Bakery owner Hannah Swensen just can't keep her hands out of the batter when murder stirs things up in Lake Eden, Minnesota, leaving the sheriff dead, an innocent deputy accused, and a killer still on the loose…
For bakery owner Hannah Swenson, life in Lake Eden, Minnesota, seems to be lacking a certain flavor. It's not that she doesn't enjoy teaching a weekly "Potluck Cooking" class at the community outreach center. Or that she's not excited about her sister Andrea's bun in the oven-watching the very pregnant Andrea try to sit on a stool at The Cookie Jar is worth it every time. Maybe it's this year's sheriff's election that's got her down. For years, Sheriff Grant's been the iron hand in town. But now, Hannah's brother-in-law Bill is giving the old blowhard the fight of his long, dubious career-and Grant's not taking it in stride, especially once the local polls (and the Cookie Jar gossip) show Bill pulling ahead.
But before anyone can get a taste of victory, things go sour. Just as Hannah's emptying the trash, she makes a very unappetizing discovery: Sheriff Grant's body in the Dumpster behind the high school where she's teaching her cooking class. And as if that weren't bad enough, the poor man still has fudge frosting on his shirt from the cupcake she gave him earlier. She'd been trying to find the secret ingredient left out of the recipe. Now she has a more important mystery to crack.
The number one suspect is none other than Bill. In fact, he's the only suspect, but Hannah's not swallowing it. Plenty of people had reason to hate Sheriff Grant, starting with all the deputies whose cases he stole during election years just so he could take the glory. Even his long-suffering wife Nettie isn't blame-free. Rumor has it the Grants were doing some serious feuding and had a skeleton rattling in their closet. Soon, Hannah's dishing up scandalous secrets, steaming hot betrayals, and enough nastiness to keep the gossip mill at The Cookie Jar going through several pots of decaf. And the closer Hannah gets to the truth, the closer she gets to smoking out a murderer with a very nasty recipe for silencing people. Will Hannah be able to stand the heat when someone wants her out of the kitchen…for good?
INCLUDES TEN ORIGINAL DESSERT RECIPES FOR YOU TO TRY! Views: 10
Fifteen-year-old Mike McGill has lived with his Uncle Billy since his mother's death. Only ten years older than Mike, Billy loves to party, and he doesn't pay much attention when Mike starts getting in trouble. But nothing gets by Mike's history teacher, an ex-cop named Riel—especially not long-hidden information about Mike's mother. Her death might not have been an accident after all! Views: 10
A murder in wartime Switzerland reveals Swiss complicity with the Nazis and profiteering during World War II Billy and Kaz are sent to neutral Switzerland to investigate the murder of a Swiss banking official with ties to the Office of Strategic Services (OSS). The US and Swiss governments are about to embark on diplomatic discussions regarding the Safehaven Protocols, which are aimed at limiting the amount of war materials exported by Switzerland to the Nazis, halting the laundering of looted gold, and preventing the postwar use of Nazi wealth for war criminals. With the talks about to begin, the OSS wants their involvement in the murder cleared up, as well as to protect the participants from any threat of violence.The plans go wrong from the beginning when Billy and Kaz crash-land in France. As they make their way through occupied territory to the border, they meet Anton Lasho, a member of the Sinti ethnic group, whose family was slaughtered by the Nazis,... Views: 10
SOMETIMES, THE COST OF IMMORTALITY IS TOO HIGH… The year is 1775, and the first rumblings of the American Revolution are only just being felt. But the War for Independence may be over before it even begins. When General George Washington learns of a daring expedition by British troops to discover a place of ultimate power—and the key to immortality itself—he knows that to salvage the war effort, his forces must get there first. And to find the legend, Washington must employ a legend. Rumors of an ageless pirate who has haunted the high seas for more than a century abound. General Washington commissions an expedition to find and hire the immortal pirate, Lanme Wa—the Sea King—who has been stretched to the point of breaking, and who wants nothing more than to be left alone. Their mission will not be easy. In a Caribbean world filled with voodoo, giant pythons, mischievous spirits and an army of mindless creatures who could live for millennia, the privateers of the Continental Navy might have bitten off more than they can chew. Jack Sigler, an immortal Special Ops soldier stuck in the past, forced to live through thousands of years of history to return to his family in the present, is back in this second Continuum thriller from Jeremy Robinson and J. Kent Holloway, who once again boldly re-imagine history. Views: 10
An ordinary man who finds himself caught up in a bank raid gone wrong. A murder caught on security camera where the victim doesn't exist. A man with just months to live, who is already living in hell but decides to take on the devil. A mob accountant babysitting a hired killer on a trip to the countryside, and a burglar on an easy job who finds it might not be so easy after all. A con-artist conned, and what a man will do when in the grip of an obsession more important to him than his own life. Eleven crime stories first published in Alfred Hitchcock's, Ellery Queen's, and elsewhere by award-winning writer Iain Rowan. Eleven stories of what people do when there is nowhere left to go. Iain's short fiction has been reprinted in Year's Best anthologies, won a Derringer Award, and been the basis for a novel shortlisted for the UK Crime Writers' Association's Debut Dagger award. Shortlisted for Spinetingler magazine's Best Short Story collection award.** Views: 10
Robert J. Sawyer, the award-winning and bestselling writer, hits the peak of his powers in Humans, the second book of The Neanderthal Parallax, his trilogy about our world and parallel one in which it was the Homo sapiens who died out and the Neanderthals who became the dominant intelligent species. This powerful idea allows Sawyer to examine some of the deeply rooted assumptions of contemporary human civilization dramatically, by confronting us with another civilization, just as morally valid, that has made other choices. In Humans, Neanderthal physicist Ponter Boddit, a character you will never forget, returns to our world and to his relationship with geneticist Mary Vaughan, as cultural exchanges between the two Earths begin. As we see daily life in another present-day world, radically different from ours, in the course of Sawyer's fast-moving story, we experience the bursts of wonder and enlightenment that are the finest pleasures of science fiction. Humans is one of the best SF novels of the year, and The Neanderthal Parallax is an SF classic in the making. Views: 10
