Showing results by author "Jenn McKinlay" in All Categories

The New York Times best-selling library lover's mystery from the author of Due or Die. “Avast” in pirate speak means what? Answering tricky reference questions like this one provides plenty of excitement for library director Lindsey Norris. But when a shocking murder is committed in her cozy coastal town of Briar Creek, Connecticut, the question of who did it must be answered before an innocent man gets the book thrown at him...

Love is in the air in Briar Creek as Library Director Lindsey Norris and Boat Captain Mike “Sully” Sullivan are finally tying the knot. The entire town is excited for the happy day, and Lindsey and Sully's plan for a small wedding evaporates as more and more people insist upon attending the event of the year. When Lindsey and her crafternoon pals head out to Bell Island to see if it can accommodate the ever-expanding guest list, they are horrified to discover a body washed up on the rocky shore.

Normally Mel and Angie wouldn't be caught dead at a beauty pageant, but when their bakery is asked to provide cupcakes for the 75th annual Sweet Tiara contest, they can't say no. Between cooking up a daily display for the three-day event and sponsoring a cupcake creation challenge for the participants, Fairy Tale Cupcakes will get great publicity. A high-strung judge targets Lupe, a young friend of Mel and Angie's, at the competition, though, and aims to take her out - by any means necessary.

Spring is livening up Briar Creek after a long, cold winter, and newlyweds Lindsey and Sully could not be happier. Even though the upcoming mayoral election is getting heated, everything else in town is coming up daffodils...until a body is found. Ms. Cole, a librarian and current candidate for town mayor, is shocked when she opens her trunk to discover a murder victim who just so happens to be a guy she dated 40 years ago and the founder of the baking empire Nana's Cookies.

Melanie and Angie are determined to win the Challenge to the Chef cooking competition to promote their Fairy Tale Cupcakes bakery. Mel's mentor from culinary school, Vic Mazzotta, may be one of the judges, but Mel and Angie will have to bake their best to win fair and square. But when Vic's dead body is found inside a freezer truck, Mel and Angie will need to use their best judgment to find the cold-blooded killer or they may lose more than the contest; they may lose their lives.

It's summertime, but sales at their bakery are below zero, so Mel and Angie are willing to try anything to heat things up! When local legend Slim Hazard offers them a chance to sell cupcakes at the annual Juniper Pass rodeo, they're determined to rope in a pretty payday! But not everyone at the Juniper Pass is as sweet for Fairy Tale Cupcakes as Slim - including star bull-rider Ty Stokes.

Scottsdale, Arizona, may not be the liveliest place on earth, but it's never been as dead as this. The first annual Old Town Zombie Walk is announced, and Mel, Angie, and the Fairy Tale Cupcake crew are donning their best undead attire to sell some horror-themed desserts to the hungry hordes. But fun turns to fright when Mel finds a real dead body in a prop casket outside of the bakery's truck - and the corpse looks alarmingly like a zombie of their own. Mel worries that someone near and dear was the real target.

Life is sweet and business is booming at the Fairy Tale Cupcakes bakery - and the fact that Mel and Joe are getting married is the icing on the cake. Their reception will be held at the swanky resort where Oz works as the pastry chef. The wedding planning is all fun-fetti and games until Mel and Joe meet the head chef at the resort who has been making Oz's life miserable. When the eccentric chef insults Mel's bakery, Oz gets into a blowout argument with the culinary prima donna.

Melanie and Angie are taking a gamble by opening their first franchise of the bakery, and where better to hit the jackpot than Vegas? Holly Hartzmark is a former showgirl who's looking to bring Mel and Angie's sweet treats to Sin City, but Mel isn't so sure she's ready to hand her recipes over to a complete stranger - especially one as brash as Holly. But after the potential bakery location gets blown up, Mel begins seeing another side to Holly.

It's been seven years since Chelsea Martin embarked on her yearlong postcollege European adventure. Since then, she's lost her mother to cancer and watched her sister marry twice, while Chelsea has become one of the most talented fundraisers for the American Cancer Coalition, and with the exception of one annoyingly competent coworker, Jason, her status as most successful moneymaker is unquestioned. Then Chelsea is forced to acknowledge that her life stopped after her mother died and that the last time she can remember being happy, in love, or enjoying her life was on her year abroad.

Delivering books to the housebound residents of the Thumb Islands, just a short boat ride from the town of Briar Creek, library director Lindsey Norris has befriended two elderly brothers, Stewart and Peter Rosen. She enjoys visiting them in their treasure-filled, ramshackle Victorian on Star Island until she discovers that Peter has been killed and Stewart is missing. Now she's determined to solve a murder and find Stewart before he suffers his brother's fate.

For Samantha Gale, a summer on Martha’s Vineyard at her family’s tiny cottage was supposed to be about resurrecting her career as a chef, until she’s tasked with chaperoning her half-brother, Tyler. The teenage brainiac is spending his summer at the local library in a robotics competition, and there’s no place Sam, who has dyslexia, likes less than the library. And because the universe hates her, the library’s interim director turns out to be the hot-reader guy whose book she accidentally destroyed on the ferry ride to the island.

With Angie and Tate's wedding just around the corner, it's a happy time for Melanie Cooper and the bakery crew. Not only are they finessing the last-minute details of the big day, but their bakery, Fairy Tale Cupcakes, has just been hired to bake cupcakes for the blockbuster book signing of a controversial author who wrote a steamy best seller filled with juicy local gossip. But one by one, the people Angie has hired to work the wedding begin turning up dead. As the body count rises, the best-selling author is the next to bite the dust.

When the Briar Creek Public Library holds its first overdue book amnesty day—no fines for late returns—the volume of incoming materials is more than Lindsey and her staff can handle. In a bind, Lindsey drafts the crafternoon ladies to help check in and sort the stacks of books. But one tardy tome catches her attention—a copy of J. D. Salinger’s The Catcher in the Rye, twenty years past due. When Lindsey looks up the borrower, she’s shocked to discover it was a murdered teacher named Candice Whitley, whose killer was never found.

Life is smooth as buttercream at the Fairy Tale Cupcakes bakery, and newlyweds Mel and Joe are stopping to smell the flours. But things start to crumble one night when an unknown gunman takes a shot at Mel. Even though the bullets miss their mark, the cupcake crew goes on high alert to figure out who would want to kill a small-town baker—and why.

Library director Lindsey Norris is happy to learn the Briar Creek Public Library is the beneficiary of the Dorchester family’s vast book collection. However, when Lindsey and the library staff arrive at the old Victorian estate to gather the books, things take a sinister turn. One of the bookcases reveals a secret passage, leading to a room where a skeleton is found, clutching an old copy of The Collected Works of Edgar Allan Poe.

Library director Lindsey Norris must solve a murder in her cozy Connecticut hometown before anyone else is checked out for good in this Library Lover’s mystery. Carrie Rushton, the president of the Friends of the Library, has been accused of murdering her husband. The evidence is stacking up against Carrie, but neither Lindsey nor the Briar Creek crafternoon club is buying it. When a nor'easter buries the small coastal town, the police are too busy digging out the locals to investigate the murder.

Melanie Cooper and Angie DeLaura are finally living out their dream as the proud owners of the Fairy Tale Cupcakes bakery. But their first big client is a nightmare. She's a bridezilla who wants 500 custom cupcakes for her wedding. When Mel stumbles upon the bride-to-be dead - by cupcake - Mel becomes the prime suspect. To save themselves and their business, the ladies need to find the real murderer, before the cupcake killer ices someone else.

Hip hip beret! Hatmakers Scarlett Parker and Vivian Tremont return and must collar a killer when a castle wedding goes awry in New York Times bestselling author Jenn McKinlay's new Hat Shop Mystery.

Love is in the air at FairyTale Cupcakes as Angie prepares for her wedding, but, at the same time, her co-owner, Mel, is about to help with a breakup. Mel's old friend Diane has decided to dump her fiancé after discovering he's only marrying her for her money. She wants Mel to personally deliver a batch of caramel breakup cupcakes to the louse and give her a play-by-play of his reaction. But when Mel finally tracks the man down, the look on his face isn't what she expected: he's dead.