Lisa Ks Book Reviews

I'm so happy to join Berkley Mystery in

celebrating the October 1 release of

THE BODIES IN THE LIBRARY

Book 1 in the First Edition Mysteries

by Marty Wingate

Hayley Burke's fresh start as the curator of The First Edition Society's library in Bath, England, is about to take a rotten turn in this charming new mystery series from USA Today bestselling author Marty Wingate.

Hayley Burke has landed a dream job. She is the new curator of Lady Georgiana Fowling's First Edition library. The library is kept at Middlebank House, a lovely Georgian home in Bath, England. Hayley lives on the premises and works with the finicky Glynis Woolgar, Lady Fowling's former secretary.

Mrs. Woolgar does not like Hayley's ideas to modernize The First Edition Society and bring in fresh blood. And she is not even aware of the fact that Hayley does not know the first thing about the Golden Age of Mysteries. Hayley is faking it till she makes it, and one of her plans to breathe new life into the Society is actually taking flight--an Agatha Christie fan fiction writers group is paying dues to meet up at Middlebank House.

But when one of the group is found dead in the venerable stacks of the library, Hayley has to catch the killer to save the Society and her new job.

About Marty Wingate

USA Today best-selling author Marty Wingate shares her love of Britain in three mystery series. Her newest - The First Edition Library mysteries (Berkley) - is set in the lovely Georgian spa town of Bath. Here we find Hayley Burke, curator of an impressive collection of books from the Golden Age of Mystery - Agatha Christie, Dorothy L. Sayers, Ngaio Marsh, Margery Allingham, and all the rest. Too bad Hayley has never read a detective story in her life. In book one - The Bodies in the Library (October 2019) - she attempts to bluff her way along when a member of a local fan-fiction writers group turns up dead. In her library.

Marty is also author of the Potting Shed books (Alibi) featuring Pru Parke, a middle-aged American gardener transplanted from Texas to England. In the latest, Midsummer Mayhem, Pru finds herself up to her ears in murder and Shakespeare, as she builds the set for an outdoor production of A Midsummer Night's Dream.

The Birds of a Feather mysteries (Alibi) follow Julia Lanchester, bird lover, who runs a tourist office in a Suffolk village - in book four, Farewell, My Cuckoo, Julia attempts to identify a murder victim found at the edge of the village while doing battle with her boyfriend's sister, who has made herself entirely too at home in Julia's cottage.

Marty lives with her husband and two cats near Seattle, and her local library stands in for a more colorful writing venue - say, Vita Sackville-West's tower at Sissinghurst. She is a member of Sisters in Crime, Mystery Writers of America, and the Crime Writers Association (Britain) as well as the Royal Society for the Protection of Birds and the Royal Horticultural Society. She has her own modest vintage collection of books from the Golden Age writers.

Marty takes research seriously - she is a former how-to garden writer of three books and a countless number (at least, she stopped counting ages ago) of magazine and newspaper articles on everything from apple maggot to the prettiest daffodils and the best-smelling roses. Research took on an entirely new light when she began writing mysteries, and now she and her husband travel regularly to England and Scotland, where she plunges deeply into study concerning the next adventure for Hayley, Julia, or Pru - sparing not a few minutes a day to head to the pub.

Connect with Marty on Facebook (Marty Wingate Author) or on her website: martywingate.com.