Showing results by publisher "Penguin Audio" in Amateur Sleuths

Landscape artist and owner of SeaScapes, Kinsley Clark has been re-hired to decorate Harborside for the upcoming holiday season and boat parade. Using the local elements found in Maine, Kinsley creates kissing balls to hang downtown and along the wharf. Kinsley is also responsible for Harborside’s official “lobster-stacked” Christmas tree, located beside the local marina, where the annual Harborside Boat Parade & Fireworks Display takes place. When local alderman Chris Chesterfield falls off the pier and into the icy Atlantic the night of the annual kickoff event, the town is in shock.

Cattail Island in the Outer Banks is a popular destination for honeymooners and nature lovers alike. So it is a huge blow when the murder of a newlywed grinds the pre-summer season to a screeching halt. Bookseller Callie Padget launches her own investigation, after mysterious customer Geri-Lynn Humfeld, caretaker of the island’s protected wild horses, brings in an irresistible piece of information.

It’s August in Chattanooga, Tennessee and moonshiner Hattie Hayes has collaborated with a nearby vineyard to serve her moonshine at a Wine and 'Shine event. Not only is this an opportunity for Hattie to gain more moonshine fans, but she’s also excited to hear the Bootlegging Brothers, a popular bluegrass band. But not every attendee is looking for harmony. When one of the brothers disappears and is presumed dead, Hattie realizes her grace note gathering has suddenly turned more sour than her mash.

The Fourth of July is coming, and for professional food lover Samantha Barnes, it’s all about the picnic. Okay, and the fireworks. And the parade. But mostly the picnic. What could be better than a DIY clambake followed by the best blueberry buckle in the world? Sam has finally found the perfect recipe in the kitchen of Clara Foster, famed cookbook author and retired restaurateur, and she’s thrilled when Clara agrees to a buckle baking lesson. But when Clara dies in a house fire blamed on carelessness in the kitchen, Sam doesn’t believe it.

When Yale Yee discovers her cousin Celine is visiting from Hong Kong, she is obliged to play tour guide to a relative she hasn’t seen in twenty years. Not only that, but her father thinks it’s a wonderful idea for them to bond by running a food stall together at the Eastwood Village Night Market. Yale and Celine serve small dishes and refreshing drinks, and while business is slow, it eventually picks up thanks to Celine’s surprisingly useful marketing ideas. They’re quite shocked that their bubble tea is a hit—literally—when one of their customers turns up dead.

Emma Westlake, proprietor of A Friend for Hire, finds a heart-wrenching email from a prospective client in her inbox. The email is from Kim Felder, a woman struggling with empty-nest syndrome and an out of left field divorce. Determined to help get Kim in a better headspace, Emma suggests she draft a bucket list of things she has always wanted to do in life but has put off in favor of taking care of everyone else.

Now that her moonshine shop is up and running, Hattie Hayes can focus her efforts on expanding her fledgling business to events in the area, like the Chattanooga Choo Choo Model Train Convention, which is running full steam ahead at the convention center down the block. Hattie is all aboard, seizing this perfect opportunity to promote her Southern homebrew to the folks who have come to the city for the annual event. But when an attendee dies after drinking some of Hattie’s moonshine, she’ll need to prove her innocence.

When Callie is laid off from her reporting job, she returns to her hometown of Cattail Island and lands a gig at the local bookstore—the same one where she found comfort after her mother died.

Phaedra Brighton is perfectly content with her life of lecturing college students, gossiping with her best friends, and dreaming of Mr. Darcy. As a young, respected (if somewhat peculiar) English professor, her expertise lies in all things Jane Austen — but she knows that the closest she'll ever get to being a real-life Elizabeth Bennet is in her dreams.

Odessa Dean has made a home of Brooklyn. She has a fun job waiting tables at Untapped Books & Café and a new friend, Izzy, to explore the city with. When she's invited on a girls' day out escape room adventure, she jumps at the chance. It's all fun and games until the lights come on and they discover one of the girls bludgeoned to death.... The only possible suspects are Odessa and the four other players that were locked in the escape room with the victim.

An urgent note from a friend spurs Ann Gay to visit her recently married cousin, Jacqueline Heaton. Upon her arrival at Fiddler's Fingers, a remote, pine-grown estate on Lake Superior, Ann immediately senses her cousin's fear - someone has been playing increasingly malicious tricks on the Heatons, a proud family of Minnesota lumber tycoons, and all signs point to Jacqueline as the instigator. Ann quickly resolves to take Jacqueline and her young daughter, Toby, away from the danger. But what began as seemingly trivial pranks escalates to direct attacks and ultimately murder.

Bailey Ruth finds herself comforting a distraught sister when she's sent to Adelaide, Oklahoma, on her latest mission. Susan Gilbert receives a $100,000 ransom demand for her younger sibling. When the caller wants Susan to pay a visit to her wealthy boss and take the cash from his safe, Bailey Ruth follows Susan to the home. But she finds herself in a quandary, knowing that robbery is hardly a Heavenly pursuit.

Stella Krakus, a curator at Manhattan's renowned Central Museum of Art, is having the roughest week in approximately ever. Her soon-to-be ex-husband is stalking her, a workplace romance with "a fascinating, hyper-rational narcissist" is in freefall, and a beloved colleague, Paul, has gone missing. Strange things are afoot: CeMArt's current exhibit is sponsored by a Belgian multinational that wants to take over the world's water supply, she unwittingly stars in a viral video that's making the rounds, and her mother wants to have lunch.

Annie's friend and fellow shop owner Ves Roundtree is a very wealthy woman. Her rich brother entrusted her with his estate, and upon her death, his fortune is to be divided. Several cash-strapped islanders are in line to collect life-changing inheritances. The problem is, Ves is very much alive. Ves hosts a dinner for the prospective beneficiaries and feels a chill in the air that has nothing to do with the wintry season. Not long after, she suffers a bad fall that is no accident. Everyone at the table has a motive, but not a shred of evidence is left behind.

Bailey Ruth Raeburn's latest mission is to guide the happy-go-lucky spirit of a deceased young man named Jimmy to the next life. But Jimmy is determined to watch over his still-living girlfriend, Megan, whom he wants to be happy even without him - which is easier said than done.

Amateur sleuth Mordecai Tremaine is back in another classic mystery from the author of Murder for Christmas. Mordecai Tremaine's hobby of choice - crime detection - has left him in need of a holiday. A break away from that gruesome business of murder will be just the ticket, and the picturesque island of Moulin d'Or seems to be just the destination. Amid the sunshine and the sea air, Mordecai falls in with a band of fellow holidaymakers and tries to forget that such a thing as foul play exists.

A woman violently attacked in her bed. A billionaire businessman on trial at The Old Bailey. As the world's press gather outside London's luxurious Tribeca hotel, can Jon Roscoe protect his own family from the terrifying consequences of the verdict?

The grand opening of the world's most exclusive hotel: 40 floors of breathtaking luxury. VIPs gather in London for the ultimate preview. But one uninvited guest plans to make this a day the city will never forget. Global Head of Security Jon Roscoe confronts a killer with a deadly timetable.

David Loogan is living in Ann Arbor with Detective Elizabeth Waishkey and her daughter, Sarah. He's settled into a quiet routine as editor of the mystery magazine Gray Streets - until one day he finds a manuscript outside his door. It begins: "I killed Henry Kormoran." Anthony Lark has a list of names: Terry Dawtrey, Sutton Bell, Henry Kormoran. To his eyes, the names glow red on the page. They move. They breathe. The people on the list have little in common, except that 17 years ago they were involved in a notorious robbery.

New York Times best-selling author Lisa Lutz conspires with - or should we say against? - coauthor David Hayward to write an original and hilarious tag-team crime novel. Meet Paul and Lacey Hansen: orphaned, pot-growing twentysomething siblings eking out a living in rural Northern California. When a headless corpse appears on their property, they can't exactly dial 911, so they move the body and wait for the police to find it. Instead, the corpse reappears, a few days riper... and an amateur sleuth is born. Make that two.