In the dark, wintry highlands of Lochdubh, Scotland, where the local Calvinist element resists the secular trimmings of Christmas, the spirit of old Saint Nick is about as welcome as a flat tire on a deserted road. Nor is crime taking a holiday, as Constable Hamish Macbeth soon finds himself protecting an unhappy girl, unlocking the secrets of a frightened old woman, and retrieving some stolen holiday goods. Now the lanky lawman must use all his Highland...

The hilly terrain next to the old Sprocket house that Meg Langslow and her fiance, Michael, are refurbishing is the perfect location for an extreme croquet field--even the legs of cows and sheep are convenient extra wickets. Croquet has become all the rage in Caerphilly...until it appears someone in town has taken the rage a bit too literally. While stumbling down a steep bank after her ball, Meg encounters the body of a fresh female corpse with a...

Serving up murderous munchies at a church potluck social wouldn't win any popularity contests, as Jackie Hoffner discovered. Someone had laced Jackie's casserole with poisonous mushrooms, and now her fellow churchgoer and town fussbudget is pushing up daisies. Suspected of foul play, Jackie decided to prove her innocence by conducting her own murder investigation. And Trooper Dennis Walsh's helpful efforts and boy-next -door charm were welcome. Meanwhile,...

U.S. ex-pat Lori Shepherd and Aunt Dimity investigate sabotage (and possible regicide) at a local Renaissance faire held in the idyllic Cotswolds village of Finch.

Temple Barr and Matt Devine make a cozy engaged couple, and the feisty redhead is all for her handsome radio host fiance staring in a week-long televised Las Vegas charity event, "Dancing with the Celebs." But while ex-priest Matt struggles to master the sexy moves of the tango, a killer stalks the dance floor. Not only is Matt in danger, but so is the lovely tween Mariah, daughter of homicide cop C. R. Molina, who is dancing in the Junior Division...

From feuding scientists to ailing locals, Sarah Booth Delaney finds no shortage of bad blood coursing through the little town of Zinnia, Mississippi, as she drops everything to stop an outbreak of boll weevils and save the only place she's ever been

Quirky detective Adrian Monk travels with his assistant Natalie to Trouble, California, to investigate the murder of the watchman at the Gold Rush Museum, but Monk's attention is diverted when he discovers a personal link to the unsolved train robbery that put the town on the map.

Hannah Swensen has her hands full trying to prepare for a three-day fundraising event that includes being a magician'sassistant for the talent show; but when the show's host and former love interest, Professor Bradford Ramsey, turns up dead, Hannah finds herself pouring through a list of possible suspects.

It is Winter Carnival in Quebec City, bitterly cold and surpassingly beautiful. Chief Inspector Armand Gamache has come not to join the revels but to recover from an investigation gone hauntingly wrong. But violent death is inescapable, even in the apparent sanctuary of the Literary and Historical Society- where an obsessive historian's quest for the remains of the founder of Quebec, Samuel de Champlain, ends in murder. Could a secret buried with...