Too Many Crooks Spoil the Broth

Too Many Crooks Spoil the Broth

Tamar Myers

Tamar Myers

An Amish Bed and Breakfast Mystery with Recipes - PennDutch Mysteries #1 Readers will delight in this laugh-out-loud cozy mystery debut - and relish the country cooking recipes included. This debut mystery introduces Magdalena Yoder, prim, proper, and persnickety proprietor of the PennDutch Inn, where guests luxuriate in the true “Amish experience,” (read: doing Magdalena's chores and paying top dollar for the opportunity!). When one of her more reclusive guests takes a tumble down the PennDutch's picturesquely steep staircase and breaks his neck, the timing couldn't be worse. It's the start of hunting season - and her inn is packed to capacity! What at first seems to be a horrible accident (and insurance nightmare for Magdalena!) could turn out to be a much more sinister event; and when another mishap occurs, Magdalena is certain there is a killer in her group - and it's up to her to sniff out the culprit…before the world's most incompetent town sheriff throws her in jail! “Bubbling over with mirth and mystery.” -Dorothy Cannell “A delicious treat!” -Carolyn G. HartFrom Publishers WeeklyThis debut mystery introduces Magdalena Yoder, a mean-spirited Mennonite innkeeper who offers service with a sneer to the "well-heeled, highfalutin customers" patronizing her PennDutch Inn in southern Pennsylvania. When not badmouthing her sinful, slothful, divorced sister and her "bizarre excuse for a dog," Magdalena attends to an unfortunate combination of guests: a congressman, his wife and aide, who are in the area for the first weekend of deer-hunting season; a quartet of anti-hunting activists; and Heather Brown, who calls herself a "photo-hunter." Ironically, one of the hunting foes bags the first big game when, in the middle of the night, he finds Heather sprawled dead on the inn stairs. Police chief Jeff Myers initiates an investigation of the suspicious death, but leaves soon for a vacation with his wife Tammy, who is, Magdalena's observes, "dingier than a mailbox on a gravel road." With the case in the hands of a dim deputy, Magdalena undertakes some sleuthing and learns that her patrons are secretly linked in their pasts. Another guest bites the dust as this carping narrator fails to display the high IQ she brags of: matters become clear to her only when the villain is overcome by a desire to confess. Occasional recipes, rich in butter and sugar, don't make up for the story's sour tone. Copyright 1993 Reed Business Information, Inc. From Library JournalMuch of this first mystery novel occurs as a lengthy flashback interrupting the present moment. Narrator Magdalena Yoder, of Hernia, Pennsylvania, exploits her Mennonite heritage, in-your-face attitude, and razor wit by running a prosperous, elitist inn. Murder threatens her success when two of her customers are dispatched on the premises. Suspects include a secretive congressman, his socialite wife, a gay aide, and several animal rights activists. More than a little hokey and simplistic but still a mildly amusing possibility for larger collections.Copyright 1994 Reed Business Information, Inc.
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The Kills

The Kills

Linda Fairstein

Linda Fairstein

Paige Vallis claimed that she gave in to Tripping's sexual demands because he had threatened to harm his son if she didn't. Alexandra Cooper, prosecuting the ex-CIA man, knew she had her work cut out to convince the jury, but before Paige could complete her testimony on the stand she is found dead – strangled in her own apartment building, just hours after she'd confessed to Alex that she had had a relationship with another ex-CIA operative. While the accusation of rape against Tripping is dropped, he has other charges to face, not least abusing his own child. As Tripping's defence team go into overdrive to keep their client out of jail, Alex, Chapman and Mercer set out to discover who so conveniently killed the woman who could have put him behind bars. As they peel back the layers of Paige's life, they discover a decades-old viper's nest of robbery and double-dealing and discover that truth of the adage of money being at the root of all evil – however old and 'respectable' it might be.
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The Book of Separation

The Book of Separation

Tova Mirvis

Tova Mirvis

The memoir of a woman who leaves her faith and her marriage and sets out to navigate the terrifying, liberating terrain of a newly mapless world Born and raised in a tight-knit Orthodox Jewish family, Tova Mirvis committed herself to observing the rules and rituals prescribed by this way of life. To observe was to be accepted and to be accepted was to be loved. She married a man from within the fold and quickly began a family. But over the years, her doubts became noisier than her faith, and at age forty she could no longer breathe in what had become a suffocating existence. Even though it would mean the loss of her friends, her community, and possibly even her family, Tova decides to leave her husband and her faith. After years of trying to silence the voice inside her that said she did not agree, did not fit in, did not believe, she strikes out on her own to discover what she does believe and who she really is. This will mean forging a new way of life not...
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The Surrogate

The Surrogate

Tania Carver

Tania Carver

A shocking double-murder scene greets Detective Inspector Philip Brennan when he is called to a flat in Colchester. Two women are viciously cut open and laying spreadeagled, one tied to the bed, one on the floor. The woman on the bed has had her stomach cut into and her unborn child is missing. But this is the third time Phil and his team have seen such an atrocity. Two other pregnant women have been killed in this way and their babies taken from them. No-one can imagine what sort of person would want to commit such evil acts. When psychologist Marina Esposito is brought in, Phil has to put aside his feelings about their shared past and get on with the job. But can they find the killer before another woman is targeted?
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Poum and Alexandre

Poum and Alexandre

Catherine de Saint Phalle

Catherine de Saint Phalle

This is the story of two flawed eccentrics. Everything they do subverts their firm intention of keeping up appearances. They meet just after the war in liberated Paris but they cannot quite free themselves from the many strings attached to them – the old aunts, the sisters, the cousins, the nuns and the ominous concierges who dog their footsteps.Alexandre is a banker and a Resistant and lives in a world of numbers and Roman emperors. Poum resides in the Odyssey and in her bed, hiding from the mysterious disapproval of their relatives, for they both seem to persist in some irreparable faux pas which has them wading through a lifetime pickle. Their daughter, Catherine, would like to help but she seems to be part of the problem.
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Requiem for a Killer

Requiem for a Killer

Paulo Levy

Paulo Levy

Palmyra, a small city on the coast of Rio de Janeiro, woke up that morning in full surprise. Inspector Joaquim Dornellas noticed a different motion of people on his way to work. A little crowd by the Church of Santa Teresa, downtown, stared at a corpse stuck in the dry mud of the channel. No wounds, no signs of violence, only a small band-aid on the right arm.
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The Thirty-One Kings

The Thirty-One Kings

Robert J. Harris

Mystery / Thriller / Historical

Richard Hannay returns to action in this new spy thriller set in wartime Paris, as John Buchan's famed hero (from The 39 Steps) races to rack down a mysterious figure holding vital war secrets before the Nazis beat him to it . . .June, 1940. Richard Hannay has returned.As German troops pour across France, the veteran soldier and adventurer Richard Hannay is called back into duty. In Paris, an individual code named "Roland" has disappeared and is assumed to be in the hands of Nazi agents. Only Roland knows the secret of The 31 Kings, a secret upon which the future of Europe depends. Hannay is dispatched to Paris to find Roland before the Germans overrun the city. On a hazardous journey across the battlefields of France, Hannay is joined by old friends and new allies as he confronts a ruthless foe who will stop at nothing to destroy him.
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