Can it get any hotter? Yes, it can! Luckily, I’m talking about mysteries on my bookshelf and not the temperatures outside. (I refuse to listen to the weather reports at this point.) The books I’ve chosen this month are heating up the charts and bringing a biting blast to enflame your imagination.
July started out rather nicely with temps below normal, and a novel release of a curious cat prowling around in Booking a Crook! Laurie Cass’s ninth Bookmobile Cat Mystery will have you dreaming of creating your own snow angels (preferably not the ones that accompany dead bodies) and wondering if it can actually get cold enough outside to make your teeth chatter as Minnie Hamilton struggles to keep her bookmobile on the streets of Chilson, Michigan. The name of the midwestern town alone should help you feel the chill in the air, but if you’re still looking for goosebumps, imagine looking at the people you’ve known your entire life as murder suspects. The shocking twist at the end is guaranteed to freeze the blood in your veins!
BOOKING THE CROOK by Laurie Cass
It’s all paws on deck as a librarian and her rescue cat track down a killer in the newest book in the national bestselling Bookmobile Cat Mystery series.
Minnie Hamilton and her rescue cat, Eddie, cruise around lovely Chilson, Michigan delivering happiness and good reads in their bookmobile. But the feisty librarian is worried that the bookmobile’s future could be uncertain when a new library board chair arrives and doesn’t seem too friendly toward her pet project.
Still, she has to put her personal worries aside when she and Eddie are out on their regular route and one of their favorite customers doesn’t turn up to collect her books. At Eddie’s prodding, Minnie checks on the woman and finds her lying dead in her snow-covered driveway. Now it’s up to Minnie and her friends—feline and otherwise—to find the perpetrator and give them their due.
Mystery Pet Lovers | Mystery Cozy [Berkley Prime Crime, On Sale: July 2, 2019, Mass Market Paperback / e-Book, ISBN: 9780440000983 / eISBN: 9780440000990]
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Sometimes it takes a bit of the supernatural to deal with the heat and Juliet Blackwell knows how to cast just the right spell to make everything cozy. Building up her witchy abilities one novel at a time, Lily Ivory is ready to take the next step of creating a magical future with her favorite inspector in this tenth Witchcraft Mystery. Planning a wedding and warding off a deadly disaster is all in a day’s work for this bride-to-be. Bewitched and Betrothed was a refreshing dip into intrigue with a delightful dash of hocus-pocus.
BEWITCHED AND BETROTHED by Juliet Blackwell
A mystery wrapped up in a magical threat and a family reunion keeps witch and vintage store owner Lily Ivory on her toes as she prepares to walk down the aisle…
Lily Ivory’s beloved San Francisco is under siege and not just from the paranormal—her relatives are coming to town. Tensions run high as Lily and Sailor’s big day approaches, especially when a magical menace threatens the safety of the city she loves. It’s up to Lily to sleuth out the culprit, resolve any family conflicts, and make it to that altar.
Mystery Cozy [Berkley Prime Crime, On Sale: July 2, 2019, Mass Market Paperback / e-Book, ISBN: 9780451490612 / eISBN: 9780451490629]
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There’s nothing like a bit of comfort food to take off the edge, even if it’s the weather you’re trying to escape. Rising to the occasion, Mary Lee Ashford takes on a small town gossip, corruption and the return of a small-town bad boy with a tale, or two, of murder—all over a delicious breakfast of biscuits and gravy in her second Sugar & Spice Mystery. It’s an appetizing recipe of intrigue too hard to resist for cookbook editor Sugar Calloway and blue-ribbon baker Dixie Spicer to dip their spoons into—and too gratifying for mystery readers to pass up. Risky Biscuits was a cool treat on my summer reading list.
RISKY BISCUITS by Mary Lee Ashford
A Sugar & Spice Mystery #2
Former magazine editor “Sugar” Calloway’s life has taken a delicious twist since she launched a community cookbook publishing business with blue-ribbon baker Dixie Spicer. Now these amateur sleuths must solve a small-town murder—without getting burned…
Sugar and Spice Cookbooks’ newest project is a fundraiser organized by the St. Ignatius Crack of Dawn Breakfast Club, famous for their all-you-can-eat biscuits and gravy events. But when a group member is found dead, Sugar and Spice’s priorities change from raising dough to figuring out who put murder on the menu.
The return of former badboy Nick Marchant has stirred the town’s gossips too. Add a few grudges and some old-fashioned greed over a land deal into the mix, and it’s a recipe for mayhem. And when someone serves up a second helping of murder, Sugar and Spice need to sift the guilty from the blameless, or their next breakfast may be their last…
* Includes delicious recipes! *
Mystery Cozy | Mystery Culinary [Lyrical Underground, On Sale: July 9, 2019, e-Book, ISBN: 9781516105076 / eISBN: 9781516105076]
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What can thrill a mystery lover more than a new series by a great mystery writer? A novel steeped in history, lore, and magic that makes a murder more intriguing than ever. Julia Buckley has done it again with her new Hungarian Tea House Mystery that is infused with humor and charm. I enjoyed submerging myself for several hours into her tastefully written novel, Death in a Budapest Butterfly.
DEATH IN A BUDAPEST BUTTERFLY by Julia Buckley
HUNGARIAN TEA HOUSE
Hanna Keller runs her family’s Tea House, serving up scrumptious snacks and tantalizing teas but when a customer keels over from a poisoned cuppa, Hanna and her tea-leaf reading grandma will have to catch a killer in the first of the new cozy mystery series from Julia Buckley.
Hanna Keller and her family-run Maggie’s Tea House, an establishment heavily influenced by the family’s Hungarian descent and specializing in a European-style traditional tea service. But truthfully, one of the shop’s largest draws is Hanna’s eccentric grandmother, who’s known for her remarkable ability to read the future in the leaves at the bottom of their customers’ cups. Lately, however, her readings have become alarmingly ominous…
Hanna is also an avid teacup collector and especially takes pride in the Anna Weatherley butterfly cup she recently procured. But the exquisite piece of porcelain soon becomes the center of a murder investigation, when it’s suspected of delivering poison to one of the guests at their most recent event. Hanna’s determined to find the true killer, exonerate her family, their business, and in the process, reclaim her beautiful Budapest Butterfly.
Mystery Cozy [Berkley Prime Crime, On Sale: July 30, 2019, Mass Market Paperback / e-Book, ISBN: 9781984804822 / eISBN: 9781984804839]
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Until next month, get cozy and read on!
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About Kym Roberts
Passion. Mystery. Suspense. Catch the Wave! Because a little PMS can change your world!
Kym Roberts is a retired detective sergeant who looks for passion, mystery, and suspense in every book she reads and writes. She can be found on the web at kymroberts.com, on Facebook @KymRobertsAuthor911, and on Twitter @kymroberts911. You can also listen to her new podcast Romance Book Chat with Kym and Misty on iTunes & Stitcher.
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