Showing results by author "Donna Muse" in All Categories

Maybelle was hoping for a quiet weekend and maybe a little romance. She and Peter are finally dating, and to her surprise, she’s enjoying it more than she imagined. But when a body turns up at an estate sale, their budding relationship is thrown straight into another investigation. Peter wants to keep their case from clouding their personal lives, but as the leads run cold and their theories begin to clash, the tension between them grows. With a prime suspect Peter is convinced is guilty—and Maybelle not so sure—the line between detective work and dating becomes harder to navigate.

The Wright sisters, Maybelle and Helen, find their lives turned inside out when they inherit their grandmother’s stately Victorian home on East Lake. Amid their grief, they resolve to uphold their family's storied legacy within its cherished walls. However, the house's quiet grandeur is shattered when Maybelle stumbles upon a chilling scene: a woman lifelessly suspended in the dining room.

It’s the hottest part of the summer in Wrangler’s Hill, and Geneva Pomolo has been hired as a consultant on a major film. A new adaptation of Oliver Twist is shooting in town, and Geneva is personally assisting the director, the legendary Tom Jolly, in writing the script.

At an event celebrating Lewis Carroll’s Wonderland novels, amateur investigator Geneva Pomolo is drawn into intrigue when her gentleman friend, George, discovers he has a long-lost, now fully grown, daughter. This daughter lives in the Wrangler’s Hill area and is—or so he hears—in terrible danger. George and Geneva begin a mad scramble to find the girl before the worst happens. But their quest is interrupted by a murder—that of Myrna Nettles, a locally beloved octogenarian who had recently, improbably, become engaged to be married.

In early spring, amateur detective Geneva Pomolo receives a wedding invitation from a friend she hasn’t thought about in 10 years. Gladys Button has already been married six times—five of those marriages ended in divorce or annulment and the sixth ended in death. Now she’s getting married again, and she wants Geneva to be there. Baffled by the invitation, Geneva accepts. But when she and her detective partner Iris Reeves drive up to Fort Wayne to meet Gladys, they learn all is not as it seems. Gladys wants Geneva to investigate a murder—her own.

Temporarily lost on a long walk, Amateur Sleuth Geneva and her crime-solving partner, Iris, stumble across a shocking sight—the body of retired circus performer, Lawrence Lavelle, a man who spent his sunset years alone on a sprawling ranch watching circus movies and dreaming of days past. Lavelle has no shortage of enemies—Shorty Sycamore, who fantasizes about murdering him; Rita Toboggan, who loves and hates him in equal measure, and to whom he leaves all his money; Donald Fenugreek, a former business partner—still smarting from the loss of the girlfriend Lavelle stole from him.

Regina Baldwin was once one of the most famous runners in the world. Back in her prime, she ran a marathon in under three hours. After retiring from sports, she continues to host and MC races all over America. Her podcasts and documentaries have made her a fitness guru to millions. So, it’s all the more baffling when she drops dead whilst overseeing a marathon in Wrangler’s Hill. The evidence points to murder—but who would want to kill such a beloved figure? Amateur investigator Geneva Pomolo and her partner, Iris Reeves, are determined to find out.

Feeling guilty for spending too much time on her phone and wanting to get back into the spirit of literature, amateur sleuth Geneva Pomolo attends a Jane Austen-themed party hosted by the Brixton family. Tensions are simmering between Kerri and her husband Jeremy. The party is thrown into disarray when a quarrel erupts between the couple, provoking Jeremy to storm out.

Amateur sleuth Geneva Pomolo and her assistant, Iris Reeves, are on a quest to visit every major tourist attraction in Northern Indiana. Their efforts lead them to the town museum, where a meeting of the Cryptid and Paranormal Society dissolves into chaos over disputed sightings of the Wrangler’s Devil. Howard “Hefty” Gulch advocates putting a team together to find the beast, but is shouted down by opponents who feel he’s meddling in things best left alone. When Hefty is found dead on the slopes of a cliff during a routine camping trip, Geneva is certain of foul play.

For nearly 20 years, Chester Claus had run a year-round Christmas-themed diner in Wrangler’s Hill. For many Indiana locals, he was the embodiment of the holidays - gregarious, portly, his eyes radiating amusement as he handed out candy to children. The idea of anyone wanting to murder him was simply preposterous. But when Claus is found dead in his kitchen during the Christmas Feast, poisoned with his own favorite knife, it falls on Indiana’s finest amateur detective, Geneva Pomolo, and her partner, Iris Reeves, to investigate.

When a real murder spoils the opening of an old-fashioned murder-mystery theme park, Mrs. Pomolo and her partner, Iris, go along for the ride. All this intrigue, and right before Christmas!

Wandering through Indianapolis one weekend, amateur sleuths Geneva Pomolo and Iris Reeves visit a local jewelry store owned by Derek Wattle and his girlfriend, Estelle Landliner. Within 24 hours of their visit, Estelle is dead, Derek is a suspect, and Geneva and Iris plunge once again into a mystery with no easy answers.

Amateur sleuth Geneva Pomolo is once again drawn into mystery when her investigating partner, Iris Reeves, signs up to read from her novel-in-progress during an open mic night at the local club. The proceedings are interrupted by a scuffle between best-selling young adult novelist William Miller and his former boss and fiancée, Ava Warner. Ava has been feeling salty toward William ever since he suddenly broke off the relationship. William was forced to file a restraining order when she began following him around hoping to humiliate him in public...

Crime-solving duo Geneva Pomolo and Iris Reeves are attending the annual Wrangler’s Hill WonderCon, a convention celebrating all things fantasy and science-fiction. There they hope to meet Bryan Rylance, the handsome (and arrogant) star of the long-running TV series Starman and Sapphire. There are rumors in the press that Bryan and his former co-star, Lucky Mitten, are planning a reunion. But there’s bad blood between them due to a mysterious event in their past which neither will talk about.

Christmas is approaching, and private investigator Geneva Pomolo is spending a blissful week at a local bed and breakfast. But her hopes of a few idle days spent reading and relaxing are shattered by a scream in the night. A woman stumbles into her room with a strange tale of ghostly apparitions and a phantom figure clutching his severed head. Geneva dismisses the story as the ravings of a fantasy-prone woman, but soon it becomes clear that the bed and breakfast is crowded with more ghosts than a Dickens novel.

Madeline Ponderphelt has no reason to end her life. But when the middle-aged vlogger is found dead beneath a bridge in late January, the news calls it a suicide. When the obituary writer for the Beacon is found dead in the same location shortly thereafter, private sleuth Geneva Pomolo suspects something more than coincidence at work.

Private investigator Geneva Pomolo and her partner Iris Reeves are busier than ever. An old foe has challenged them to a contest to see which pair of friends can take the most one-day courses at the local community college. Never one to shirk from a challenge, Geneva now has her hands full three evenings a week learning the basics of sailing, baking, watercolors, Olympic sports, and mystery writing.

With the holidays approaching, amateur sleuth Geneva Pomolo takes a minor role in a community theatre’s musical stage adaptation of A Christmas Carol. A lifelong Dickens fan, Geneva is hoping for a calm respite from the rigors of crime-solving, but her stage debut proves anything but calming. The cast is stacked with powerful egos who have deluded themselves into thinking they deserve a career in Hollywood — such as Peter Vankirk, who lands the starring role of Ebenezer Scrooge.

With Iris now dating and working on her first novel and Geneva reaping the benefits of being the most famous amateur sleuth in northern Indiana, things seem to be looking up for the crime-solving duo. That is, until the day they go shopping at a high-end clothing store and discover a scene of carnage. Marilyn Abshire, 77, the genius impresario behind Sunday Chic, is found run down in a deserted alley.

Iris Reeve’s young niece, Nanette, invites Iris and Geneva Pomolo to a birthday party at a lavish estate belonging to Leandra Bosworth. Iris and Geneva - both of them amateur sleuths - are expecting a relaxing weekend getaway in rural Indiana. But the Bosworth household proves to be anything but relaxing. There’s the aggressive ex-boyfriend who is still hanging around...the daughter who is secretive, anxious, and high-strung...and the teenage granddaughter who seems entirely too invested in boys...