Showing results by author "Joanna Campbell Slan" in All Categories

In front of a meeting room full of customers and merchants, Kiki watches helplessly as a rival crafter takes one bite of a scone and goes into anaphylactic shock. Suddenly all eyes turn to Kiki Lowenstein, who was Dead Woman's archenemy. Just that fast, Kiki's moment of triumph turns into a disaster. Just when Kiki was settling into her new job, her first real career, she's become the poster child for dead customers. But Kiki's life isn't all doom and gloom. On the bright side, her mother-in-law has invited her to a gala event. A spa day is in order . . . and that doesn't go as planned either.

This Christmas, shop owner Kiki Lowenstein has more than holiday crafts on her mind. As she juggles family responsibilities, her thriving business, and preparations for her famous Holiday Crafting Extravaganza, a series of mysterious burglaries plagues their quiet town of Webster Groves, a suburb of St. Louis. Kiki soon finds herself drawn into a sinister plot that goes far beyond stolen jewelry. With the help of her loyal Great Dane Gracie, her intuitive employee Nona, and a cast of colorful local characters, Kiki must unravel a web of deceit.

Stuart, Florida. Her ex-husband is refusing to pay their son's college tuition (as promised), her sister is pulling mean pranks, and her old boyfriend has broken her heart . . . again. And that's just the personal stuff. She's also concerned about keeping the cash register ringing at the Treasure Chest, her store specializing in upcycled, recycled, and repurposed goods. An important media event goes sadly wrong and Cara's famous temper gets the better of her. Then a prying reporter turns up dead, practically in Cara's backyard.

Just because her husband's naked, dead, and in a hotel bed . . . it might not be what it seems. But there's that scarf in his mouth.... Given the situation, Kiki Lowenstein can't help remembering that her (late) husband got her pregnant while cheating on his girlfriend. True, he did the right thing at the time, and their much-loved daughter Anya is now eleven years old. But suddenly he's dead, and Kiki's financially embarrassed—that jerk disinherited his own family!

An old enemy has put out a contract on Kiki. She's worth a lot more dead than alive, which isn't surprising given the state of Kiki's finances. This would be a good time to focus on work at the scrapbooking and craft store—except Kiki can't shake the memory of those sniper shots raining down. While creating a memorial album for the murdered heiress, Kiki discovers murky family politics that could be a motive for murder. With help from friends in high and low places, including hunky beau Chad Detweiler, Kiki finds herself facing a grave ultimatum.

Stuart, Florida. With her parents deceased and her son away at college, Cara Mia Delgatto longs to reinvent herself. And a sentimental purchase of a fixer-upper in a small, coastal town seems ideal for a new business selling repurposed relics. But when she trips over a corpse at her rundown building, she flips from renovator to prime suspect. Desperate to clear her name, it shocks Cara to discover that her property once housed a multi-million dollar art collection—stolen after the original owner's death. And when her first love shows up, her whirlwind life upgrades to a hurricane.

Craft maven Kiki happens to be a card-carrying Episcopalian—but she respects the power of intuition. So when she has a "bad feeling" on the way to Marla Lever's house for a crafting party, she heeds her instincts. Marla's nowhere to be seen, although her car's in the garage—buried under a heap of garbage and lawn furniture. Because the potential horror of a party in a hoarder's paradise pales in comparison to the body that's found in Marla's freezer. Marla's nearly dead herself—passed out from heat stroke.

Cragan calls an emergency meeting of the Friday Night Mystery Club. Can their combined talents prove that Pru is innocent? And will they find an answer in time to save Cragan from the wrath of a vengeful shooter?

Good-hearted Kiki Lowenstein plans a Halloween charity crop at a historic haunted house. The crafting is going great until someone attacks Laurel, one of Kiki's employees. The attack puts a real damper on the festivities. Sure, there are tons of reasons to hate Laurel. She's beautiful, shapely, and intelligent. But she's also kind and gentle. Why would anybody want to see her dead? Hint: Maybe it's because of her second job?

The wedding should have been perfect. Kiki Lowenstein certainly did her part to make everything just right for her mother-in-law Sheila's special day. But the discovery of a corpse can put a damper on any festivity. Why did somebody want to cut a retired plastic surgeon out of the big picture?

The school nurse calls to say that Kiki's daughter has stumbled over the corpse of a dead teacher. But don't worry. Everything's all right. (Ha!). And Kiki might just believe that a badly shaken daughter is the worst of her worries . . . EXCEPT that pre-teen Anya might have actually seen the killer fleeing the scene of the crime. Now Kiki must track down a murderer before the creep "guarantees" Anya's silence forever. After taking a vow to have nothing to do with her crush, the hunky police detective, Kiki is all on her own.

When police detective Chad Detweiler's estranged wife is found shot to death with bullets from his revolver, the proud papa-to-be finds himself up the creek without a lawyer. The dead woman's family immediately points the finger at the detective. An exhausted Kiki does all she can to be supportive. After all, the dead woman was a drug addict! But when Detweiler's family makes a request that Kiki can't honor without breaking a promise, a solemn oath to her daughter, Kiki puts her foot down.

Kiki is eight months pregnant and trying to cram as much ho-ho-ho into the holidays as possible. When a customer drops dead during an offsite event, this intrepid scrapbooking sleuth is left holding the bag. After her name is cleared, Kiki isn't one to sit around while her friends are threatened with false imprisonment. Instead, she vows to wrap up this case and tie it with a bow. Leave it to Kiki to determine who was nice, and who was very, very naughty, indeed. A nasty Christmas Grinch is targeting one of Kiki's friends—and that's just not kosher.

"Till death do us part" comes way too soon for newlywed Kiki Lowenstein. A very pregnant Kiki Lowenstein and her fiance Detective Chad Detweiler are trying to race the stork to the altar, when their vows are interrupted by a shoot-out. Kiki and the children hide in the shed with their local neighborhood donkey! When the all-clear sounds, everyone's worried about the expectant mother. But the problem isn't hers. It's Detweiler's, and he's been seriously hurt.

The arrival of Kiki's baby is cause for celebration, but Kiki herself suffers from a severe case of post-partum blues. Her mood darkens further when she learns that her friend Bonnie's newborn infant has been stolen from a local hospital. Bonnie is too grief-stricken to help the authorities. Can Kiki pull herself together long enough to step in? Bonnie won't talk to anyone else.

A nasty divorce leaves Cragan Collins with a mountain of bills and her grandmother to support. She takes a job as an ad salesperson for the Gazette. The market is tough, but Cragan finds a mentor in business reporter, Robert Smithson. One icy January day, Robert is found dead in a city park. His murder is dismissed as gay-on-gay crime. Cragan asks The Friday Night Mystery Club to find justice for Robert. Will Cragan's quest for the truth land her on the obituary page?

Dumpster diving for her lost paycheck is definitely the low point of Kiki Lowenstein's day—that is, until she finds a severed leg in the trash. Who'd toss a body part in the garbage outside of Time in a Bottle, the crafts store where Kiki works? Accompanying the grisly "gift" is a creepy computerized voice message, a warning to the store's "rich and snotty" female shoppers. Kiki soon discovers that the amputated leg belonged to a customer with a tyrannical and violent husband, a powerful man in the community. And that jerk is now harassing Kiki.

There are two sides to every divorce . . . yours and the jerk's. In this case, there's Clancy's side and then there's the JERK's side. Of course, Kiki sides with Clancy because they're BFFs (Best Friends Forever). As for the JERK, well, the poor guy can't make up his mind.

An epidemic of teenage suicides leaves a rural community grieving—and the death toll keeps rising. Can Kiki go undercover as an art teacher at a local high school to help? To clear her calendar, Kiki must juggle multiple obligations and make a tough decision: Can she trust her in-laws (including her alcoholic mother-in-law) to take an out-of-state vacation with her kids? To make everything work, Kiki must move in with her OTHER mother-in-law and that's enough to make Kiki want to commit suicide. Once in place, Kiki suspects these are not just copycat deaths. There's another dynamic at work.

Two FBI agents come looking for Kiki's nanny, and suddenly the household is turned upside down. Kiki and her husband must ask themselves the toughest question they'll ever have to face: Can we trust this person with our kids? The answer might say more about them than it does about their nanny, Brawny.