Holiday Thriller

The rented house was supposed to be a relaxing getaway. But Jill and her companions feel a sense of danger instead. First, they learn that their hosts' son had a fiancee, but her disappearance remains unexplained - and then they meet some menacing members of a local trail-riding club. When one of Jill and Greg's friends finds human remains amid the dunes - with a diamond ring around one mummified finger - things start heating up fast, and they'll be thankful just to survive through the long weekend....

Sarah Booth just wants the perfect Christmas holiday. Even with the dissolution of her engagement, she refuses to lose her Christmas spirit. But when Theodora Prince - an ex classmate and current Pastor's wife - comes calling with a year-old case and cash upfront, Sarah Booth must find the truth about the boys who ruined last year's Christmas pageant in time to stop them from doing it again.

Christmas is coming to Beechwood Harbor, but will the manor residents be ready for his magical visit? With mischief and mystery at every turn, Holly and friends have to rally to save Christmas before it's too late! A Very Beechwood Christmas includes four mini mysteries set around a wild and magical Christmas when the real Santa Claus comes to town!

Recently retired Met Detective Roz Parker boards the Christmas Eve sleeper to head home for the holidays, anxious and dreading her new role as grandmother upon arrival. Violently thrown from her thoughts when the train derails, Roz finds herself stranded on the snowy tracks, where she finds a fellow passenger suspiciously murdered in a locked cabin. With the train stuck in snow in the middle of nowhere, a killer stalks its carriages, picking off passengers one by one.

The white-washed Italian villa is perfect. I thought it might feel odd, living in a stranger’s house for the summer, but as my husband and children swim in the infinity pool, I start to relax. And then, in the back of a wardrobe, I find something that shatters everything.... Sparkling green eyes, square jaw, lopsided smile. A young man with his arm around a beautiful woman. The picture is old and faded, but I’d recognize him anywhere. The man is my husband.

Who killed Baubles the Clown? The beloved performer Baubles, hired to entertain children with Sparkles his Shetland pony, is found slumped over in the corral strangled by his trick lasso. Lily Rock's librarian, Meadow McCloud, wants to help find the killer but she has a personal crisis to deal with. Between Christmas errands and the plentiful expectations that come with the season, she's feeling pretty overwhelmed. Plus there's the secret she's kept from her daughter, Sage, that keeps threatening her peace of mind. If that isn't enough, Sage is overwhelmed with her concerns.

A stranger from the snow. A warning from the future. A mother’s fight to rewrite it all. For Kelly McCormick, trying to balance single motherhood and a never-ending to-do list, is a constant battle. Every time she seems to inch ahead, some new emergency jumps up to knock her back. But she’s making it work . . . most of the time. Less than a week before Christmas, she’s setting out to pack up the cabin of her closest friend with her two teenage sons in tow. Although it’s not a vacation, Kelly is hoping that maybe they’ll have one more magical memory there before the cabin is sold. ...

To save a sick, orphaned boy, Anna Freeman must risk her own life. Little Paulo desperately needs a new heart. It's his only Christmas wish - well, that and building his first snowman. For the surgery, Anna must take him to a hospital in the city she once called home. A place she fled in fear years ago. Which means telling Dr. Lucas Bennett that the woman he's known all this time as a caring orphanage worker is really someone else. Someone with a very frightening past. And that the danger stalking all of them won't take Christmas Day off.

This Yuletide season, there's no time for Angie Curtis and Patrick West to linger under the mistletoe. Patrick's being needled by his mother - movie star Skye West - to set the stage for a perfect white Christmas as she brings her costar, screenwriters, and director home for the holidays. With his mother's long list of wishes, Patrick's becoming unraveled. To help, the Mainely Needlepointers offer to decorate Skye's Victorian mansion and create needlepoint pillows as gifts for the guests.

Knitting an ugly Christmas jumper at Cardinal Woolsey's knitting shop in Oxford is supposed to be relaxing. Until a knitter keels over. It's soon clear to amateur sleuth Lucy that murder's in the air and that the culprit is one of the knitters. This is a fun take on a classic closed-room mystery. Of course, no room is every closed when vampires live downstairs. But are the undead knitters to blame? Or is there more to this Oxford knitting circle than lumpy Santas and light-up reindeer?

All Dr. Abby Sullivan wants for Christmas is to escape her guilt. Yet no matter how far and fast she runs, she can't leave behind her past or the grim secret she carries. Then a stalker's threats send her on a chilling journey to Rose Mountain, North Carolina, where she's forced to rely on a stranger's protection. But her reliance on handsome cop Cal MacIvers puts him and his family in danger. To survive a deadly showdown, Abby will have to choose: flee again or fight for her life - and for love.

As the holiday season lights up Seattle's famed Pike Place Market, Pepper Reece's beloved Spice Shop is brimming with cinnamon, nutmeg, and shoppers eager to stuff their stockings. Add to the mix a tasty staff competition—a peppermint bark-off—along with Victorian costumes for this year's Dickensian Christmas theme, and Pepper almost forgets to be nervous about meeting her fisherman boyfriend's brother for the first time. But when a young woman working in her friend Vinny's wine shop is brutally assaulted, costumed revelers and holiday cheer are the last things on Pepper's mind.

Aurora Hart hates everything Christmas, but how could she turn down the opportunity to serve one year of probation in Holiday Haven versus a full sentence for her crimes? Saddled with a talking squirrel roommate, Aurora is doing her best to keep a low profile as she bides her time. Everything is going fine...until Santa's sleigh gets stolen.

For all its merriment, Christmas can also bring melancholy-and in Magic Springs, Idaho, Mia finds that the season has brought her an unhappy ghost who's pulling poltergeist-style pranks to get her attention. When she demands an explanation, the ghost just sends a message: Ask Mary Alice-that is, Mia's beloved Grans, who's been training her to develop her witchy talents. If anyone can figure this out, it's Grans . . . even if she still hasn't managed to free Mia's cat from a previous spell that she cast.

After dumping her boyfriend, Sadie can't help but say yes when she's invited to visit an island just off the coast of Fiji. The island is exactly what Sadie imagined: paradise. Beautiful sunsets, gorgeous white beaches and with no wifi, Sadie can finally try to escape her past. But she quickly discovers that there's more to the island than meets the eye. Why are only women able to visit? Why is a section of the island off limits? And why does no one seem to want - or be able - to leave? As Sadie begins to question everything, she starts to uncover a dark secret that lurks in this haven.

Though he may not look the part, Madoc Rhys is a Mountie - and his keen sense of detection tells him it's time to ask Janet Wadman to marry him. They have just gotten engaged when Christmas rolls around, and Janet's boss invites them to his family estate for a last holiday fling before Janet leaves her job. After a long helicopter ride, they are at Graylings, ancestral home of the Condryckes, a family so strange that Canada's shortest Mountie fits right in. There is a psychic old woman, an erudite butler, and a family patriarch.

For residents of Salem, Massachusetts, the day after Halloween brings empty candy wrappers, sagging pumpkins, and a community-wide identity crisis. That is, until Lee Barrett's TV production class suggests extending the spooky season with the traditional Mexican celebration Dia de Los Muertos. But when the students discover not all of Salem's dead are resting in peace, the post-October blues don't seem so bad after all....

Holiday time in the Valley, and in the holiday spirit - despite the dismal shape of the finances at the Little Detective Agency - Bernie refers a potential client to Victor Klovsky, a fellow private eye. It’s also true that the case - promising lots of online research but little action - doesn’t appeal to Bernie, while it seems perfect for Victor, who is not cut out for rough stuff. But Victor disappears in a rough-stuff way, and when he doesn’t show up at his mom’s to light the Hanukkah candles, she hires Chet and Bernie to find him.

Jill Gardner has volunteered her Coffee, Books, and More to host a Christmas adopt-a-pet party. Among the potential forever friends is a male terrier named Baby, whose owner died of a heart attack. With few clues to go on, even finding the name of Baby's human is a daunting task. But there's no challenge too big for Jill this holiday season. Playing Santa's Little Helper, Jill is determined to find out what happened - and to fulfill a long-time coming Christmas wish.

Christmas lights on palm trees and Santa hats on plastic pink flamingoes are far from the snowy landscape Maureen and her beloved golden retriever, Finn, are used to. But Maureen is determined to make this a holiday to remember—which means finding a way to promote Haven House on a shoestring. Fortunately, Haven's vintage movie theater, the Paramount, has come up with a great "Twelve Days of Christmas" idea. They'll feature an impressive list of the best classic Christmas movies ever made—shown by one-time movie actor-turned-projectionist Decklin Monroe.