Living on Devon's gorgeous coast, I'm melding my lifelong love of reading Cozy Sleuths with my love of writing and years of living in foreign climes to write Travel Cozies. I also have a Vella Heist serial Found Money starting on Vella soon, and a Cozy Spy series They Call Him Gimletcoming out in the Autumn.
Narrator Professor Hilary Tamar’s habits and character traits invite non-stop laughter; and yet amazingly the three young barrister characters are every bit as funny in an entirely different way. One of the barristers always carries the action; but Hilary is no Dr. Watson gasping at their brilliance; in every book, her perspicacity and specialist knowledge enable the murder motive to be unravelled and the murderer brought to justice.
These books are rich in comic dialogue, often given as indirect speech. Caudwell’s unique spin on technical legal language will have you laughing out loud.
The storyline is enchanting. Without Hilary’s specialist knowledge of ancient Greek texts, there might well have been many more murders! And yet so cleverly is this charming novel plotted, that we almost feel her esoteric expertise is only what might be expected of any amateur sleuth worthy of the name.
Everyone in the family had decided that changing the trust arrangement seemed the perfect way to avoid three million in taxes. However, when dreary cousin Deirdre has a mysterious accident after demanding a fee for her signature, the young London barristers handling the trust seek advice from mentor Hilary Tamar.
Julia believes it's murder; whilst Hilary wonders why the raven-haired heir did not die. But with more deadly accidents occurring, it is Hilary who is given the perilous quest of unmasking the killer.
InEscape from Sunset Grove, Minna Lindgren gives us a delightful contemporary cozy murder mystery whose protagonists, the nonagenarian amateur sleuths of the Lavender Ladies Detective Agency, live in a Finnish Retirement Apartments complex. When their quiet lives are quite literally broken to bits by unskilful plumbers, Siiri and Irma innocently go in search of a quieter place to drink a cup of coffee—and find a murderer.
The humour in Lindgren’s delightful cozy series, excellently translated by Kristian London, is quieter than Caudwell’s sparkling masterpieces but just as enjoyable. Called with some justice “The Finnish Miss Marple” the Lavender Ladies appeal to all age groups.
It's not easy sharing a flat. Especially when you're 95 years old . . .
Escape from Sunset Grove is the second hilarious and heartwarming crime caper in Minna Lindgren's Lavender Ladies Detective Agency trilogy. Perfect for fans of Richard Osman's The Thursday Murder Club and M.C. Beaton
Change is afoot at Sunset Grove retirement home, and its residents aren't impressed.
Under threat from falling masonry, best friends Irma and Siiri are forced out of their home to negotiate twenty-first-century living in the centre of Helsinki. Their new surroundings throw up an endless number of daily challenges, from caring for…
Can any guide to the Best Humorous Murder Mysteries be complete without Janet Evanovich? If you are unfamiliar with her books, joyfully murderous mirth is coming straight at you by the barrelful, via 30 Stephanie Plum novels. Stephanie lives in an extraordinary neighborhood, where law enforcers, Mafia types, goodies, baddies, peeps-crazy-in-a-good-way, bonkers-in-a-bad-way, and all stops in between, are crammed cheek by jowl.
In the first book One for the Moneyout-of-workStephanie becomes a Bounty Hunter. We meet her nutcase Nan and her crazy family, and follow her as she learns her dangerous new job via laugh-out-loud captures! Too much cussing to be a true cozy, but Evanovich novels have all the best features of the cozy mystery. Having met Stephanie and her clan, likely you’ll keep coming back for more.
Stephanie Plum is down on her luck. She's lost her job, her car's on the brink of repossession, and her apartment is fast becoming furniture-free.
Enter Cousin Vinnie, a low-life who runs a bail-bond company. If Stephanie can bring in vice cop turned outlaw Joe Morelli, she stands to pick up $10,000. But tracking down a cop wanted for murder isn't easy . . .
And when Benito Ramirez, a prize-fighter with more menace than mentality, wants to be her friend Stephanie soon knows what it's like to be pursued. Unfortunately the best person to protect her just happens to…
Do you like some romance with your murder mystery? Then you will love Getting Rid of Bradley by Jennifer Crusie. Better known for her many bestselling romantic comedies, twice RITA winner Crusie had been writing laugh out loud love scenes for years before she turned to murder mystery. And boy does it show!
The pace is lightning fast, the dialogue a delight, the snazzy sister talk and keep your hair on cop talk metamorphose swiftly into a laugh-a-minute embezzlement and attempted murder romp. Does true love win? Ask Jake or Lucy. Or perhaps Lucy’s sister Tina, who will always take the opposite view. A well-plotted story that satisfies yet still leaves you wanting more!
Lucy Savage is not having a good week. Her cheating husband, Bradley, lobbed the final insult when he stood her up in divorce court. A dye job gone wrong has left her hair green. And someone is trying to kill her. To top it off, sexy cop Zack Warren is certain that the very same man Lucy is trying to wash right out of her hair is the same Bradley he wants to arrest for embezzlement.
When someone shoots at her and then her car blows up, Zack decides she needs twenty-four-hour police protection. Next thing Lucy knows, Zack has…
My all time fav Humorous Murder Mystery (now out of print but still available currently in the anthology He Do The Time Police In Different Voices) British author David Langford's The Spear of he Sun is set on a spaceship. This gem is simultaneously a terrific Locked Room murder mystery; the best Father Brown story I have ever read (and I've been a Father Brown fan for decades); a wonderful cozy mystery; and a fantastic parody-pastiche of GK Chesterton, The Roman Catholic Church imprints, and Isaac Asimov's SF Magazine, all three at the same time. It's tears-of-laughter-pouring-down-your-cheeks funny, and a Hall-of-Fame-Quality of murder mystery if read straight. Don't miss it.
A collection of Langford parodies and pastiches incorporating the whole of The Dragonhiker's Guide to Battlefield Covenant at Dune's Edge: Odyssey Two (1988, long out of print) plus some 40,000 words of additional material.
Màiri and her BFF Lianna dump their cheating partners and head for a New Life in Istanbul. But they get stopped dead in Paris. Lianna is locked up in jail, charged with murder. Màiri is being hunted by murderous terrorists. She never dreamt that travelling outside Scotland would be so dangerous...
Death in Paris won 9 International Book Awards in 2022, including the Firebird Award for Best Book by a Debut Author.
Willem and Jurriaan have a miserable childhood thanks to their cruel, controlling mother—Louisa Veldkamp, a world-renowned pianist. Dad turns a blind eye. One day, Louisa vanishes without a trace during a family vacation.
Adoptee Anneliese Bakker survives a toxic childhood and leaves home, vowing never to return. While searching for her biological mother, she meets the adult Willem, and they fall in love. Pregnant and engaged, she moves into the family mansion, wanting nothing more than to create a loving family for her child. But the Veldkamps are cold and distant. And why is Louisa a taboo subject?
An expectant mother gets more than she bargained for when she marries into a seemingly perfect family in this gripping debut novel–a must read for fans of A. J. Finn and B. A. Paris.
After surviving a nightmarish childhood, Anneliese Bakker is on the mend and searching for her birth mother. But when she meets Willem, she falls madly in love and finally finds a safe place to land. Engaged and expecting her first child, she moves into the Veldkamp mansion on a stately, tree-lined avenue in Amsterdam. And yet, nothing about Willem’s family is as it seems. Instead of…
