The Golden Tresses of the Dead

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Flavia de Luce has joined forces with her late father's valet Dogger to form Arthur W. Dogger & Associates and that can only lead to trouble. In The Golden Tresses of the Dead by Alan Bradley. Flavia's sister Ophelia is finally getting married.(The Golden Tresses of the Dead will be released on January 22 by Delacorte.)

Thrilled to finally be rid of her annoying older sister and her fiance Dieter, a former German prisoner of war, now turned British resident. Flavia is not your average 12-year-old. Since she was ten she has been solving crimes and now she's decided to turn pro.

As her sister is cutting her wedding cake, she shrieks and claims she has discovered a finger in the cake slice. Flavia quickly makes the finger vanish and convinces her sister there was nothing to see. Of course Flavia has other ideas on how to handle the finger and races to study it in her laboratory.


When she cannot seem to get the attention of her hero Inspector Hewitt (husband of the lovely Antigone) about the finger, she and Dogger, along with new sidekick Undine, try to discover who the finger belonged to and why it was included in the cake.

After thorough study, Flavia finds herself enmeshed in a dark secret and some nasty dealings with other body parts and miracle cures.

Hijinks and adventure for the clever Flavia and her new sidekick, Undine, her younger cousin.

Literal Mess

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A two AM phone call brings the news Allie Cobb has been dreading - her father has passed away. In Literal Mess by J.C. Kenney, Allie flies home to Rushing Creek, Indiana, from New York City where she is a literary agent.

It was hard to make her own way back home with her father being a prominent literary agent and even though she loved living in Indiana, she knew she had to leave. Now returning for her father's funeral has tugged at her heart.

Attending his funeral is his best friend and longest client Thornwell Winchester, a best selling author of historical fiction, also the not-so-attentive father to Allie's best friend Sloane. Their relationship had been tenuous and caused Sloane many tears and much heartache while she was growing up, but Thornwell seems to be trying to repair the damage.

Just as he and Sloane are getting to know each other again, he is found dead under the Rushing Creek Bridge. At first it seems like an accident, but then it is thought to be murder. Naturally all eyes focus on Sloan, but there are plenty of suspects to go around.

With trying to close down her father's literary agency and the Fall Festival bringing more people to town, Allie speeds headlong into finding the killer.

The first in a new series - I hope there are more Allie and her family and friends are entertaining characters.

Pruning the Dead

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After her husband's death, Lilly Jayne has isolated herself from everything and everyone. Finally after several years, Lilly comes out of the fog and rejoins society. In Pruning the Dead by Julia Henry, she plans a huge garden party at her beautiful home in Goosebush, Massachusetts. (Pruning the Dead will be released on January 29 by Kensington Publishing.)

Many of her old friends and neighbors are delighted to see her entertaining again. Even her ex-husband and his third wife, the annoying Merilee, show up as well as town grinch Pat French. Ever the gracious hostess, Lilly doesn't let them get under her skin.

When she is coaxed out to a live poetry reading at The Star, her friend Stan's theater and restaurant, she learns the poet is a friend of hers as well - Callisto Pace. Always a little avant garde, he has a slide show to accompany his poetry. Unfortunately the slide show doesn't show Goosebush in its best light and that gets Lilly thinking about renewing her commitment to community beautification.

Lilly and her pals Tamara, Delia and Ernie (the Garden Squad) dive into planning to spruce up Alden Park. When they get the grudging approval of the town council,

they gather volunteers, equipment and plants and prepare to clean up and beautify the park. Unfortunately someone decides to kill Pete's wife Merilee in the shed on the property making the park a crime scene.

The police believe Pete killed Merilee because they were seen arguing earlier in the day, but Lilly isn't so sure. She and her Garden Squad set out to find the real killer and quietly beautify small parts of the town. With Pat French looming over their shoulder and threatening to fine them every step of the way, the Garden Squad sneaks out under cover of darkness to work their magic and to find the killer.

This is the first in the Garden Squad series and I enjoyed immensely. Wish I had my own Garden Squad to work on my untended garden.

Interview with Barbara Ross

What is the title of your newest book? How many books have you published?
My newest book is Steamed Open, the seventh novel in the Maine Clambake Mystery series and my

eighth published book overall. There are also two novellas in the series. They are in the holiday anthologies Eggnog Murder and Yule Log Murder.

How did you develop your character and choose your location?
The location was a natural. My husband and I have owned a Victorian house at the head of the harbor in Boothbay Harbor, Maine for many years. It’s such a natural location for a cozy mystery series. The character of Julia Snowden came from the location. I wanted her to be both an insider and a outsider, so she became the daughter of marriage between a summer person and a local, as well as someone who’d been sent to boarding school for high school and just kept going.

What is a day in the life of an author like? Do you write a certain number of words, do you write in the morning or evening?
When I’m writing a first draft I try to write 1500 words a day. Late afternoon is my most productive time. I try to do “the business of writing,” —answering emails, blog posts, etc., in the morning.

Do you model your character after yourself or any one you know?
Julia Snowden is half my age, so in the beginning I thought a lot about how she would think and talk. My daughter pointed out the character was a lot like my niece, Julia. Now, Julia’s voice comes pretty naturally to me.

If your books were made into a movie, who would you want to play the lead character?
I always say Anna Kendrick as the answer to this question because she’s a Mainer and she’s small and also I love her work. She doesn’t look like he Julia in my head, but that’s okay.

Who is your favorite author?
Such a hard question. Living author, I would say Louise Penny. Of course, I am in the middle of The Kingdom of the Blind, which I am loving.

If you could invite five people – living or dead – to a dinner party, who would they be?
Let’s have a mystery author party. I would invite PD James, Ruth Rendell, Dorothy L. Sayers, Agatha Christie and Louise Penny. It might be a little tense at first. Ruth has said some not nice things about Agatha’s work. But then I think we would all settle in for a great discussion.

If you could not be an author, what would like to do as a career?
I’ve already had another career, as a Chief Operating Officer in three successful software companies. At this point, if I wasn’t an author, I’d be enjoying my retirement.

Past Due for Murder

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In Past Due for Murder by Victoria Gilbert, life as a library director in Taylorsford, Virginia, has suited Amy Webber well. Her new boyfriend, the gorgeous Richard Muir, is attentive until suddenly he is not. (Past Due for Murder will be released on February 12 by Crooked Lane Books.)

Amy has organized a storytelling session around a campfire in the woods with folklore expert and lecturer at Clarion University Mona Raymond. When one of the college students working with Mona goes missing from a library function, Amy sets out to find out what happened to her. Lacey's friends mention she has hinted at a relationship with an older man and that worries Amy. 

When Amy's former boyfriend arrives on the scene newly grieving the death of his girlfriend who was killed by a hit and run driver, Amy tries to be sympathetic, but she recalls his manipulative ways. Richard, Amy's current boyfriend, is acting very distance and she is puzzled by this

When a folklore expert is found dead with the missing teen

unconscious next to her, Amy tries to track down the killer. Signs seem to point to Richard as he is Lacey's dance instructor and cannot account for his whereabouts the night Mona was killed. 

With Lacey in an induced coma, she is not able to give any details of how she ended up near the body or what actually happened. The police do notice that Lacey, although she was supposedly missing for five days, she did not look like someone who had been in the woods that long. This leads them to think she was hiding in someone's house.

Using her research techniques as a librarian, Amy digs deeper into the stories of the people involved to get at the truth. I like the development of Amy as a character and I look forward to others in this series.

A Baker Street Wedding

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When Reggie Heath Q.C. and actress Laura Rankin finally get married, the paparazzi crash the wedding and it is pandemonium with cake flying. In A Baker Street Wedding by Michael Robertson, law clerk Lois inadvertently reveals the location of the wedding and the press invades. This forces Laura and Reggie to hop into a small plane and fly to who knows where.

Surprising Reggie, too, Laura expertly lands them in Bodfyn Moor in Cornwall - not exactly a honeymoon destination. As suddenly as she flew them here, Laura reveals she had spent a year here in boarding school when she was younger.

Waiting for them as they land is Mrs. Hatfield, her former theater teacher. Reggie is stumped by this change of plans, but allows Laura to lead him to their lodging. It seems Mrs. Hatfield had written to Laura about replacing someone in the local theater production of MacBeth.

The next morning, Laura disguises herself and auditions for the role. She learns she is replacing an

actress who died in am accidental fall. Reggie tries to occupy his time without access to his cell phone or internet, wandering around the town.

Reggie continues to wonder how they ended up here and then Laura confesses to reading a letter she found at the Baker Street Chambers addressed to Sherlock Holmes, saying, "Something is terribly wrong in Bodfyn. Please send Scarecrow." Laura knows she is Scarecrow and she wants to discover what is wrong. She sends him out to discover what he can about the dead actress.

Meanwhile back on Baker Street Lois is beside herself because she has not been able to reach Reggie or Laura. Where did they go and have they landed safely? When a strange man named Sig coaxes Lois to join him to search for Laura and Reggie, they head for Bodfyn.

A Baker Street Wedding is fifth in the series about two brothers who rent 221B Baker Street and wind up answering letters delivered to the address and addressed to Sherlock Holmes even to this day. Funny, clever and and fun for fans of Sherlock Holmes.

Death is Coming to Town

Now that all that Christmas cheer is over, this is a book you will not feeling guilty about reading. Death is Coming to Town by Eleanor Cawood Jones brings readers four murderous holiday tales.

In the first one entitled "He's Making a List," Marcie Burns is hoping for a lovely Christmas with her husband Kelly. It is her favorite time of the year and she is looking forward to the decorating, baking and all the presents.

When she discovers Google searches for creating new identities and obtaining fake IDs, you wonders which of her husband's clients needs this information. After she overhears a phone call, she knows what this means.

In the second story entitled "Checking it Twice." Divorce is hard on everyone including the husband who is left behind for his younger co-worker. Roger seems to be handling it pretty well and he has made an effort to keep things sane with his daughters, following holiday traditions from when they were children.

When he learns from his daughter's that the new husband wants to leave their mother for another woman, Roger sees red and decides to confront Mark. That's where the trouble begins.

The other two stories entitled "Gonna Find Out" and "Who's Naughty or Nice" follow along in the same vein. Author Eleanor Cawood Jones has a diabolical mind. Four mysteries designed to give bad people their comeuppance. Loved it

Murder at Blackburn Hall

After concluding her first case successfully, High Society Lady Detective Olive Belgrave thinks she will be flooded with interesting cases. In Murder at Blackburn Hall by Sara Rosett, Olive has been relegated to searching for missing pets, note the cases she was hoping for. (Murder at Blackburn Hall will be released on January 14 by McGuffin Ink.)

She is eturning from a job interview as a hat model when she encounters her friend Jasper Rimington. He laments her foundering detective work, but encourages her to call Vernon Hightower, owner of Hightower Books.

When she does Hightower hires her to discover why his celebrated author R.W. May, whose real name is Mayhew, has missed a deadline for the latest book in his series. The recluse author has never been to Hightower's office and he follows a clandestine method of submitting his manuscripts through his solicitor.

As her cover Hightower sends Olive to Blackburn Hall under the

pretense of discussing Lady Holt etiquette book. Olive discovers R.W. May has lived like a recluse in the village of Hadsworth and no one has seen him close up. Many have seen him wandering the lanes dressed in his tweeds with a colorful tie and pocket square. Most prominent is the mask he wears to cover a war injury. 

His typist has never seen him either. Anna Finch, daughter of the local doctor, types the manuscripts and returns the typed pages to May by dropping them through the mail slot at the cottage. Even she has not seen him. 

Olive is determined to meet him, but Anna says he left her a note saying he was going to be away for a while. This sends Olive to his cottage to snoop. After a thorough search she realizes the cottage doesn't look like someone was planning to be away. As she walks back to Blackburn Hall, she discovers Lady Holt's eccentric sister Serena clambering up the riverbank. Serena announces that she has found a body. 

And there, my friend, the plot thickens. 

I love this series and cannot wait to read the next one The Egyptian Antiquities Murder.

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Foul Play on Words

When Charlee Russo's friend Viv invite her to Portland to give the keynote speech at a mystery writers conference, Charlee is nervous but thrilled by the opportunity. In Foul Play on Words by Becky Clark, Charlee meets a man at the airport who gives her a tip for her speech. (Foul Play on Words will be release on April 9, 2019.)

He writes ACHIEVE on a piece of paper and adds: A - for ability to write a story, C - courage, H - hocus pocus to make the magic work, I - imagination, E - editor writing and rewriting and you need an editor to trust,V - voice and E - earnings. Sage advice Charlee thinks and quickly stores it in her phone.

She finally meets Viv at the airport, but Viv shocks her with her news. Viv's daughter Hanna has been kidnapped. Charlee's first response is to call the police, but Viv says no police. She asks Charlee to help with the conference while she tries to raise the ransom.

Charlee soon learns most of the volunteers are ill from food poisoning so much of the works falls on

her. In her spare time, she decides to investigate and discovers plenty of suspicious characters. With her mystery writer's imagination she caroms from suspect to suspect.

Complicating the coordination of the conference and the search for Hanna is the hotel's mistake. They have double booked a dog show with the writers conference. Soon there are dogs in the lobby practicing obstacle course tricks.

Foul Play on Words is a riotous mystery with plenty of laughs that gives Charlee more ammunition for her mystery writing.

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More Reviews to Come in 2019

Happy New Year to all my readers, friends and authors. I have plans to read and review many books in 2019. If you have a new book and would like me to review it, please email me at mapyourmystery@gmail.com and I will try to add it to the schedule.

In 2018 MapYourMystery published almost 200 book reviews, interviewed 50 authors, held several giveaways and published a few recipes.

On the list for 2019 are books by Julia Henry, Sara Rosett, Michael Richardson, Eleanor Cawood Jones, Victoria Gilbert, Edith Maxwell, Catriona McPherson and that's only the first two weeks.