Showing results by author "Victoria Hamilton" in All Categories

While in Bath preparing for her upcoming marriage to Lord Darkefell, Lady Anne learns of a profoundly accurate mystic working in town whose uncanny predictions have stunned the gullible and the skeptical alike. Certain there's a harmless rational explanation for the medium's supposed otherworldly abilities, Anne's tolerance turns to defiance when the seer's dark pronouncements begin having a decidedly harmful affect on her friends - and a troubled local vicar takes his own life.

After receiving a distressing letter from a friend, Lady Anne Addison wastes no time in traveling to Yorkshire to offer whatever help she can. She has no idea what she'll find there, but she certainly wasn't expecting to be met by tales of a werewolf terrorizing the area - nor the dead body she discovers upon arriving. Driven by curiosity and a keen intelligence, Lady Anne dismisses the notion of such a beast, but she's nonetheless drawn into the mysteries by the secrecy surrounding her friend and the infuriating yet enticing Lord Darkefell.

They say that one's home is one's castle, but when it comes to Wynter Castle, Merry would like it to belong to someone else. But until a buyer bites, she could use some extra dough, so she decides to take in renters. The idea pans out, and Merry's able to find a handful of tenants eager to live in a real castle. The only problem is that most of them are crumby, tea-swilling old biddies.

Merry is making a fresh start in small-town Autumn Vale, New York, in the mansion she's inherited from her late uncle, Melvin. The house is run-down, and someone has been digging giant holes on the grounds, but with its restaurant-quality kitchen, the place has potential for her new baking business. She even has her first client - the local retirement home. Unfortunately, Merry soon finds that quite a few townsfolk didn't like Uncle Mel, and she has inherited their enmity as well as his home.

Merry's career as a New York City stylist has crumbled, but her passion for muffins has helped her rise upstate in Autumn Vale. Everyone in town loves the tasty treats. Still, she would like to return to her glamorous life. Besides, the upkeep of Wynter Castle is expensive, and Merry's cup isn't exactly overflowing. So in order to bring some prospective buyers into the mix, Merry whisks together a spooky soiree and decorates the castle with dashes of fabric and a sprinkling of spiderwebs.

The shocking murder of Sir Henry Claybourne leaves Regency London shaken and horror-struck. But for genteel spinster Miss Emmeline St. Germaine, the crime slices far too close to home. Just hours before the knight's death she held a dagger to him, threatening him to stay silent as she rescued a scullery maid he had procured for his pleasure. Did the man - or woman - who murdered the knight know of her visit? Her secret identity at risk, her reputation and life in jeopardy, Emmeline must solve the crime or face scandalous exposure and ruination for a crime she did not commit.

Finally home in Kent after her recent adventures in Yorkshire and Cornwall, Lady Anne Addison is shocked to spy her erstwhile suitor, the Marquess of Darkefell, skulking around the gypsy camps near her property. Outraged that he has followed her there, she writes a scathing letter to him and his family, which brings Darkefell - and his denials that it was he - to Kent. Despite Darkefell's arrival, Anne is preoccupied with the troubles that plague her family and loved ones. Is it the old gypsy woman's curse that is making her friends ill, or something far more sinister?

Vintage kitchenware and cookbook collector Jaymie Leighton has been estranged from her high school best friend Kathy Cooper since they were teenagers, but she never knew what turned Kathy against her. After fireworks at a Fourth of July picnic, Jaymie discovers the body of her former friend in the park. On the ground nearby is Jaymie's own Depression-era glass bowl, broken in two.

Fleeing the attentions of the handsome and commanding Marquess of Darkefell, Lady Anne Addison arrives on the doorstep of a dear friend seeking nothing but rest and relaxation, but soon finds herself putting her investigative talents to work after a sighting of the Barbary Ghost. Always a skeptic of the supernatural, Lady Anne immediately suspects the apparition is nothing more than a diversionary tactic to conceal smugglers on the beach below her friend's house.

Having chosen to go to a women's institution rather than live under her brother's oppressive thumb, Emmeline is second-guessing her decision. Her ulterior motive was to learn under what circumstances her sister died there six years ago, but the conditions are dismal, the treatment is harsh, and the women are restricted on all sides. When one of the women is murdered, Emmeline resolves to solve the crime despite the powerful owner's hostile insistence that the death was a suicide.

When vintage cookware and cookbook collector Jaymie Leighton spies an original 1920s Hoosier brand kitchen cabinet at an estate auction, it's love at first sight. Despite the protests of her sister that the 19th-century yellow-brick house they share in Michigan is already too cluttered with Jaymie's "junk," she successfully outbids the other buyers and triumphantly takes home her Hoosier.

As her wedding to Lord Darkefell approaches, Lady Anne is summoned by a local girls' school to help them with a young student troubled by ghostly apparitions. She's quick to respond, and quick to discover the trickery behind the so-called ghosts. But despite her efforts to demonstrate to the student that she's been the victim of a cruel hoax, the young woman apparently jumps to her death the very next night. Stunned and saddened by the turn of events, Lady Anne soon realizes that what she thought was a prank was a dark precursor to foul play.

Looking forward to her girls-only college reunion vacation, Jaymie's on cloud nine at the idea of lazy trips to the beach, dinner cruises on the nearby river, and snug sleeping in the vintage trailer she's renovated. But no sooner does the group reconnect than her hopes turn to tension as petty squabbles and old acrimonies surface, along with tagalong friends, unexpected guests, and stalkerish ex-husbands. And when a local tool belt Romeo with an eye for one of the women is found murdered, his home ablaze, the simmering hostility in the group suddenly shifts to secrecy.

The Queensville Heritage Society is restoring the once-grand Dumpe Manor. While Dumpe relatives and society members use the occasion to dust off old grudges, Jaymie Leighton prefers to adorn the kitchen with authentic Depression-era furnishings. A collection of vintage wooden mallets found in the house is a perfect addition to her display, but one also offers a late-night intruder the perfect weapon to knock Jaymie unconscious before escaping.

Queensville has great expectations for their Dickens Days festival. A tourist-trade boom means a big turnout for the opening of Queensville Historic Manor and, for Jaymie Leighton, food columnist and vintage cookware collector, a chance to promote the manor and give away homemade goodies. At the end of a long day of festival fun, Jaymie discovers the battered body of local woman Shelby Fretter.

With plans for a new performing arts center at Wynter Castle taking up all her time, baker Merry Wynter has been all but unaware of the fringe group compound near her small town - until a street preacher accosts her with taunts of doom and damnation. Worried that some of her close friends may have been lured in by the group and its charismatic leader, Merry begins digging into the ministry - and soon suspects they may have ties to the recent death of a young woman and the disappearance of many others.

Vintage cookware collector Jaymie Müller is stunned when an irate woman accuses her pharmacist friend Val of tampering with her prescription. When more unfounded accusations follow, it seems clear the woman has a personal grudge against Val. But before they can figure out why, Jaymie and Val stumble upon the woman's dead body on the steps of Val's pharmacy. Given her altercations with the woman and the location of the body, the police naturally suspect Val.

When a reality TV show for aspiring opera singers descends on Wynter Castle, Merry's got her hands full catering to the endless demands of the distinguished judges and ambitious contestants. Then mysterious rumors about the cast and crew begin to surface, suggesting that some of their performances may be filled with false notes. When a dogged reporter with an eye for scandal who's been covering the competition is attacked and left for dead, Merry's determined to discover who orchestrated the heinous deed.

While Merry is distracted by her quickly planned marriage to Virgil Grace and a blissful honeymoon in New York, her friend Pish invites the ghost-hunting crew from the TV show Haunt Hunt to investigate Merry's home, Wynter Castle. Merry soon discovers that not only is the crew out of sync, there are so many feuds and squabbles, it's a miracle they get a show produced at all. It all goes from bad to worse when the show's psychics claim to have contact with people murdered on Merry's property.

Opera singer Roma Toscano may have a crippling case of stage fright, but she certainly is stirring up drama in Autumn Vale, New York, as she prepares for an upcoming performance at Merry's Wynter Castle. With her flamboyant style and flirtatious personality, Roma attracts fans as well as critics, including the town's postmistress - and Merry's bitter foe - Minnie Urqhart. But Roma and Minnie's heated rivalry goes cold after Merry discovers Minnie dead at the post office.