Showing results by author "Diana Xarissa" in All Categories

Aunt Bessie has become something of an expert in the history of the island that she's called home for all of her adult life. Aunt Bessie considers it unfair when the entire conference schedule is thrown into disarray by Mack Dickson's sudden arrival. Mack promises that what he has to say is important enough to warrant the upheaval. But even more turmoil follows when Bessie discovers Mack's body only a short time after he's finished giving his speech.

Aunt Bessie is somewhere past 60 and old enough to ignore the rude woman that does her best to ruin the first session of the beginning Manx language class they are both taking. Moirrey's sudden death is harder to ignore. Aunt Bessie believes that Moirrey's death was the result of the heart condition that Moirrey always complained about. The police investigation, however, suggests that someone switched some of the dead woman's essential medications for something far more deadly.

Aunt Bessie assumes that she'll have the beach all to herself on a cold, wet, and windy March morning just after sunrise, then she stumbles (almost literally) over a dead body. Aunt Bessie assumes that the dead man died of natural causes, then the police find the knife in his chest. Try as she might, Bessie just can't find anything to like about the young widow that she provides tea and sympathy to in the immediate aftermath of finding the body. There isn't much to like about the rest of the victim's family either.

Fenella Woods has only met a few people during the twenty-four hours she's been in Douglas, the capital city of the Isle of Man. She's shocked when she discovers one of them dead in an alley behind her apartment building. Nearly fifty and newly single, Fenella meets a handsome police inspector, a dashing new neighbor, and a sophisticated businessman, all of whom have her questioning her determination to remain unattached. Having a ghost for a roommate and a kitten as an uninvited houseguest has her questioning her decision to start a new life on the small island in the Irish Sea after all.

Aunt Bessie goes house hunting with her friend, John Rockwell. CID Inspector John Rockwell asks Bessie Cubbon, a longtime resident of the village of Laxey where she's known to just about everyone as "Aunt Bessie", to help him find the perfect house in the village. What they find in one of the bedrooms of the last house they visit isn't what either of them was expecting. Aunt Bessie goes to look at furniture with John as well. Again, they find the unexpected, this time in a furniture storage unit in Jurby. But are the two cases, separated by 30 years, connected?

Elizabeth Cubbon is called “Aunt Bessie” by nearly everyone in the small village of Laxey that she calls home. A number of murders have thrown her normally quiet life into turmoil, and at her age (just don’t ask her exactly what age that is), she feels like she’s had enough. Aunt Bessie enjoys getting through the whole day without anyone stumbling over a dead body.

Julie Carter was celebrating her high school graduation with five friends on a rainy weekend in 1985. Her murder is the third case that Andrew Cheatham presents to his cold case unit. One of the five people at the cottage with Julie killed her, but, more than a decade later, no one has ever been...

Fenella Woods is excited to be taking the ferry across the Irish Sea to England so that she can begin her research. When she finds a dead body in her cabin, she has to change her plans. The police seem convinced that the killer is one of the other passengers who had a cabin reserved for the journey. Fenella meets a group of suspects that includes a wealthy couple, an older man and his much younger wife, and a retired and incredibly nosy woman.

When Bessie Cubbon’s best friend, Doona Moore, wins a week’s stay at an English holiday park, she’s quick to invite Bessie to join her. Bessie isn’t sure the destination, hugely popular with families with small children, is one she would have chosen herself, but with all their expenses paid, she’s determined to make the best of it. They’ve only just unpacked when Doona gets an unexpected and unwelcome surprise. The next morning, the pair find a dead body and Doona’s the prime suspect in a murder investigation far from home.

Bessie Cubbon, Laxey Village’s “Aunt Bessie,” is feeling overwhelmed by the twists and turns her life has taken recently. When a friend suggests that she look at a flat in Douglas, Bessie is seriously tempted to try relocating to the Island’s beautiful capital city. Aunt Bessie finds another body. This one is still breathing at least, but no one seems to know anything about the man. Could he be tied to the strange things that are happening in Bessie’s friend’s building?

Jennifer Hardwick loves everything about Ramsey, New York, the small town to which she recently moved. Divorced, with grown children, she’s happy on her own in a little house near the high school where she teaches math. Her new friends at the school talk her into taking part in the town’s “Romance Roundup,” a speed-dating event that’s part of the Ramsey Valentine’s Faire. She’s just happy that Seth Pierce, a man she met the night before the Roundup, is going to be there. He’s very nice and he’ll be good company, even if the rest of the night is a waste of time. To her ...

Fenella Woods is nervous but eager to start driving lessons on the Isle of Man. Having never driven a manual transmission before, she quickly finds herself struggling with having to change gears with her left hand while sitting on what feels like the wrong side of the car and driving on what seems to be the wrong side of the road. Her friendship with CID Inspector Daniel Robinson is less stressful. He's going through some cold cases, and he asks her to share her thoughts.

Aunt Bessie decides that she and her closest friends should have an enjoyable night out. Elizabeth Cubbon (known to almost everyone as Aunt Bessie) has made many friends over the lifetime that she’s lived in the village of Laxey, but few have been as close as the ones she’s made recently. Bessie relied on Doona Moore, Hugh Watterson, and John Rockwell to help her through several recent murder investigations she’s found herself caught up in. Now she wants to treat them all to an open-air performance of a Shakespearean play on the grounds of historic Peel Castle.

When Leanne Canfield’s employer lets her go with very little notice and a generous severance package, she’s ready to take a few days off before she starts job-hunting again. She gives up her apartment and leaves Chicago, ready for a new start somewhere else. But first, she’s going to spend a weekend with her two best friends from college. They get together every year and they’ve been planning this gathering for months. It’s the first time in a long time that Leanne has been back in Ramsey, New York, where she went to college. Of course, it always snows in Ramsey in January, and ...

When Debbie met Andy the first time, they’d shared a romantic evening together. That was the last time she’d seen him until more than twenty years later when he walked in the Ramsey DMV where she was working. Andy is new to the small town and eager to make friends, and Debbie is happy to show him around and spend some time with him. Andy’s fiancée, Ella, is less than happy that Andy and Debbie have renewed their friendship, though. As Debbie does her best to encourage Andy to chase some long forgotten dreams, Ella is doing all she can to keep Andy to herself. Interfering friends, the...

After fifteen years of full-time work and part-time study, Suzy Snyder has finally finished her degree. Now she just has to find the perfect new job. She’s been working at the Diner since she was a teenager, but even though she’s now the manager, she wants more. A job as an area manager for Lucas Hogan sounds perfect, but Karl Kemp, the man temporarily filling the position, is quick to let Suzy know that she doesn’t have enough experience for the job. The two end up arguing about just about everything as they seem to bump into one another all over the small town of Ramsey. By the time...

After a surprisingly successful first investigation, Andrew Cheatham's cold case unit is considering murder this time around. No one knew that Paul Bernhard was in New York City. No one knows why he was brutally murdered. No one knows where to find the woman he was meant to be meeting on the...

Welcome to Ramsey, New York – a small town full of characters. Some are looking for love, some most definitely are not. Sooner or later, everyone finds his or her happily ever after. Jana Bailey is doing her best to raise her son on her own after she was unexpectedly widowed four years ago. Money is tight, but she’s managing. When her car breaks down and it’s clear it needs to be replaced, she has to make a difficult decision. Her son, Shawn, has been training in Tae Kwon Do for a year and he really loves the sport. Paying for that and a car payment, though, will stretch Jana’s ...

Welcome to Ramsey, New York – a small town full of characters. Some are looking for love, some most definitely are not. Sooner or later, everyone finds his or her happily ever after. Camille Quinn has had her heart broken twice and she isn’t interested in finding love again. She’s busy raising her two children, Brandon and Molly. When Maxwell Steward, the first man who broke her heart, thirty years earlier, comes back to Ramsey, all she wants to do is avoid him. When Brandon manages to crash into Maxwell’s expensive sports car during a driving lesson, avoiding the man becomes ...