Barbara Peters, owner of The Poisoned Pen, recently hosted Amanda Jayatissa, author of You’re Invited. There are connections between Sri Lanka and Los Angeles in both of her books, including this latest one. You can order copies of both books, You’re Invited and My Sweet Girl, through the Web Store. https://bit.ly/3C3gvoO
Here’s the description of You’re Invited.
What could be worse than your ex-boyfriend marrying your childhood best friend? Getting accused of her murder… From the award-winning author of My Sweet Girl comes a dangerously addictive new thriller about a lavish Sri Lankan wedding celebration that not everyone will survive.
When Amaya is invited to Kaavi’s over-the-top wedding in Sri Lanka, she is surprised and a little hurt to hear from her former best friend after so many years of radio silence. But when Amaya learns that the groom is her very own ex-boyfriend, she is consumed by a single thought: She must stop the wedding from happening, no matter the cost. But as the week of wedding celebrations begin and rumors about Amaya’s past begin to swirl, she can’t help but feel like she also has a target on her back. When Kaavi goes missing and is presumed dead, all evidence points to Amaya. However, nothing is as it seems as Jayatissa expertly unravels that each wedding guest has their own dark secret and agenda, and Amaya may not be the only one with a plan to keep the bride from getting her happily ever after…
Amanda Jayatissa grew up in Sri Lanka, completed her undergrad at Mills College, CA, and lived in the UK before moving back to her sunny little island. She works as a corporate trainer, owns a chain of cookie stores, and is a proud dog-mum to her two spoiled huskies.
Enjoy the conversation about Sri Lanka and crime fiction.
Barbara Peters, owner of The Poisoned Pen, recently welcomed Martin Walker from France who appeared to talk about his latest Bruno, Chief of Police novel. To Kill a Troubadour is available through the Web Store. https://bit.ly/3JNxwF4
Here’s the description of To Kill a Troubadour.
When a musician’s new song hits a political nerve, he finds himself in the crosshairs of Spanish nationalists’ ire, and it’s up to Bruno to track down the extremists who seem ready to take deadly measures, in another delightful installment of the internationally acclaimed series featuring Bruno, Chief of Police.
The French and Spanish governments agree to mount a joint operation to stop the assailants, and Bruno is the local man on the spot who mobilizes his resources to track them down. While Bruno tries to keep the peace, his friend Florence reaches out for help. Her abusive ex-husband is about to be paroled from prison and she fears he will return to reclaim their children. Will Bruno and Florence be able to prevent this unwanted visit? Despite the pressures, there is always time for Bruno to savor les plaisirs of the Dordogne around the table with friends.
MARTIN WALKER, after a long career of working in international journalism and for think tanks, now gardens, cooks, explores vineyards, writes, travels, and has never been busier. He divides his time between Washington, D.C., and the Dordogne.
Walker’s discussion of world politics is very interesting. Check out the video.
Award-winning author Sulari Gentill was recently guest host for The Poisoned Pen, welcoming another Australian author, Hayley Scrivenor. Scrivenor is the debut author of Dirt Creek. You can order copies of the book through the Web Store. https://bit.ly/3JKWG7m
Here’s the description of Dirt Creek.
Who’s lying about what happened at Dirt Creek?
“Blends a taut psychological thriller with a suspenseful police procedural…Fans of Liane Moriarty and Jane Harper won’t want to miss this page-turner.” —Publishers Weekly, starred review
“A novel of sharp-edged tempers, accidents waiting to happen and dark inheritances.” —New York Times Book Review
When twelve-year-old Esther disappears on the way home from school in a small town in rural Australia, the community is thrown into a maelstrom of suspicion and grief. As Detective Sergeant Sarah Michaels arrives in town during the hottest spring in decades and begins her investigation, Esther’s tenacious best friend, Ronnie, is determined to find Esther and bring her home.
When schoolfriend Lewis tells Ronnie that he saw Esther with a strange man at the creek the afternoon she went missing, Ronnie feels she is one step closer to finding her. But why is Lewis refusing to speak to the police? And who else is lying about how much they know about what has happened to Esther?
Punctuated by a Greek chorus, which gives voice to the remaining children of the small, dying town, this novel explores the ties that bind, what we try and leave behind us, and what we can never outrun, while never losing sight of the question of what happened to Esther, and what her loss does to a whole town.
In Hayley Scrivenor’s Dirt Creek, a small-town debut mystery described as The Dry meets Everything I Never Told You, a girl goes missing and a community falls apart and comes together.
Hayley Scrivenor is a former Director of Wollongong Writers Festival. Dirt Creek is her first novel. Originally from a small country town, Hayley now lives and writes on Dharawal country and has a Ph.D. in creative writing from the University of Wollongong on the south coast of Australia. An earlier version of Dirt Creek was shortlisted for the Penguin Literary Prize and won The Kill Your Darlings Unpublished Manuscript Award.
Sulari Gentill said that people all across Australia are talking about Dirt Creek. Now, you can talk about Hayley Scrivenor and her book as well.
Ramona Emerson is the debut author of Shutter. I know how much Barbara Peters, owner of The Poisoned Pen, likes to introduce debut authors to readers. She welcomed Emerson as well as David Heska Wanbli Weiden who acted as guest host for the virtual event. There are signed copies of Shutter still in stock in the Web Store. https://bit.ly/3BNNWvo
Here’s the summary of Shutter, the August First Mystery Book of the Month at the Pen.
This blood-chilling debut set in New Mexico’s Navajo Nation is equal parts gripping crime thriller, supernatural horror, and poignant portrayal of coming of age on the reservation.
Rita Todacheene is a forensic photographer working for the Albuquerque police force. Her excellent photography skills have cracked many cases—she is almost supernaturally good at capturing details. In fact, Rita has been hiding a secret: she sees the ghosts of crime victims who point her toward the clues that other investigators overlook.
As a lone portal back to the living for traumatized spirits, Rita is terrorized by nagging ghosts who won’t let her sleep and who sabotage her personal life. Her taboo and psychologically harrowing ability was what drove her away from the Navajo reservation, where she was raised by her grandmother. It has isolated her from friends and gotten her in trouble with the law.
And now it might be what gets her killed.
When Rita is sent to photograph the scene of a supposed suicide on a highway overpass, the furious, discombobulated ghost of the victim—who insists she was murdered—latches onto Rita, forcing her on a quest for revenge against her killers, and Rita finds herself in the crosshairs of one of Albuquerque’s most dangerous cartels. Written in sparkling, gruesome prose, Shutter is an explosive debut from one of crime fiction’s most powerful new voices.
Barbara Peters, owner of The Poisoned Pen, recently hosted Robert Pobi for a virtual event. Pobi is the author of the Lucas Page novels, and Do No Harm is the third in the series. There are copies of it available in the Web Store. https://tinyurl.com/2p96v79d
In Robert Pobi’s thriller Do No Harm, a series of suicides and accidental deaths in the medical community are actually well-disguised murders and only Lucas Page can see the pattern and discern the truth that no one else believes.
Lucas Page is a polymath, astrophysicist, professor, husband, father of five adopted children, bestselling author, and ex-FBI agent—emphasis on “ex.” Severely wounded after being caught in an explosion, Page left the FBI behind and put his focus on the rebuilding the rest of his life. But Page is uniquely gifted in being able to recognize patterns that elude others, a skill that brings the F.B.I. knocking at his door again and again.
Lucas Page’s wife Erin loses a friend, a gifted plastic surgeon, to suicide and Lucas begins to realize how many people Erin knew that have died in the past year, in freak accidents and now suicide. Intrigued despite himself, Page begins digging through obituaries and realizes that there’s a pattern—a bad one. These deaths don’t make sense unless the doctors are being murdered, the target of a particularly clever killer. This time, the FBI wants as little to do with Lucas as he does with them so he’s left with only one option—ignore it and go back to his normal life. But then, the pattern reveals that the next victim is likely to be…Erin herself.
Robert Pobi is the author of several novels, including the international bestsellers Bloodman and Harvest, as well as the Lucas Page thrillers, which begin with City of Windows. He lives in Canada.
Barbara Peters, owner of The Poisoned Pen, recently hosted a favorite at the bookstore, Rhys Bowen. There are signed copies of both the hardcover and paperback of Bowen’s Where the Sky Begins available in the Web Store. https://tinyurl.com/2p9crc5n
Here’s the description of Where the Sky Begins.
A woman’s future is determined by fate and choice in a gripping WWII novel about danger, triumph, and second chances by the New York Times bestselling author of The Venice Sketchbook and The Tuscan Child.
London, 1940. Bombs fall and Josie Banks’s world crumbles around her. Her overbearing husband, Stan, is unreachable, called to service. Her home, a ruin of rubble and ash. Josie’s beloved tearoom boss has been killed, and Josie herself is injured, with nothing left and nowhere to go.
Evacuated to the English countryside, Josie ends up at the estate of the aristocratic Miss Harcourt, a reluctant host to the survivors of the Blitz. Awed as she is by the magnificent landscape, Josie sees opportunity. Josie convinces Miss Harcourt to let her open a humble tea shop, seeing it as a chance for everyone to begin again. When Josie meets Mike Johnson, a handsome Canadian pilot stationed at a neighboring bomber base, a growing intimacy brings her an inner peace she’s never felt before. Then Stan returns from the war.
Now a threat looms larger than anyone imagined. And a dangerous secret is about to upend Josie’s life again. Her newfound courage will be put to the test if she is to emerge, like a survivor, triumphant.
Rhys Bowen is the New York Times bestselling author of more than forty novels, including The Venice Sketchbook, Above the Bay of Angels, The Victory Garden, The Tuscan Child, and her World War II novel In Farleigh Field, the winner of the Left Coast Crime “Lefty” Award for Best Historical Mystery Novel and the Agatha Award for Best Historical Novel. Bowen’s work has won twenty honors to date, including multiple Agatha, Anthony, and Macavity Awards. Her books have been translated into many languages, and she has fans around the world, including an online following of over two hundred thousand fans worldwide. A transplanted Brit, Bowen divides her time between California and Arizona. To learn more about the author, visit www.rhysbowen.com.
Enjoy the conversation as Rhys Bowen and Barbara Peters discuss trends in mysteries, World War II, and Bowen’s books.
Jayne Ann Krentz was recently guest host for The Poisoned Pen’s virtual event with Karen Rose. Rose is the author of Quarter to Midnight. Signed copies of the book are available through the Web Store. https://bit.ly/3BJSqTH
Here’s the description of Quarter to Midnight.
Discover New York Times and USA Today bestselling author Karen Rose’s brand-new series set in the sultry city of New Orleans and featuring a tough team of high-end private investigators who are after justice—no matter what they have to do to get it.
Good cops. Bad cops. Only one will win.
After completing her tours with the Marines in Iraq, Molly Sutton knew she could take down any bad guy she met. But when a family tragedy exposes the dark side of her local police, she joined up with her former CO Burke Broussard, who left New Orleans PD to set up a private investigative service for people who couldn’t find justice elsewhere.
Gabe Hebert saw the toll that working for the NOPD took on his dad and decided instead to make a name for himself as one of the best young chefs in the French Quarter. But when his father’s death is ruled a suicide after a deliberately botched investigation by his former captain, Gabe knows his dad stumbled onto a truth that someone wants silenced.
Gabe goes to his father’s best friend, Burke, for help. Burke assigns the toughest member of his team, Molly, to the case. Molly can’t believe she’s being asked to work with the smoking hot chef whose chocolate cake is not the only thing that makes her mouth water. Sparks fly as they follow the leads Gabe’s dad left them, unraveling a web of crimes, corruption, and murder that runs all the way to the top.
Karen Rose is the award-winning, #1 international bestselling author of twenty-six novels, including the bestselling Sacramento, Baltimore, and Cincinnati series. She has been translated into twenty-three languages, and her books have placed on the New York Times, the Sunday Times (UK), and Germany’s der Spiegel bestseller lists.
Enjoy Karen Rose’s conversation with Jayne Ann Krentz.
The Private Eye Writers of America announced the 2022 Shamus Award Winners earlier this week. The awards are presented for private eye novels and short stories originally published in 2021. Congratulations to the winners! Check for their books in the Web Store. https://store.poisonedpen.com/
Here are the winners.
BEST PI HARDCOVER – Family Business by S.J. Rozan
BEST ORIGINAL PI PAPERBACK – Every City is Every Other City by John McFetridge
BEST FIRST PI NOVEL – Lost Little Girl by Gregory Stout
BEST PI SHORT STORY – “Sweeps Week” by Rick Helms (July/August EQMM)
And, you might want to watch S.J. Rozan’s appearance for The Poisoned Pen last December when she talked with Barbara Peters about her award-winning novel, Family Business.
John Charles from The Poisoned Pen recently welcomed four cozy mystery authors published by Kensington for a virtual event. Gabby Allan, Darci Hannah, Cheryl Hollon, and Angela M. Sanders all appeared to talk about their careers and their books. You can order copies of their books through the Web Store. https://store.poisonedpen.com/
Check out the latest books by the mystery authors.
In Gabby Allan’s second Santa Catalina Island-set mystery series with a rom-com twist, boat tour guide Whitney Dagner, her chonky cat Whiskers, and Whitney’s not-so-ex police diver boyfriend must lead a dangerous investigation into years of scandal and bad blood…
Take in the wild beauty of Santa Catalina Island with tour guide and eclectic gift shop owner Whitney Dagner. On the itinerary: dramatic Pacific coastlines, diverse marine life, and murder!
Since returning home from mainland California and finding her groove with the family tourism business, Whitney Dagner’s daily routine has become a wonderfully chaotic adventure. She and her nimble kitty, Whiskers, often find themselves at the center of the action on Catalina, from staged treasure hunts to gossipy birdwatchers. But before Whit can get too comfortable in the place where she grew up, a gift shop order leads to a stunning discovery—someone’s dead body . . .
One of Whit’s best boat tour client’s, Leo Franklin was young and newly engaged when he unceremoniously took his own life. Only it doesn’t seem like that’s what really happened—not after the suspicious activity displayed by his family’s old rivals at the scene of his death. As a bitter, generations-long feud between Leo’s kin and the local Ahern clan comes to a head, Whit and her police diver not-so-ex-boyfriend must lead a dangerous investigation into years of scandal and bad blood to figure out who’s innocent . . .and who’s covering a killer’s tracks.
Gabby Allan is a California girl who now lives with her husband, daughter, and two insane dogs in Central Pennsylvania. A member of Sisters in Crime, she’s previously published romances and cozy mysteries under another pen name. Visit her at GabbyAllan.wordpress.com.
After a career on Wall Street, Lindsey is making a different kind of dough in a pretty lakeside village, and the upcoming blueberry festival—including the pie-eating contest her bakery is hosting—is the highlight of the summer. But soon Beacon Harbor runs into a patch of trouble.
A local real estate agent gets pranked. A parade float gets pelted with water balloons. It’s all laughed off until the stunts start escalating—and looking more like sabotage. As the event turns into a debacle complete with rampaging goats, Lindsey’s sweetheart, a former SEAL, starts investigating. But the juicy mystery takes a bitter turn when a man—dressed up as a Viking—is found dead in a boat, and it’s no longer mischief but murder…
Darci Hannah grew up in the northwest suburbs of a Chicago, is a graduate of Indiana University, and currently lives in a small town in Michigan with her husband, three sons and two dogs. She has lived around the Great Lakes all her life and considers them a source of inspiration. When she’s not engaged in a rollicking family adventure, walking her dogs, or working at the historic Howell Carnegie District Library, she’s either baking up a storm or hard at work on her next Beacon Bakeshop Mystery. Visit her at DarciHannah.com.
In rural Kentucky, business is booming for Miranda Trent’s unique Appalachian adventure tour company, Paint & Shine. But sometimes murder lurks amid the peaceful mountains, scenic views, and moonshine …
Miranda’s business—combining Appalachian adventure tours with art and a bit of moonshine—is the perfect place for an outdoor sporting goods company to hold an employee retreat. It’ll be a challenge, but the money they’re paying will definitely help with building her new distillery.
Miranda has lots of teamwork-fostering activities planned, from sketching classes to Southern cooking, but the executive running things prefers a more competitive spirit. In fact, after the workers are split into teams, they’re told that only the winners will keep their jobs, and tensions begin to spike. Even after a participant is found dead, the contest continues—while Miranda starts drawing her own conclusions about the ambitious attendees. Now she just has to find the proof . . .
Cheryl Hollon writes full-time after she left an engineering career of designing and building military flight simulators in countries such as England, Wales, Australia, Singapore, Taiwan and India. Fulfilling the dream of a lifetime, she combines her love of writing with a passion for creating glass art. In the small glass studio behind her house, Cheryl and her husband design, create, and produce fused glass, stained glass and painted glass artworks. She is a member of Sisters in Crime, the Florida Chapter of Mystery Writers of America and the Tampa Chapter of the Romance Writers of America. A mystery conference addict, she regularly attends SleuthFest in Florida, Malice Domestic in Washington, D.C., and New England Crime Bake in Dedham, Massachusetts. Cheryl and her husband live in St. Petersburg, Florida. Visit her online at CherylHollon.com or on Twitter @CherylHollon.
Set in small-town Oregon, the latest in the witty, charming Witch Way Librarian series from bestselling and acclaimed author Angela M. Sanders features a spellbinding heroine, a clever cat familiar, a glamorous movie star—and of course, murder. The perfect read for fans of Bailey Cates, Adele Abbott, Juliet Blackwell, and all mystery lovers with a taste for the witchy.
For a tiny town, picturesque Wilfred, Oregon, has everything, including an impressive library housed in a Victorian mansion, a touch of magic in new librarian and fledgling witch, Josie Way, a visiting movie star—and a curious tendency toward murder…
Josie and all of Wilfred are buzzing with excitement. A-list movie star Daphne Morris has chosen to interview Roz, assistant librarian and novelist, for her book club. But when the glamorous actress quickly charms both Roz’s long-time love and Sheriff Sam, the object of Josie’s unrequited affection, Josie turns to the whispers from her beloved books for ideas on revising the plot. Yet soon there’s another twist . . .
At a party to celebrate the interview, Daphne’s personal chef is found dead in a scene that all too closely echoes one in Roz’s novel. It’s clear to Josie that someone’s idea of a happy ending means framing her friend. She’ll have to read between the lines with the help of the library’s enchanted stacks, guidance from her magical grandmother’s letters, and her cat familiar, Rodney, to solve this murder before someone decides to stage a deadly sequel . . .
Angela M. Sanders is the author of the bestselling Joanna Hayworth Vintage Clothing Mysteries, the Witch Way Librarian Mystery series, The Booster Club Capers, and the Kite Shop Mysteries, written under the name Clover Tate. In addition to cozy mysteries, she regularly writes articles on food, vintage clothing, personalities and perfume for Portland Monthly, Now Smell This, the French perfume magazine Nez, and various food magazines. A former congressional investigator, she now writes full-time and is a member of Novelists, Inc., International Thriller Writers and Sisters in Crime. Angela has two cats—one of whom is black of course—a witch’s freckle in her left eye, and learned to read tarot cards from a pagan priestess. She lives in Portland, Oregon and can be found online at AngelaMSanders.com.
Enjoy John Charles’ conversation with the Kensington authors as they talk about cozy mysteries.
Rhys Bowen’s Where the Sky Begins is the current Hot Book of the Week at The Poisoned Pen. In fact, Bowen will be appearing for a virtual event on Friday, August 5 at 2 PM (5 PM ET). You can watch it on YouTube or Facebook. In the meantime, you can order a signed copy of the book through the Web Store. https://bit.ly/3zqIoUQ
Here’s the description of Where the Sky Begins.
A woman’s future is determined by fate and choice in a gripping WWII novel about danger, triumph, and second chances by the New York Times bestselling author of The Venice Sketchbook and The Tuscan Child.
London, 1940. Bombs fall and Josie Banks’s world crumbles around her. Her overbearing husband, Stan, is unreachable, called to service. Her home, a ruin of rubble and ash. Josie’s beloved tearoom boss has been killed, and Josie herself is injured, with nothing left and nowhere to go.
Evacuated to the English countryside, Josie ends up at the estate of the aristocratic Miss Harcourt, a reluctant host to the survivors of the Blitz. Awed as she is by the magnificent landscape, Josie sees opportunity. Josie convinces Miss Harcourt to let her open a humble tea shop, seeing it as a chance for everyone to begin again. When Josie meets Mike Johnson, a handsome Canadian pilot stationed at a neighboring bomber base, a growing intimacy brings her an inner peace she’s never felt before. Then Stan returns from the war.
Now a threat looms larger than anyone imagined. And a dangerous secret is about to upend Josie’s life again. Her newfound courage will be put to the test if she is to emerge, like a survivor, triumphant.
Rhys Bowen is the New York Times bestselling author of more than forty novels, including The Venice Sketchbook, Above the Bay of Angels, The Victory Garden, The Tuscan Child, and her World War II novel In Farleigh Field, the winner of the Left Coast Crime “Lefty” Award for Best Historical Mystery Novel and the Agatha Award for Best Historical Novel. Bowen’s work has won twenty honors to date, including multiple Agatha, Anthony, and Macavity Awards. Her books have been translated into many languages, and she has fans around the world, including an online following of over two hundred thousand fans worldwide. A transplanted Brit, Bowen divides her time between California and Arizona. To learn more about the author, visit www.rhysbowen.com.
Don’t forget to check the website for a copy of the book. And, I hope to be able to share the virtual event sometime next week so you can watch it if you can’t catch it on Friday.
