Recommendations based on "Mrs. Pollifax on the China Station"

When a Gypsy woman is wrongly accused of kidnapping a local child, precocious young Flavia de Luce draws on her encyclopedic knowledge of poisons and Gypsy lore to discern what really happened while investigating the mystery of her own mother's fate. By the author of The Sweetness at the Bottom of the Pie.

Ellie Simons, an obese decorator, and her pornographer suitor, Bentley T. Haskell, will inherit her eccentric Uncle Merlin's estate if she can lose sixty-three pounds, he can write a book without smut, and they can find a hidden treasure

'Animal lovers will delight' Ann Granger on The Cat and the Corpse in the Old Barn 'A real treat . . . I loved it. Cats, dogs, murder and a credible and relatable heroine' Barbara Nadel on The Cat and the Corpse in the Old Barn Driving home from a ceramics evening class, Clarice Beech reflects on the absence of one of her students, Colin Compton-Smythe. Later, Emily, Colin's daughter, telephones to say her father has died during routine surgery. Distraught, Emily opens up to Clarice about his wretched childhood and the day five-year-old Colin returned home to discover Avril, his mother, gone. Colin never believed she would have left without him and had been trying to find out more about Avril's disappearance all those years ago. Clarice readily agrees to accompany Emily to Colin's funeral. On arriving at the stunning Victorian Gothic manor house, with Bellatrix, the majestic stone Siamese cat reposing at its entrance, Clarice soon becomes drawn into the fractious world of the Compton-Smythe family: Colin's argumentative father Ralph and his equally combative partner Tessa, their daughter, Dawn, being stalked by an ex-lover and, most unsettling of all, Ernestine, Ralph's emotionally unpredictable sister. And then there's Johnson, Ralph's menacing manservant. Clarice discovers the nearer she gets to the truth, the greater she is in danger as somebody is intent that the mystery of the missing wife should never be resolved.

NATIONAL BESTSELLER • In this latest installment in the beloved No. 1 Ladies’ Detective Agency series, Mma Ramotswe is tempted to put the brakes on a business venture before it even gets rolling. Mr. J.L.B. Matekoni attends a course hosted by the local chamber of commerce entitled “Where Is Your Business Going?” But rather than feeling energized, he comes back in low spirits, not sure if he should be satisfied with the already venerable and successful Tlokweng Road Speedy Motors. Then an old friend from school approaches him with an exciting new business venture. When it turns out he will need to mortgage the garage in order to pursue this endeavor, Mma Ramotswe and Mma Makutsi worry about the potential repercussions for his current business—as well as for their own.   But even as she puzzles over mysteries on the domestic front, Mma Ramotswe’s professional duties must take precedence. When a concerned son learns that his aging father’s nurse now stands to inherit the family home, he begins to doubt her intentions and takes his case to Botswana’s premier detective agency. Fortunately, Mma Ramotswe and Mma Makutsi, committed agents of justice, agree to investigate.   Tricky as these matters may be, Mma Ramotswe, armed with her usual supply of tact, humor and good will, knows that the most creative solutions are often found with the support of friends and family and a cup of red bush tea. With these reliable assets, she is certain to ensure that all involved find the happiness that they deserve.

A classic Ngaio Marsh novel which features blood-curdling murders in the confines of a riverboat, the Zodiac, cruising through Constable country. 'He looks upon the murders that he did in fact perform as tiresome and regrettable necessities,' reflected Chief Superintendent Roderick Alleyn on the international crook known as 'the Jampot'. But it was Alleyn's wife Troy who knew 'the Jampot' best: she had shared close quarters with him on the tiny pleasure steamer Zodiac on a cruise along the peaceful rivers of 'Constable country'. And it was she who knew something was badly wrong even before Alleyn was called in to solve the two murders on board...

Between the herb shop, the catering business, and a weekend paper- making class, China Bayles has her work cut out for her. And now China's half- brother is opening up old wounds, trying to investigate their father's supposedly accidental death, and her husband is taking on the case-meaning she's just bound to get involved. To put the unsavory business out of her mind, she's gathering supplies for making paper. But in a patch of yucca plants, she finds a body-cause of death unknown. Many residents of Pecan Springs live seemingly simple lives that hide complex and dangerous pasts, and it appears the victim was one of them. Now, while unraveling secrets that hit close to home, China must set the record straight-and find a killer.

Jacqueline Winspear's marvelous and inspired debut, Maisie Dobbs, won her fans from coast to coast and raised her intuitive, intelligent, and resourceful heroine to the ranks of literature's favorite sleuths. Birds of a Feather finds Maisie Dobbs on another dangerously intriguing adventure in London "between the wars." It is the spring of 1930, and Maisie has been hired to find a runaway heiress. But what seems a simple case at the outset soon becomes increasingly complicated when three of the heiress's old friends are found dead. Is there a connection between the woman's mysterious disappearance and the murders? Who would want to kill three seemingly respectable young women? As Maisie investigates, she discovers that the answers lie in the unforgettable agony of the Great War.

Cozy lovers' favorite otherworldly detective cracks a classic country-house case. In Atherton's sixteenth mystery, Lori Shepherd returns from Down Under to her normal life in the village of Finch. But Lori's normal quickly becomes anything but. Her debonair father-in-law has moved to town and is renovating Fairworth House, a grand estate nearby. William Sr. expects a quiet, small-town life, but among the spinsters vying for his attention, shifty servants, and the discovery of a mysterious painting of a family tree in Fairworth's attic, he discovers that life in Finch is anything but quiet. On top of it all, Lori and William are embroiled in a case of deception and false identity by one of Finch's own. It's nothing the plucky Lori can't handle, but once things get truly peculiar at Fairworth-moving furniture, strange sounds, and mysterious visitors-she calls on Aunt Dimity for her otherworldly guidance and uncovers the shadowy past beneath the estate's magnificent surface. Nancy Atherton's titles continue to delight fans who eagerly anticipate each new book. Her latest will draw cheers and bring new readers to this charming series.

In the third novel of her captivating foxhunting series, Rita Mae Brown welcomes readers back for a final tour of a world where most business is conducted on horseback—and stables are de rigueur for even the smallest of estates. “A solidly crafted mystery with interesting characters and a nice sense of place. The rolling hills of the Virginia hunt country are beautiful, and all the gentility makes it a perfect place to plop a dead body.”—Toronto Globe and Mail Riding horseback, “Sister” Jane Arnold, the regal seventy-two-year-old master of foxhounds of the Jefferson Hunt Club, calmly surveys the peaceful rolling hills of Virginia, unaware that trouble is brewing. At the local train station a derelict is found dead, and a second hapless loner—a long-ago schoolmate of Sister’s—soon follows him to the morgue. Coincidence? Sister scents murder. But who among her oldest friends and the charming newcomers would kill two harmless old outcasts? Beyond the brilliance of the winter hunt season, other dramas—of love, greed, ambition, and violence—start to unfold. With a sad heart, Sister chases a killer who has gone to ground.

Kick Keswick, once a jewel thief living an exciting double life, has now retired in simple luxury to the south of France. But when an old enemy resurfaces, threatening to expose the countless fake jewels Kick had carefully substituted during her years of secret theft, she is ready to act. Back in London, Kick finds herself with more employment than she bargained for at a company whose status is much more precarious than she'd thought. Her enemy, in disguise, circles ever closer. And a young nun comes to Kick with a mysterious jewel-encrusted figurine, and a story of greed and murder. To balance on this high wire, Kick must sneak into an upper-crust wedding in the Italian Alps, break into an ancient castle owned by a very modern murderer, and do it all with her customary panache, style, and grace. Can she keep one step ahead of the most seductively ruthless foe she's ever encountered?