Friday, September 4, 2015


It's
Cozy Food Friday!

That means it's time to share a recipe from 
another great cozy mystery!

Today I'm featuring a recipe from the cozy mystery 
BASKET CASE
Book 1 in the Silver Six Crafting Mystery series
by
Nancy Haddock


First in a crafty new cozy mystery series from national bestselling author Nancy Haddock

There isn’t much crime in Lilyvale, Arkansas, but local authorities have their hands full with Ms. Sherry Mae Stanton Cutler and her housemates—a crafty group of retirees who’ve dubbed themselves the Silver Six. But when Sherry Mae’s niece, Nixy, arrives to keep them in line, Lilyvale also plays host to a killer.

When Leslee Stanton “Nixy” Nix gets the latest call from Lilyvale detective Eric Shoar, she knows it means trouble. There’s been another kitchen explosion at her Aunt Sherry’s farmhouse, and the dreamy-voiced detective has had enough. If Nixy doesn’t check on her aunt in person, the Silver Six could become wards of the court. But the trouble Nixy finds in Lilyvale is not at all what she expects.

The seniors are hosting a folk art festival at the farmhouse, featuring Sherry’s hand-woven baskets, when land developer Jill Elsman arrives to bully Nixy’s aunt into selling the property. When Jill is later found dead in the cemetery, Sherry is suspected of weaving a murder plot, and it’s up to Nixy and the Silver Six to untangle the truth.

Recipes and crafting tip included!

MY REVIEW


BASKET CASE is one of the cutest, most refreshing new cozy mysteries of the year! Author Nancy Haddock has created an extraordinarily, fun cast of characters. The “Silver Six” are such a handful, but there isn’t one of them I wouldn’t want for an aunt.


This first book in the Silver Six Crafting Mystery series is packed with fun, mystery, and just plain good story telling. I was captivated from beginning to end, sad when the book was done.

Ms. Haddock lets readers get a very good way into the story before she brings in the discovery of the murder victim. I’m so glad she waited. It really helped me to get to know and enjoy the core characters before they launched into investigation mode.

Excellent writing and a wonderfully plotted mystery make BASKET CASE one of the “must read” new mysteries of 2015. Don’t miss out on this one!  Nancy Haddock is sure to be an ongoing name in cozy mysteries.

Crafting tips, recipes, and an excerpt of book 2, GOODBYE GOURDEOUS, can all be found at the back of the book!

BASKET CASE 
is available now!


It's September and that means cooler weather is heading our way. YAY! 

I thought this recipe was perfect for a cool Fall evening. And it will certainly be perfect come winter! 

SHERRY'S CHICKEN AND ARTICHOKE CASSEROLE


Serves 10 - 12

Ingredients

6 or 7 half chicken brests, cooked deboned (and cut when cool)
3 14-ounce cans water-packed artichokes
4 teaspoons olive oil 
3 cloves garlic, pressed


Mix Together 

2 cans cream of chicken soup 
1 cup mayonnaise 
1 teaspoon lemon juice 
¼ teaspoon curry 

Set aside 1½ cups grated cheddar cheese 

Mix Together

2 cups Pepperidge Farm crumb dressing 
4 tablespoons butter, melted


Drain artichokes, and slice into smaller pieces before or after you mix with oil and garlic. 

In a casserole dish, layer artichokes and cut up chicken. 

Spread mayonnaise mixture over the top layer, then sprinkle cheese over mayonnaise mixture. 

Before baking, sprinkle dressing mixture on top.

Bake at 325 degrees for 30 minutes. 

Photos are from Google Images. Your dish may vary in appearance. 

Note from Sherry Mae:
The casserole should be warmed through when the cheese is melted and the crumb topping is browned. I use a 9 x 12, 3-quart casserole or baking dish when I cook for all of us, but you can divide the recipe to bake in smaller dishes for fewer people. 

This casserole freezes and reheats very well, though the crumb topping won't be crisp. A few minutes under a low broiler might brown and crisp the topping some, but be careful not to overcook. 

Okay all you summer lovers, does this dish make you ready for cooler weather or what? 

As always with the recipes I feature, if you try one out yourself, I'd love to hear about it and see photos!

About the author

Nancy Haddock is an award-winning and national bestselling author of mystery romance who now writes cozy mystery. Basket Case, the first book in the Silver Six Crafting mysteries, will be released in Sept. 2015 with 
Berkley Prime Crime.
Her earlier books, also with Berkley, are La Vida VampireLast Vampire Standing, and Always The Vampire. These books feature Cesca, aka Gidget with fangs, and are set in Haddock’s current hometown, St. Augustine, FL. She also contributed the St. Augustine-set short story “Medium Rare” to both the paranormal romance anthology Entangled 
and the boxed set Entranced.
Nancy draws on historic wealth, southern culture, and the plain old quirkiness of places for her books. A former speech pathologist and high school teacher in Oklahoma and Texas, Nancy now writes full-time. She lives with her husband and rescue dog Baron.


  
Please keep reading and check out my 
installments of 
Book Beginnings on Fridays
and
The Friday 56

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

My Book Beginnings and Friday 56
 for this week are also from
BASKET CASE


Book Beginnings on Fridays is a meme hosted by Rose City Reader
Share the first sentence (or so) of the book you are reading

My Book Beginnings...

I, Leslee Stanton Nix, Nixy to my friends, had never been called on the carpet for anything. Up until four days ago, that is. 

Now I had third-degree rug burns and the risk of being jobless. 

Why? Because my boss at Houston's Gate Fine Arts Gallery, Barbra (like Streisand) Vole, had blown her nonexistent fuse when the Lilyvale, Arkansas, police detective Eric Shoar had called me at work. His fifth call in the last month, the second in ten days. Shoar's deep, dreamy Southern drawl stirred my feminine interest, but deep and dreamy hadn't soften his complaints. 

"We had another incident at Miz Sherry Mae's yesterday," he'd begun. "Neighbors across the road reported booming sounds and smoke coming from the kitchen."  

The Friday 56 is a meme hosted by Freda's Voice
Rules: *Grab a book, any book. *Turn to page 56 or 56% in your eReader (If you have to improvise, that's okay.) *Find any sentence, (or few, just don't spoil it) that grab you. *Post it.

My Friday 56...

No surprise that the car incident trumped the church reconnaissance report. Sherry's friends were aghast over the news, and discussed it all the way through the meal of pot roast, veggies, rolls, and apple pie. I could see that Dab and Sherry were still a little shaken......

 
As always, please leave a comment and 
let me know what you think!

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clicking on the link in the 
upper right hand corner of this page.

Thursday, September 3, 2015


I'm so happy to have author 
Dianne Harman 
back at the blog today!


Dianne wants to celebrate the Audio
release of Book one in her 
Liz Lucas Cozy Mystery series
MURDER IN COTTAGE #6!


 Liz Lucas, a 52 year old widow, is beginning to think she’s been given a second chance at life by owning a successful spa located in a beautiful forest area on the coast north of San Francisco. What could possibly go wrong? Well, for starters, discovering that a guest staying in cottage #6 at the spa has been murdered. In order to save the spa’s reputation, Liz, along with her two dogs, Brandy Boy and Winston, sets out to find the killer. 

The cast of characters includes a handyman, spa employees, the bumbling police chief, the owner of Gertie’s Diner, the dead woman’s husband (the mayor), his girlfriend, and a Tiffany glass collector. One of them probably committed the crime, but it’s up to Liz to quickly find the culprit.

For a chance to win 1 audio copy of 
MURDER IN COTTAGE #6

Use the Rafflecopter form below to enter for your chance to win!
Giveaway open to US and Canada.
(Winner will be sent a code to download audio copy from Audible)

You can find a full list of Dianne's titles here. 


As always, please leave a comment and 

let me know what you think!

Follow my blog by 
clicking on the link in the 
upper right hand corner of this page.

Good Luck!

a Rafflecopter giveaway


Wednesday, September 2, 2015

BOOK TOUR


I'm so excited to be a stop on the blog tour for 
author Mary Marks and her new book
GONE BUT KNOT FORGOTTEN
Book 3 in the Quilting Mystery series


In the latest from the bestselling author of Plagued by Quilt, Kath Rutledge yarn bombs Blue Plum, Tennessee—and gets tangled up in the mystery of a bumped-off bagpiper.

It’s time for Handmade Blue Plum, an annual arts and crafts fair, and Kath and her knitting group TGIF (Thank Goodness It’s Fiber) plan to kick off the festivities with a yarn bombing. But they’re not the only ones needling Blue Plum. Bagpiper and former resident Hugh McPhee had just returned after a long absence, yet his reception is anything but cozy. The morning after his arrival, he’s found dead in full piper’s regalia.

Although shaken, Kath and her knitting group go forward with their yarn installation—only to hit a deadly snag. Now, with the help of Geneva, the ghost who haunts her shop, Kath and TGIF need to unravel the mystery before someone else gets kilt!


MY REVIEW


Author Mary Marks is back with another delight installment of her Quilting Mystery series.

Please be assured, you do not have to know how to quilt to enjoy this series, not do you need to have read the first to books in the series to read this one. But it is always fun to go back to the other installments to see how it all started.

In GONE BUT KNOT FORGOTTEN, protagonist Martha Rose suddenly finds herself executor to a friend’s estate. A friend she hasn’t seen in twenty years. Things don’t seem right to Martha, and then another body is discovered. Add to that the theft of items worth millions of dollars, and Martha knows she has to get to the bottom of things.

I truly enjoy Ms. Mark’s style of writing. I really liked that she explained some of the rituals of a Jewish funeral. I’m Christian and my grandmother was a minister, so learning more about other religions is fascinating to me.

GONE BUT KNOT FORGOTTEN was a wonderfully crafted mystery. Ms. Marks takes us through a sleuthing at a perfect pace.  There were more twists and turns than a quilt has stitches. More suspects than a few, and questions that felt like there could be no answers to. All leading up to an amazing reveal that had me completely surprised.

I look forward to what author Marks has in store for us next! 

Available Now!


Mary's publishing house, Kensington is giving away this wonderful prize package!


A winner will chosen by random draw through 
Rafflecopter at the end of the tour on September 15. 
This giveaway is through Great Escape Book Tours, not Lisa Ks Book Reviews.


About the author


Mary Marks grew up in Los Angeles and the San Francisco Bay Area. She became an award winning quilter after retiring from an administrative job at UCLA. Her first quilting mystery, Forget Me Knot, was a finalist in the 2011 Malice Domestic competition.

"I always heard that the best stories come from writing what you know, so Martha Rose is loosely modeled after me: a divorced, overweight Jewish quilter of a certain age who lives in the San Fernando Valley." The smart but impulsive Martha Rose is aided and abetted by her best friends Lucy and Birdie and a cast of quirky characters.

The author is an unrepentant Hidden Object game player and Sudoku addict. "Solving puzzles, finding patterns, piecing things together--that's what quilters and mystery writers do all the time," says the author.

Learn more about the author at www.marymarksmysteries.com

As always, please leave a comment and 
let me know what you think!

Follow my blog by 
clicking on the link in the 
upper right hand corner of this page.

GOOD LUCK!

a Rafflecopter giveaway

Tuesday, September 1, 2015


HAPPY
FIRST TUESDAY!!!
Just look at all the goodies coming out today! 


The author of Book Fair and Foul reconvenes the Ashton Corners book club to solve a murder in their own backyard . . .

Bob Miller, retired police chief and member of the Ashton Corners Mystery Readers and Cheese Straws Society, is stunned by the arrival of his twenty-one-year-old granddaughter, Darla, whom he has never seen. Bob has been estranged from his own daughter for decades and hopes to make up for his absence in Darla’s life. But some of the ladies of the book club find their Southern hospitality strained as they question the motives behind this sudden reunion.

After a dead man is found in Molly Mathews’s backyard, their concerns grow more serious. Lizzie Turner saw Darla arguing with the stranger the day before, but when the police question her, Darla proves to be an unreliable narrator. It’s up to the book club to uncover the real story . . . before another victim is written into the plot.


First in a crafty new cozy mystery series from national bestselling author Nancy Haddock

There isn’t much crime in Lilyvale, Arkansas, but local authorities have their hands full with Ms. Sherry Mae Stanton Cutler and her housemates—a crafty group of retirees who’ve dubbed themselves the Silver Six. But when Sherry Mae’s niece, Nixy, arrives to keep them in line, Lilyvale also plays host to a killer.

When Leslee Stanton “Nixy” Nix gets the latest call from Lilyvale detective Eric Shoar, she knows it means trouble. There’s been another kitchen explosion at her Aunt Sherry’s farmhouse, and the dreamy-voiced detective has had enough. If Nixy doesn’t check on her aunt in person, the Silver Six could become wards of the court. But the trouble Nixy finds in Lilyvale is not at all what she expects.

The seniors are hosting a folk art festival at the farmhouse, featuring Sherry’s hand-woven baskets, when land developer Jill Elsman arrives to bully Nixy’s aunt into selling the property. When Jill is later found dead in the cemetery, Sherry is suspected of weaving a murder plot, and it’s up to Nixy and the Silver Six to untangle the truth.

Recipes and crafting tip included!


Maggie’s impending wedding finds her more concerned with a cold case than cold feet in the latest from the author of Marked Down for Murder . . .

There’s something 100% off about Maggie and her fiancé Sam’s new dream home in the historic section of St. Stanley. The lights flicker, the doors blow shut, and their cat, Marshall Dillon, hisses at empty space. And there’s something in the basement that’s definitely not a bargain . . .

After Maggie discovers a skeleton in the root cellar, she’s convinced her house is haunted by a murdered man’s ghost. With the help of her Good Buy Girls, Maggie works to tag a killer. But she’ll need to be careful as she digs into the history of her new digs. Someone is willing to keep the truth buried at all costs . . .

INCLUDES BARGAIN-HUNTING TIPS!


The New York Times bestselling author of the China Bayles Mysteries takes readers back to Darling, Alabama, in the spring of 1933—where the women of the Darling Dahlias’ garden club are betting their bottom dollar there’s going to be trouble…

When the local bank suddenly closes, the small town of Darling is caught short on cash. To avoid disaster, town leaders hatch a plan to print Darling Dollars. The “funny money” can serve as temporary currency so the town can function. But when the first printing of the scrip disappears, the Darling Dahlias set out to discover who made an unauthorized withdrawal.

Meanwhile, County Treasurer Verna Tidwell questions whether she can trust the bank’s new vice president, Alvin Duffy—or the feelings he stirs up inside her. And Liz Lacy learns her longtime beau may be forced into a shotgun wedding. Seems other troubles don’t just go away when there’s a crisis. There’ll be no pennies from heaven, but if anyone can balance things out, folks can bank on the Darling Dahlias…

INCLUDES SOUTHERN-STYLE DEPRESSION-ERA RECIPES!

HARDCOVER

New York Times bestselling author Susan Wittig Albert transports readers to the summer of 1934, when a sensational murder shakes up the small Southern town of Darling, Alabama—and pulls in the ladies of the Darling Dahlias’ garden club, who never let the grass grow under their feet when there’s a mystery to solve…

The eleven o’clock lady has always been one of garden club president Liz Lacy’s favorite spring wildflowers. The plant is so named because the white blossoms don’t open until the sun shines directly on them and wakes them up.

But another Eleven O’Clock Lady is never going to wake up again. Rona Jean Hancock—a telephone switchboard operator who earned her nickname because her shift ended at eleven, when her nightlife was just beginning—has been found strangled with her own silk stocking in a very unladylike position.

Gossip sprouts like weeds in a small town, and Rona Jean’s somewhat wild reputation is the topic of much speculation regarding who might have killed her. As the Darling Dahlias begin to sort through Rona Jean’s private affairs, it appears there may be a connection to some skullduggery at the local Civilian Conservation Corps camp. Working at the camp, garden club vice president Ophelia Snow digs around to expose the truth…before a killer pulls up stakes and gets away with murder.


Includes Southern-style Depression-era Recipes


New York Times Bestselling Scumble River Series

A nasty faculty feud leaves one Scumble River teacher belly-up. . . .

Her honeymoon may have been less than relaxing, but Skye Boyd née Denison is still high on marital bliss with her new husband, Wally. The fact that their family is about to get bigger is even more exciting, even if Skye is dealing with morning sickness—and trying to hide the news from her ever-meddling mother, May.

But Skye quickly comes crashing down from cloud nine when the body of one of her coworkers, science teacher and volleyball coach Blair Hucksford, is found in the school swimming pool. The troublesome trainer was on the bad side of almost everyone on staff and many of the girls on her team, leaving Skye to sort through a huge roster of suspects. Now she must figure out which wronged party was mad enough to kill, and quickly—before someone else in town gets bumped off. . . .


This Cinderella goes from ashes to ashes in the new Victorian-era Fairy Tale Fatal Mystery by the author of Snow White Red-Handed . . .

Variety hall actress Ophelia Flax’s plan to reunite her friend Prue with her estranged—and allegedly wealthy—mother, Henrietta, is met with a grim surprise. Not only is the marquise’s Paris mansion a mouse-infested ruin, but Henrietta has inexplicably vanished, leaving behind an evasive husband, two sinister stepsisters, and a bullet-riddled corpse in the pumpkin patch decked out in a ball gown and one glass slipper—a corpse that also happens to be a dead ringer for Prue. 

Strangely, no one at 15 rue Garenne seems concerned about who plugged this luckless Cinderella or why, so the investigation is left to Ophelia and Prue. It takes them through the labyrinthine maze of the Paris Opera, down the trail of a legendary fairy tale relic, into the confidence of a wily prince charmless, and makes them vulnerable to the secrets of a mysterious couturière with designs of her own on Prue’s ever-twisting family history.


The national bestselling author of The Wolfe Widow presents another spine-tingling mystery featuring rare book collector Jordan Bingham and some Ngaio Marsh first editions worth killing for…

Jordan works hard to improve Vera Van Alst’s collection of classic detective stories. So when Chadwick Kauffman—heir to the Kauffman fortune—offers a very good price on a fine collection of Ngaio Marsh first editions owned by his recently deceased stepfather, she is thrilled to meet with him at his fabled summer estate, Summerlea.

The next day, Jordan and Vera are shocked to read that Chadwick has died in a fall from the grand staircase at Summerlea. But when the picture in the paper is of a different man, it becomes clear that the ladies are victims of a scam. And they’ll have to unmask the imposter fast, because someone is trying to frame them for murder…


The author of By Book or By Crook returns to the Outer Banks and the Lighthouse Library, where Lucy Richardson must shed light on a shocking murder…

Lucy has finally found her bliss as a librarian and resident of the Bodie Island Lighthouse. She loves walking on the beach, passing her evenings with the local book club, bonding with the library cat, Charles, and enjoying the attention of not one, but TWO eligible men. But then her socialite mother, Suzanne, unexpectedly drops in, determined to move Lucy back to Boston—and reunite her with her ex-fiancé.

To make matters worse, Suzanne picks a very public fight at the local hotel with her former classmate Karen Kivas. So, when Karen turns up dead outside the library the next morning, Suzanne is immediately at the top of the suspect list. Now Lucy must hunt down a dangerous killer—before the authorities throw the book at her poor mother…


In the first in this cat-filled cozy series, aspiring mystery author Sabrina Tate is about to discover that when it comes to solving murders, her new feline friend Hitchcock is a master of sleuthing…

Sabrina has never been the superstitious type. Still, when she moves to Lavender, Texas, to write her first novel and help her Aunt Rowe manage her vacation rental business, Sabrina can’t avoid listening to the rumors that a local black cat is a jinx—especially after the stray in question leads her directly to the scene of a murder.

The deceased turns out to be none other than her Aunt Rowe’s awful cousin Bobby Joe Flowers, a known cheat and womanizer who had no shortage of enemies. The only problem is that Aunt Rowe and Bobby Joe had quarreled just before the cousin turned up dead, leaving Rowe at the top of the long list of suspects. Now it’s up to Sabrina to clear her aunt’s name. Luckily for her, she’s got a new sidekick, Hitchcock the Bad Luck Cat, to help her sniff out clues and stalk a killer before Aunt Rowe winds up the victim of even more misfortune…


In the latest mystery in the USA Today bestselling series, Jessica Fletcher rings in the New Year with British aristocracy, but someone’s about to end the life of the party.…

A VERY PROPER MURDER


Jessica Fletcher and her friend Scotland Yard detective inspector George Sutherland are invited to attend a New Year’s Eve Ball at Castorbrook Castle, thanks to her British publisher. Shortly after arriving in the idyllic English countryside, Jessica discovers the body of a lady’s maid in the garden.

While their host, Lord Norrance, his family, and party guests squabble over the tragic death in perfectly mannered, thoroughly British style, family relations are strained as old wounds are reopened and cutting remarks are freely handed out.

As midnight beckons at the ball, the merriment crashes to a halt when Norrance falls ill and dies, apparently poisoned—and the number of suspects with a grudge against the lord of the manor sprouts like English ivy. Now it’s up to Jessica and George to find the killer—or killers—before another corpse welcomes in the New Year....


Fresh Pick - Fresh Fiction 

Top Pick - RT Book Reviews
A Best Books of the Year Pick - Kings River Life Magazine


From the New York Times bestselling author of Billionaire Blend comes an enchanting new entry in the "satisfyingly rich" Coffeehouse Mystery series.
Includes wicked good recipes. When coffeehouse manager turned amateur sleuth Clare Cosi serves "magic" beans for a Fairy Tale Fall event, she brews up a vision that leads to a sleeping beauty in Central Park; a big, bad wolf of Wall Street; and an East Side enclave with storybook secrets...


Fairy tale fever has descended on New York City. Broadway fans are flocking to Red Riding Hood: The Musical; museums are exhibiting art inspired by the Brothers Grimm; and Clare Cosi and her merry band of baristas give their coffee truck a "Jack and the Beanstalk" makeover for a Central Park festival. Clare's coffee hunter ex-husband contributes a bag of African beans with alleged magical properties. His octogenarian mother entertains customers with readings of the grinds, but Clare remains skeptical--until she receives a vision that helps her find a young model's body in the park's woods.
The police dismiss "sleeping beauty" as the victim of a drug overdose. Then Clare uncovers evidence that points to a list of suspects--from a New York Giant to quite a few wicked witches--and a cold case murder that reaches back to the Cold War. Now Clare is really in the woods with a dangerous predator on her heels and an investigation that leads from a secret Prince Charming Club right back to her own NYPD detective boyfriend. If she doesn't solve this mystery, those magic beans predict an unhappy ending.


The author of Independence Slay invites readers back to Celebration Bay for Halloween festivities with more tricks than treats…

This October in Celebration Bay, you can’t swing a black cat without hitting a haunted house. There are three finalists in the contest for the town’s official Haunted House, and ten thousand dollars will go to the winner, with the rest of the contributions and proceeds funding a new community center. Event coordinator Liv Montgomery has invited her friend Jonathan Preston, the debonair CEO of a philanthropic organization, hoping he will award a grant to the center.

But after the Museum of Yankee Horrors wins first place, the transformed Victorian boarding house is vandalized ... and among scattered mannequins of Hester Prynne, Lizzie Borden, and the Headless Horseman, a real dead body is found—one of the contest judges. Now in addition to playing host to Jon, Liv has to play detective and coordinate the clues to unmask a self-appointed judge, jury, and executioner.


In the latest from the bestselling author of Plagued by Quilt, Kath Rutledge yarn bombs Blue Plum, Tennessee—and gets tangled up in the mystery of a bumped-off bagpiper.

It’s time for Handmade Blue Plum, an annual arts and crafts fair, and Kath and her knitting group TGIF (Thank Goodness It’s Fiber) plan to kick off the festivities with a yarn bombing. But they’re not the only ones needling Blue Plum. Bagpiper and former resident Hugh McPhee had just returned after a long absence, yet his reception is anything but cozy. The morning after his arrival, he’s found dead in full piper’s regalia.

Although shaken, Kath and her knitting group go forward with their yarn installation—only to hit a deadly snag. Now, with the help of Geneva, the ghost who haunts her shop, Kath and TGIF need to unravel the mystery before someone else gets kilt!

WOW! 
So many amazing choices. 
Do you know which ones you're going to pick?

If you're ordering online, 
Amazon and Barnes & Noble were having some great sales on several of these titles. 
Amazon seemed to be the least expensive, but you may what to double check. :-)


As always, please leave a comment and 
let me know what you think!

Follow my blog by 
clicking on the link in the 
upper right hand corner of this page.