Akron Public Library

The world of Olive Kitteridge, a retired school teacher in a small coastal town in Maine, is revealed in stories that explore her diverse roles in many lives, including a lounge singer haunted by a past love, her stoic husband, and her own resentful son.

When an old colleague complains of disappearing neighbors, a retired professor of botany starts digging for clues in this delightful cozy mystery. Andrew Basnett may be retired from academia, but that doesn't seem to have stopped his former colleagues from dumping problems in his lap. This time around it's peppery Constance Camm, whose neighbors keep disappearing. Miss Camm and her sister, Mollie, would probably shrug it off if not for a frightening...

A weekend holiday at a wealthy relative's country manor is a recipe that calls for mayhem in this charming cozy English mystery. Andrew Basnett's cousin Felicity is old, rich, and the owner of a swanky Berkshire estate. If Basnett were a savvy mystery reader rather than a retired professor of botany, he would know that an invitation to spend Easter weekend at such an estate is all but guaranteed to involve at least one murder. But since Felicity...

Ah, it's an academic conference, with all the egos, the scandals, the terrifyingly petty squabbles on display. Well….perhaps not so petty. Professor Andrew Basnett has returned to his old university for a meeting of the Botanical Association, an event that should be entirely benign, except that he can't help being just a little curious about Carl Judd, an artist who was murdered here just two years ago. And, of course, about Stephen Sharland, who's...

Plans for peaceful seaside holidays rarely work out well in the world of classic British mysteries. Retired professor Andrew Basnett, for example, envisioning sandcastles and the blessings of a pale English sun on his pale English skin, is startled to meet his nephew, Peter, on the beach. He's more startled (and not entirely thrilled) when Peter gets him invited to dinner with a celebrity novelist. And he's extremely startled when the novelist's sister-in-law...

"When the fun-loving and spontaneous artist Willow West meets buttoned-up, retired English teacher George Emerson, it's not exactly love at first sight. Though she does find the obsessive-compulsive man intriguing. Making it her mission to get him to loosen up and embrace life, she embarks on what seems like a lost cause--and finds herself falling for him in the process. A confirmed bachelor, George vacillates between irritation and attraction whenever...

When her friend Georgia Hallerbee asks Phyllis to have her house featured in the annual Christmas Jingle Bell Tour of Homes, Phyllis is equally flattered and flustered. She already has a bridal shower on Christmas Eve and a wedding on New Year's Eve to prepare for, and she's been baking gingerbread cookies as if they're going out of style. But like her tasty treats, she rises to the occasion. Before the tour can even get under way, Phyllis hears a...

Montanans are legendary for their courage and wilingness to take on challnges as big as the Montana sky. But ht eherines in these four inspirational novels are ordinary people facing mountains of trouble. As the comforts of daily routine are threatened , they'll need to dig deep for a sustaining faith.

At this year's school carnival fund-raiser, the obnoxious president of the Parent Teacher Organization is found stabbed through the heart with Phyllis Newsom's own knife, with traces of incriminating frosting. Clearing her name will be no piece of cake...