Showing results by author "Denise Grover Swank" in All Categories

For Rose Gardner, working at the DMV on a Friday afternoon is bad even before she sees a vision of herself dead. She’s had plenty of visions, usually boring ones like someone’s toilet’s overflowed, but she’s never seen one of herself before. When her overbearing momma winds up murdered on her sofa, instead, two things are certain: There isn't enough hydrogen peroxide in the state of Arkansas to get that stain out, and Rose is the prime suspect.

Rose Gardner feels like she’s up a creek without a paddle. Her sister is dying, her secret boyfriend, James Malcolm, is struggling to protect the county underworld from an upstart drug dealer, and her ex has moved back to town with a bee in his bonnet and a mission to root out corruption in the county.

It’s been nearly three years since the fall of the Hardshaw Group, and Rose is living a low-key life in Fenton County. She’s happily married to Joe Simmons, raising her own two children along with her niece and nephew, and running her landscape business. Everything is coming up…well…roses! And still, when she and her best friend Neely Kate unearth a peculiar wooden box in a client’s yard, she finds herself yearning for the good old days of solving mysteries. Be careful what you wish for.

Rose Gardner feels responsible for the death of a woman she tried - and failed - to save with her visions, and though she intends to do the “right” thing and tell James Malcolm she can’t possibly accept his offer of a relationship, she hasn’t yet mustered the strength. Worst of all, her sister is terminally ill, and there isn’t a thing she can do to save her. When a new case falls into Rose’s lap, she eagerly shifts her attention to someone else’s problems - except it’s Henryetta, and every person, and problem, is somehow connected.

Life in Henryetta, Arkansas, is turned upside down with the arrival of a televangelist, but it’s the death of a little old lady on Rose’s street that catches her attention. The Henryetta police deem her death natural causes, but Rose suspects foul play, and so does an unlikely supporter - the president of the Busy Body Club, her 82-year-old neighbor Mildred.

Stephanie Ketterman has been doing her level best to find a new normal since her beloved husband's tragic death two years ago, but it's been a real struggle. After nearly three decades of wedded bliss with Paul, filling the gaping hole he left behind seems impossible. How can she look forward to her future when her heart is firmly stuck in the past? But when she begins to find evidence of secret trysts and cryptic notes written shortly before his death, she's forced to reexamine everything. What if perfect wasn't so perfect after all?

Rose Gardner collects secrets the way other people collect junk - and now she’s being asked to expose them. Special prosecutor Mason Deveraux has called a grand jury to investigate the corruption in the Sweet Branch police department, and he’s summoned Rose as a witness. Any topic is fair game, and the criminals in Fenton county are rightly scared of what she might share under oath. While trying to placate the lawless men, Rose is also caring for her dying sister, Violet.

When a body shows up south of Henryetta, Rose knows trouble is on the horizon. Rufus Wilson worked for the county crime lord, Skeeter Malcolm, and she soon discovers Wilson had a special skill set - he could crack safes. Now everyone is looking for Wilson’s girlfriend, including Rose, and it doesn’t take her long to realize Wilson’s murder might actually be connected to something else, something bigger. Hardshaw Group, a Dallas crime syndicate, is meeting a South American drug cartel in the county, only no one knows the time and place.

One wrongly accused man. Twenty-nine reasons for Rose to clear his name. When Rose reports for Fenton County jury duty, she figures she’s lucky to get out of a morning working at the DMV. Instead, despite a disastrous encounter with the new assistant district attorney, Mason Deveraux, she’s picked as a juror on a murder case. As the trial progresses, she realizes an ominous vision she had in the men’s restroom proves the defendant is innocent. And there’s not a cotton picking thing she can do about it. Or is there?

While Rose might be reeling from the news that Joe's ex-girlfriend is pregnant, she's got bigger issues to deal with. One, putting her business back together - albeit with a new partner - and into two separate entities; and two, trying to keep the Fenton County Sheriff's Department from figuring out the true identity of the Lady in Black.

Celia Burrows thought she had it all - a handsome husband, two successful children, and a gorgeous beach house on the northern coast of Maine. But her perfect life cracks apart when her husband of 30 years informs her that he's leaving. In a note. And since problems come in threes, her adult children reveal they've both been struggling with issues of their own.

Trouble always comes to those who court it. Rose Gardner's ability to see glimpses of the future has gotten her into hot water time and again, but so have her curiosity and her sense of daring. Those very qualities helped her defeat the most powerful man in Arkansas - a man so adept at hiding his crimes there was no way to defeat him inside of the law - but her success came at a steep personal price. Now she's throwing herself into her landscaping business, trying to live a life that's as orderly as one of her gardens.

Book Nine in the New York Times Best Selling mystery series by Denise Grover Swank.

Rose Gardner is trying to build a new normal. One that leaves the Fenton County crime world - including James "Skeeter" Malcolm, the current king - behind. Her best friend and roommate is a big part of that effort, but Neely Kate is busy building her own life anew. She disappeared for a few days, scaring the spit out of Rose - which is why Rose finds it impossible to deny her when she suggests they look for a missing parrot. Only this time Neely Kate isn't interested in the reward money - she's set them up to work with a cranky private investigator.

Book eight in the New York Times and USA Today best-selling Rose Gardner Mystery series. Rose Gardner has survived plenty of close scrapes in the past, but her latest bit of trouble has landed her in the Fenton County holding cell on trumped-up charges. The most powerful man in Southern Arkansas, J. R. Simmons, is determined to put her behind bars for good and destroy everything she holds dear, including her boyfriend, Mason, and her friend, Skeeter, reigning king of the Fenton County crime world.

Matt Osborn had no idea coaching his five-year-old nephew's soccer team would get him so much attention from the mothers—attention he doesn't want now that he's given up on love and having a family of his own. Yep, Matt's the last of his bachelor buddies and plans on staying that way. That is until he finds himself face to face with the woman who broke his heart.

Summer Butler had no idea that Darling Investigations would be such a smash. But ratings don’t lie—fans love watching the former star solve real-life crimes in her hometown. With the first season wrapped, the reality-show PI is feeling the pressure to make the next one an even bigger success. It seems the town is harboring an arsonist, and all the smoldering signs point to the same culprit: her cousin Dixie.

There's no denying trouble finds Rose Gardner like a divining rod finds water, especially when Rose finds herself in the middle of a bank robbery. But after the robbers steal her deposit bag - containing a large amount of cash - she soon finds out that thanks to her sister Violet's financial mismanagement, trouble is threatening her business as well. To top it off, Rose's ex-boyfriend Joe Simmons has moved back to Henryetta to fill the chief deputy sheriff position.

For as long as Magnolia Steele can remember, the past has had its hooks in her. Her time as a Broadway actress in New York City was an escape that ended in public humiliation, but now that she's back home in Franklin, Tennessee, she's feeling the grip of the two incidents that stole her innocence. The first was the disappearance of her father when she was a teen, who left home for a meeting and never came back. The other incident...well, her memories have returned, but it's best left where it belongs - in the past.

Rose Gardner hates seeing her normally flamboyant best friend Neely Kate struggle with depression. So when Rose stumbles onto a piece of evidence indicating her birth mother might have been involved in a crime, she does the one thing guaranteed to cheer Neely Kate. She convinces her friend to help her solve a mystery. Though their penchant for investigating has gotten them into plenty of pickles in the past, what can go wrong?