International Cozy Mysteries

While Fanny takes care of the business end of Amy's Travel in New York City, Amy is traipsing around Monte Carlo, managing their first mystery-themed excursion, a road rally in which guests compete to solve a fictional murder along the way. Amy still has reservations about partnering up with her mother. But both women, having lost the men in their lives, need a fresh beginning.

Winter has come early to the tiny Siberian village of Roslazny, but for Olga Pushkin, aspiring writer and Railway Engineer (Second Class), it only makes leaving the harder. Olga is being forced overseas by her jealous superior, and now faces two years in exile from her beloved rail-side hut, her white-breasted hedgehog Dmitri and Vassily Marushkin, sergeant-in-charge at the tiny Roslazny police station. Fate seems to intervene when Olga's train crashes outside Roslazny, shutting the line and killing two on board—local celebrity Danyl Petrovich and his wife, Anoushka.

When murder invades Haydn's opera stage, scandal isn't far behind . . . Charged with ensuring that an imperial wedding transpires without mishap, composer Joseph Haydn has his hands full. Barely seventeen, Archduke Ferdinand Karl, the imperial bridegroom, is reluctant to marry. And the bride, Maria Beatrice, has her reservations as well. But when an extortion note surfaces—an unpleasant reminder of the bridegroom's shameful past—the wedding seems truly doomed. Worse still, all the evidence points to Haydn's prima donna, Lucia Pacelli, being the blackmailer. Before Haydn can confront her...

The heirs to one of the oldest Cognac estates in France face a hostile takeover by foreign investors. Renowned wine expert Benjamin Cooker is called in to audit the books. In what he thought was a sleepy provincial town, he is stonewalled, crosses paths with his first love, and stands up to high-level state officials keen on controlling the buyout. Meanwhile irresistible Virgile mingles with the local population until a drowning changes the stakes.

OPERAS CAN BE DEADLYIn the cobblestone streets of Vienna, rumors of a musical treasure draw out a killer. . . Kapellmeister Joseph Haydn is busy preparing for the opera season when he receives an urgent request from Vienna. An impoverished violinist with bills to pay wants Haydn to examine his bequest—a collection of scores so valuable they could wipe out his debts. A collection reputed to be the long-lost works of the Italian master of opera Monteverdi. Haydn agrees to help, but remains skeptical. Until Kaspar is murdered—beaten and left to die in front of a wine tavern. The police ...

The lazy, slow month of August at the height of the Sicilian summer is, Inspector Montalbano assures his girlfriend, Livia, as they prepare for a relaxing holiday in a villa he has found for them, far too hot for any murders to be committed. But when Livia's friends' young son goes missing, a chain of events is sparked which will certainly ruin the Chief Inspector's pleasant interlude. A secret apartment and a grisly find in an old trunk are just the beginning as Montalbano navigates his way though the case and copes with the sweltering heat.

Ever since he survived a suicide attempt, New York artist Stan Foster has not been himself. Plagued by amnesia and a head full of visions of death and destruction that fuel his ever-more disturbing work, he claws his way through a life he doesn't recognize in search of his true identity. What he finds leads him to believe he is Satan, spit out from the bowels of hell to live among the mortal inhabitants of earth. Is he delusional, or is there truth behind this troubling revelation? One woman can help him find out.

Sailing on a cruise ship to discover unusual adventures for her travel magazine, journalist Sam Anderson gets caught up in the disappearance of a wealthy dining companion. From the glaciers of Alaska to the steamy heat of New Orleans, Sam begins to tie up the loose strings of this intriguing mystery.

Hettie Bagshot has bitten off more than any cat could chew. As soon as she launches her No. 2 Feline Detective Agency, she's bucketed into a case: Furcross, a home for slightly older cats, has a nasty spate of bodysnatching, and three of the residents have been stolen from their graves. Hettie and her sidekick, Tilly, set out to reveal the terrible truth. In a haze of catnip and pastry, Hettie steers the Furcross Case to its conclusion, but will she get there before the body count rises - and the pies sell out?

France's top wine expert Benjamin Cooker sets off to enjoy the delights of Vienna, a romantic ride down the Danube, a gourmand's visit to Budapest, and a luxury train through the enchanting Hungarian countryside. All too soon, stolen wallets, disappearing passports, guides who are a bit too obliging, and murder mar the trip. Meanwhile, in Bordeaux, Cooker's handsome assistant Virgile faces an annoying rival and a mildew crisis in the vineyards just as Cooker's lab technician is the victim of a mugging.

Harriet, der i mange år har haft Harriets Antiques i Lund, dør på mystisk vis. Samtidig forsvinder Kjell, souschefen i Albin Larssons herreekviperingsbutik, pludselig sporløst. Den excentriske hr. Larsson finder det svært at leve uden tjenestefolk, så han ansætter Bodil som erstatning for Kjell. Men det tomrum, som Kjell efterlader, er svært at udfylde. Larsson og hans sidekick Oskar, der kæmper med både sit forhold og det rejsebureau, som tiden synes at være løbet fra, begynder at lede efter den forsvundne Kjell. Undervejs støder de på lyssky agenter, affyrede pistoler og udstoppede dyr.

“Ask anyone on Atbara Avenue how well they know their neighbors, and they'll answer ‘well'. After all, they see each other across the vast distance afforded by close proximity, and that is probably for the best...”. For the best, because Atbara Avenue is a street where, all too often, murder feels like the solution.

Olga Pushkin, Railway Engineer (Third Class) and would-be best-selling author, spends her days in a little rail-side hut with only Dmitri the hedgehog for company. While tourists and travellers clatter by on the Trans-Siberian Express, Olga dreams of studying literature at Tomsk State University and escaping the sleepy, snow-clad village of Roslazny. But Roslazny doesn't stay sleepy for long. One day Olga arrives at her hut only to be knocked unconscious by a man falling from the Trans-Siberian, an American tourist with his throat cut from ear to ear.

Le pianiste virtuose Stephen Orlac est victime d'un grave accident de chemin de fer. Le docteur Cerral, un célèbre chirurgien à la réputation sulfureuse, sauve ses mains en pratiquant sur lui plusieurs opérations délicates. Stephen Orlac, bien que parfaitement remis physiquement, souffre d'un profond malaise. Malgré un travail acharné, il ne retrouve pas la dextérité qui l'avait rendu célèbre au piano. Il est tourmenté par de terribles hallucinations et, peu à peu, s'enfonce dans la dépression.

A small town holds fiercely on to its secrets. In the heart of Gascony, a fire ravages the warehouse of one of Armagnac's top estates, killing the master distiller. Wine expert Benjamin Cooker is called in to estimate the value of the losses. But Cooker and his assistant, Virgile, want to know more. How did the old alembic explode? Was it really an accident? Why is the estate owner, Baron de Castayrac, penniless? How legal are his dealings?

In dem malerischen Dörfchen Ballydehag in Irland, in das die Hexe Quinn Callahan vor kurzem gezogen ist, scheint ein uralter Fluch Unheil zu stiften. Ist dieser schuld an dem Mord, der sich ereignet? Oder läuft dort ein sehr lebendiger Mörder frei herum? Der Umzug in ein kleines irisches Dorf hätte die nicht mehr allzu junge Hexe vor Schwierigkeiten bewahren sollen. Doch leider geht diese Rechnung nicht auf. Quinn und ihre untoten Bücherwürmer müssen den wahren Mörder finden und dem Fluch ein Ende setzen, bevor noch jemand ums Leben kommt.

Wherever there was trouble in the world, one would find Martha McGillivray. The celebrated journalist had a nose for rooting out corruption and a passion for sticking it to the man. Unsurprisingly, then, eventually trouble finds her and she dies of Ricin poisoning whilst traveling on a train to Edinburgh. Back from a spell on a punitive training course for middle-aged male dinosaurs, Detective Inspector Russell McCord is under pressure to crack the case quickly. However, his superiors have forbidden all contact with the press. In particular magazine writer and amateur sleuth Amy Thornton.

Mumbai, murder and a baby elephant combine in a charming, joyful mystery for fans of Alexander McCall Smith and Harold Fry. On the day he retires, Inspector Ashwin Chopra inherits two unexpected mysteries. The first is the case of a drowned boy, whose suspicious death no one seems to want solved. And the second is a baby elephant.

Constable Hamish Macbeth ist traurig: Gegen seinen Willen muss er einen Kollegen vertreten, und zwar ausgerechnet im weit entfernten Cnothan, dem mürrischsten Dorf Schottlands. Den Einzigen, den die Bewohner von Cnothan noch weniger ausstehen können als Hamish, ist ein besserwisserischer Engländer. Als dessen Skelett mitten im Moor gefunden wird, ahnt Hamish, dass ihm ein ziemlich außergewöhnlicher Fall bevorsteht - und dass es noch eine ganze Weile dauern wird, bis er in sein geliebtes Dorf Lochdubh zurückkehren kann.

Kim faces two cases in this gripping instalment. An escaped felon and a strange request from an olive-skinned beauty. She must wrestle simultaneously with both conundrums, and track down the convict while resolving the mystery of what exactly is inside the booty in the boathouse - and who put it there and why? There are the usual splashes of humour as Kim gets to grips with her tasks.