young assistant Adele with him to Jackson’s home, which has been left derelict for some time. After visiting Jackson’s lab, Aaron finds out that Jackson hasn’t been seen in months. With the help of Jackson’s former assistant, Celia, Aaron and Adele unearth a shocking secret, experiments that Jackson and disgraced geneticist, Jonas Eckstein, have been conducting in secret on exotic spiders…
Aaron’s investigation leads him to Aldwych Station, an abandoned subway beneath the streets of London, where he comes face-to-face with pure terror. Nothing could prepare him for what he encounters in the tunnels below—the home of The Widow.
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(The Arachnoid Chronicles)
The Hidden
by Heather Graham
Rating: 4.7 #ad
Can the same killer strike again—a hundred and fifty years later?
Estes Park, Colorado, is a place of serenity. But it wasn’t always so serene. Shortly after the Civil War, Nathan Kendall and his wife were murdered there, leaving behind a young son. The crime was never solved.
Now…historian Scarlet Barlow is working at a small museum attached to a B and B, the same building where that murder occurred. She recently came to Colorado, reeling after her divorce from FBI agent Diego McCullough. Diego—who’s just been asked to join the Krewe of Hunters, a unit dealing with “unusual” situations…
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(Krewe of Hunters Mysteries)
The Lions of Fifth Avenue
by Fiona Davis
Rating: 4.3 #ad
It’s 1913, and on the surface, Laura Lyons couldn’t ask for more out of life—her husband is the superintendent of the New York Public Library, allowing their family to live in an apartment within the grand building, and they are blessed with two children. But headstrong, passionate Laura wants more, and when she takes a leap of faith and applies to the Columbia Journalism School, her world is cracked wide open. As her studies take her all over the city, she is drawn to Greenwich Village’s new bohemia, where she discovers the Heterodoxy Club—a radical, all-female group in which women are encouraged to loudly share their opinions on suffrage, birth control, and women’s rights. Soon, Laura finds herself questioning her traditional role as wife and mother.
Bear Willis: Mountain Man: Blood and Gold
by Peter Alan Turner
Rating: 3.8 #ad
The sixth Mountain man adventure in a rip-roaring series from Peter Alan Turner!
Mountain Man Bear Willis thought the wagon train he rescued from a Cheyenne war party were simply homesteaders looking to settle in the Montana Bitterroot Territory. He wasn’t happy about pilgrims moving into the valley but realized there wasn’t much he could do about it.
However, when he discovers their real reason for choosing the Bitterroot, all hell breaks out. The big mountain man is used to settling things with a gun, knife, and tomahawk. However, things get complicated when Bear finds himself attracted to a pretty woman whose husband abuses her. As events reach a boiling point, Bear has to decide which side he is on. Will he side with the Shoshone, Cheyenne, and the other tribes?
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(A Bear Willis Mysteries)
Special Agent Rylee
by Mimi Barbour
Rating: 4.5 #ad
Rylee couldn’t believe her rotten luck… Being chosen as one of the agents to play bodyguard to a spoiled billionaire while sailing on a Caribbean cruise depresses her… a lot. The dude – so important to the government that they’re willing to provide the best to protect him – won’t even know they’re in place. The big question – why her? She prefers work that matters, the dirty jobs, on the streets, in the trenches, and her boss knows it. Keeping Mr. Fancy Pants out of the clutches of a worshipping stalker, mercenaries and a man out to seek revenge for an old injustice just annoys her.
Not excited about his pending cruise, before boarding the ship, Jake Andrews sees an enticing woman on the pier and decides it might not be so bad after all…
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(Undercover FBI Mysteries)
Hit List
by Stuart Woods
Rating: 4.5 #ad
When Stone Barrington finds his name on a hit list, he plans to lie low until the culprit is caught. But when this foe shows no signs of stopping until his deadly objective is realized in full, Stone is left with no choice but to face the problem head-on.
Armed and alert, Stone joins forces with his most savvy connections to catch the perpetrator before the next strike. But it turns out this scum is an expert at evasion in more ways than one, and the international cat-and-mouse hunt that ensues has Stone questioning if he has become the predator or the prey. . .
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(A Stone Barrington Mysteries)
Dead Run
by Erica Spindler
Rating: 4.5 #ad
Compelled to uncover the truth about her sister’s disappearance, she heads to Key West. Within hours of her arrival a successful banker jumps to his death. Then a teenage girl whom Rachel was counseling is found brutally murdered. The ritualistic style of the killing is hauntingly similar to that used by the notorious “New Testament” serial killer—now on death row.
Could the teen’s murder be related to Rachel’s disappearance? Is a copycat killer at work? And why do the police refuse to help?
Monday’s Mystery eBooks
Digging Up Trouble
by Kitt Crowe
Rating: 4.4 #ad
Life is sweet when you live in Confection, Oregon. Or, at least, that’s how it’s supposed to be. But on a summer day, when tourists and locals alike gawk at the majestic mountains, quaint Craftsman houses, and lovely flowers–particularly the renowned Confection Rose–the last thing anyone has come to see is a dead body, unearthed from a shallow grave by a curious dog.
A bathrobe-clad Lexi rushes next door to her neighbor’s backyard to find her pooch, Cookie, stalwartly sitting watch over a body in the vegetable garden. Cookie, encrusted in dirt, grips a copper pipe between her teeth.
My Canvas Bag
by Lucas Kinkaid
Rating: 5.0 #ad
“A heart -wrenching story about a young man who is born into a family who at times, I felt that I disliked so strongly, I wish he’d have run away and never seen them again. But resilience is his best ally, humor, wit, wisdom, and bravery. This story is told so well that I was riveted to each page. I could visualize every scene unfolding through this writer’s amazing words. A great book for discussions in family groups, and good for others who may have gone through a dysfunctional childhood and felt as if they were the only one.” Karen Malena, Author
Mark is a young man born into a bad family situation. He lies about the reality of his life to hide his shame. Mark escapes from the chaos of his home by spending time in some nearby woods. He keeps a canvas bag hidden close to his house. It contains blankets, a flashlight, cans of food, a transistor radio, things to read, and more. The canvas bag makes his time in the woods possible.
Mark’s life is a constant struggle to avoid the judgments of his family being placed on him. He feels helpless against his parent’s unstable relationship constantly bringing him into embarrassing situations.
On Her Majesty’s Frightfully Secret Service
by Rhys Bowen
Rating: 4.6 #ad
Lady Georgiana Rannoch juggles secret missions from the Queen, her beau, and her mother in this mystery in the Royal Spyness series.
When royal sleuth Georgie Rannoch receives a letter from her dearest friend Belinda, who’s in an Italian villa awaiting the birth of her illegitimate baby, she yearns to run to her side. If only she could find a way to get there! But then opportunity presents itself in a most unexpected way—her cousin the queen asks her to attend a house party in the Italian Lake Country. The Prince of Wales and the dreadful Mrs. Simpson have been invited, and Her Majesty is anxious to thwart a possible secret wedding.
Check out:
(A Royal Spyness Mysteries)
The Adventures of Black Lace
by Dennis Higgins
Rating: 5.0 #ad
Lacey Straight was just a boring, 9 to 5 type woman. Her freshwater fish was the most exciting thing in her tedious life. That all changed the day her twin sister, Alice, brought her to Mindbender for the adventure of a lifetime.
When Alice’s steampunk past comes calling, Lacey becomes Black Lace and is left to fend for herself in this world from a pseudo time. Undaunted, she takes to her new and magical surroundings as a Siamese fighting fish takes to water, leaving outlaws, air pirates, and a host of unique individuals in her wake. She finds courage and purpose she never knew she had. As her old life fades to memory, Black Lace must decide where she truly belongs.
A Blue So Dark
by Holly Schindler
Rating: 4.6 #ad
Holly Schindler’s Award-Winning Debut Novel – The 2022 Re-Release
Fifteen-year-old Aura Ambrose has been hiding a secret. Her mother, a talented artist and art teacher, is slowly being consumed by schizophrenia, and Aura has been her primary caretaker ever since Aura’s dad left them. Convinced that creative expression is behind her mother’s deteriorating condition, Aura shuns her own artistic talent. But as her mother sinks still deeper into the darkness of her disorder, the hunger for a creative outlet draws Aura toward the depths of her imagination. Just as desperation threatens to swallow her whole, Aura discovers that art, love, and family are profoundly linked—and together may offer an escape from her fears.
The Falcon at the Portal
by Elizabeth Peters
Rating: 4.7 #ad
The Land of the Pharaohs harbors more secrets than any tomb can hide.
In Egypt for the 1911 archaeological season, Amelia Peabody and her family are not anticipating trouble, but it finds them nonetheless. Their young friend David is accused of selling ancient artifacts, and it’s up to the Emersons to expose the real culprit. But the body of an American discovered at the bottom of their excavation shaft and a child of mysterious antecedents are sparking twin crises that threaten to tear the family apart. Amelia brings her estimable powers of deduction to bear, but she might not survive long enough to unravel more than one perplexing puzzle—because suddenly someone is shooting bullets in her direction…and coming too close for comfort!
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(Amelia Peabody Mysteries)
The Downstairs Neighbor
by Helen Cooper
Rating: 4.1 #ad
An addicting and twisty debut about an apartment building devastated by the disappearance of a teenage girl–and by the secrets that won’t be kept behind each closed door–that will thrill fans of Lisa Jewell and Shari Lapena.
One House. Three Families. Countless Secrets.
From her downstairs apartment in suburban London, Emma has often overheard the everyday life of the seemingly perfect family upstairs–Steph, Paul and teenage daughter Freya–but has never got to know them. Until one day, she hears something that seizes her attention: Freya has vanished and the police are questioning Steph and Paul about their life. Do either of you have any enemies? Anyone who might want to harm or threaten you?
Thriller: Stories To Keep You Up All Night
by Multiple Authors
Rating: 5.0 #ad
Lock the doors. Draw the shades. Pull up the covers and be prepared for Thriller to keep you up all night!
Featuring North America’s foremost thriller authors, Thriller was the first collection of pure thriller stories ever published. Revisit these heart-pumping tales of suspense, including thirty-two of the most critically acclaimed and award-winning names in the business. From the signature characters that made such authors as David Morrell and John Lescroart famous to some of the hottest new voices in the genre, this blockbuster will tantalize and terrify.
The Uplift War
by David Brin
Rating: 4.6 #ad
Although they were uplifted and given full sapience, the Bururalli clearly weren’t ready to run a planet, almost wrecking Garth. As a “salvage world,” it was given to despised Earthlings, assigned to reclaim it from the brink. Many senior Galactics—leaders of the Five Galaxies—hoped humanity would fail. But now Garth is peacefully surging back, tended by human and neo-chimpanzee colonists.
Meanwhile, enemies desperately seek some way to coerce Earthclan, looking for a possible answer to the secret of the Progenitors. One of them – the Gubru avian race – prepares to invade and hold hostage defenseless Garth.
Check out:
(The Uplift Saga)
Sunday’s Mystery eBooks
The Rocky Road to Ruin
by Meri Allen
Rating: 4.5 #ad
Justice will be swirled by amateur sleuth Riley Rhodes in the first in Meri Allen’s brand-new mystery series, The Rocky Road to Ruin!
Riley Rhodes, travel food blogger and librarian at the CIA, makes a bittersweet return to her childhood home of Penniman, Connecticut – land of dairy farms and covered bridges – for a funeral. Despite the circumstances, Riley’s trip home is sprinkled with reunions with old friends, visits to her father’s cozy bookshop on the town green, and joyful hours behind the counter at the beloved Udderly Delicious Ice Cream Shop. It feels like a time to help her friend Caroline rebuild after her mother’s death, and for Riley to do a bit of her own reflecting after a botched undercover mission in Italy. After all, it’s always good to be home.
Dream Town
by David Baldacci
Rating: 4.4 #ad
It’s the eve of 1953, and Aloysius Archer is in Los Angeles to ring in the New Year with an old friend, aspiring actress Liberty Callahan, when their evening is interrupted by an acquaintance of Callahan’s: Eleanor Lamb, a screenwriter in dire straits.
After a series of increasingly chilling events – mysterious phone calls, the same blue car loitering outside her house, and a bloody knife left in her sink – Eleanor fears that her life is in danger, and she wants to hire Archer to look into the matter. Archer suspects that Eleanor knows more than she’s saying, but before he can officially take on her case, a dead body turns up inside of Eleanor’s home . . . and Eleanor herself disappears.
Secret of the Broken King
by Eliza Raine
Rating: 4.6 #ad
He married me, exiled me, and now he’s the only thing stopping me from saving my sister.
My sister is turning to stone. She’s been asleep for eight years – the same amount of time I’ve been the secret, exiled wife of the King of the Ocean. Poseidon is fierce, unforgiving, and terrifyingly powerful. I’m just a broken sea nymph whose magic never surfaced. But the only way to save my sister lies in his underwater palace, and I’ve got nothing else to lose.
I expected escaping exile and getting to the palace to be tough. What I didn’t anticipate was battling a torrent of unexpected desire for Poseidon when he catches me. The devastatingly beautiful ocean god has secrets. Wild waves crash through his eyes when he looks at me, and I soon realize he might be just as broken as I am.
But when a god has secrets, the consequences are deadly.
Check out:
(The Poseidon Trials)
Who Killed These Girls?
by Beverly Lowry
Rating: 4.3 #ad
“Gripping, moving, and as good as any depiction of a murder case since In Cold Blood…. Brilliant.” – Ann Patchett, award-winning, bestselling author
The facts are brutally straightforward. On December 6, 1991, the naked, bound-and-gagged, burned bodies of four girls – each one shot in the head – were found in a frozen yogurt shop in Austin, Texas.
Grief, shock, and horror overtook the city. But after eight years of misdirected investigations, only two suspects (teenagers at the time of the crime) were tried; their convictions were later overturned and detectives are still working on what is now a very cold case. The story has grown to include DNA technology, coerced false confessions, and other developments in crime and punishment.
The Dime
by Kathleen Kent
Rating: 4.2 #ad
Dallas, Texas is not for the faint of heart. Good thing for Betty Rhyzyk she’s from a family of take-no-prisoners Brooklyn police detectives. But her Big Apple wisdom will only get her so far when she relocates to The Big D, where Mexican drug cartels and cult leaders, deadbeat skells and society wives all battle for sunbaked turf. Betty is as tough as the best of them, but she’s deeply shaken when her first investigation goes sideways. Battling a group of unruly subordinates, a persistent stalker, a formidable criminal organization, and an unsupportive girlfriend, the unbreakable Detective Betty Rhyzyk may be reaching her limit.
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(Betty Rhyzyk Mysteries)
The Girl She Wanted
by K.L. Slater
Rating: 4.2 #ad
What was my sister doing standing over Florence’s cot in the middle of the night?
I trust my sister Carrie with my daughter’s life. But then she’s accused of a terrible crime. Carrie lives under our roof, she pushes my daughter on the swings, she takes her out for ice cream. You might ask, why do I let her? Why would I risk my darling baby? How could I let my sister stay?
Because I have a dangerous secret too. One that only Carrie knows about. And if that secret gets out, I could lose my little girl…
The Marriage of Sticks
by Jonathan Carroll
Rating: 4.2 #ad
Miranda marches into her high school reunion with the confidence of a professional at the top of her field. But inside she is lost, disenchanted with her career, and as alone as a person can possibly be. As a teenager in Crane’s View, she fell in love with unrepentant bad boy James Stillman, and though they never slept together, he thrilled her as no man has since. She returns to her hometown hoping to reconnect with him, but learns at the reunion that he was killed in a car crash years ago. In the weeks that follow, Miranda is haunted by visions of the past.
Stop Toxic Thoughts
by Cody Evans
Rating: 4.8 #ad
Kick Toxic Thoughts in The Teeth –Without The Same “Happy Thoughts” Advice.
Are you tired of feeling stuck, exhausted, worried, and stressed? Perhaps you’re constantly doubting and questioning yourself: Why did I say that? Why did I do that? What will they think? What will I do now?
It’s no surprise that this constant and relentless negative self-talk makes you doubt yourself, weighs you down, and brings your ambition to a dead halt. The good news is that you CAN take back control over your mind and finally stop those annoying thoughts with simple strategies proven to work!