Bookclubbed to Death

Book 8: Mystery Bookshop

by V.M. Burns

Genres: Amateur Sleuth; Cozy Mystery

Synopsis

V. M. Burns returns with the latest book in her popular Mystery Bookstore mysteries set in a Michigan bookshop specializing in selling murder mysteries.

When the bookshop she owns becomes a crime scene, mystery writer Samantha Washington discovers there is such a thing as bad publicity.

After the local library in North Harbor, Michigan, is flooded in a storm, Sam offers her bookstore as a new venue for the Mystery Mavens Book Club. Unfortunately, she immediately runs afoul of the club leader, Delia Marshall, a book reviewer who can make or break careers—something Sam can ill afford with her debut historical mystery soon to be published.

But the next morning, Sam opens her shop to find the unpleasant woman dead on the floor, bashed with a heavy—apparently lethal—tome: The Complete Works of Agatha Christie. While Sam is busy writing her latest British historical mystery in which the queen mother is suspected in the murder of a London Times correspondent, a pair of ambitious cops suspect Sam of the real-life crime.

When she gathers Nano Jo and their friends from the Shady Acres Retirement Village to review the case, they discover that every one of the Mavens had a motive. With her novel about to hit the stores, Sam must find out who clubbed Delia before a judge throws the book at her.

Release date: December 27, 2022

Publisher: Kensington Books

Print pages: 336

Sample

“Snickers, come!” I yelled. My hands were shaking so badly that I fumbled to unlock Oreo’s crate. Eventually, I got the lock open, turned, and hurried out of the room, confident that the dog who trailed me around the house like a shadow would follow. I was halfway across the living room before I realized I was alone.

The wind roared as the rain pounded against the windows.

I hurried back to my bedroom. Snickers was still curled up in the center of my bed, oblivious to the storm raging outside. “Snickers.” I shook her.

Fourteen, with more white around her muzzle than brown, my barely eight-pound toy poodle lifted her head and yawned. Her breath halted me for a split second before I held my own, reached over and scooped her up, and looked around for Oreo.

“Samantha Marie Washington, what is taking you so long?” Nana Jo said. “We need to get down in the basement now.”

“I can’t find Oreo.” I frantically scanned my bedroom, looking to see what could have happened to him. “I just had him. I had to come back for Snickers, and he got away from me.”

Oreo, my male toy poodle, would normally have bounced out of his crate. Always energetic, Oreo was still more a puppy than his twelve years showed.

A tiny brown head poked out from underneath the bed and glanced around before sliding back underneath.

“He’s terrified. Here.” I handed Snickers to Nana Jo and got down on my knees.

“We don’t have time for this, Dorothy. That tornado is almost on top of us, and I left my magic wand and shiny red shoes at the dry cleaners.” Before I could comment on The Wizard of Oz reference, Nana Jo pushed her flashlight in my hand. “Oreo, come here right now.” She turned and walked out of the room.

A few seconds later, there was a loud boom of lightning, and the lights flashed.

Oreo stuck out his head from underneath the bed and then flew after Nana Jo, leaving me on my knees.

Another loud crack, and I hurried after them.

The power went out just as I started down the stairs from my apartment to the bookstore on the first floor. I turned to the right and headed toward my office. There was a coat closet, but Nana Jo had already removed my rain slicker and boots and left them out and ready for me.

I shoved my feet down in the pink rubber boots my grandmother called galoshes. My rain slicker was yellow and was an exact replica of one I’d had as a kid with metal clasps and a hood. I pushed my arms through the slicker. I yanked open the door and held on for a few seconds while the winds pummeled me. I pulled the door closed and braced myself as I pushed against the winds and made my way the few short steps to the cellar door.

One of the only things I disliked about the building, which was now my business and my home, was that the only way to reach the basement was from outside. The entrance to the cellar was on an angled and raised platform and formed a triangle slanting down from about three feet up the side of the building to the ground. We usually kept a padlock on the doors, but Nana Jo had already taken care of that. Concrete stairs led underground. It was dark, damp, with an earthy smell that reminded me of worms and other creepy-crawly things that slithered on the ground. I hated dark basements.

The wind wrenched the door out of my hand, and I had to use all of my strength to pull it closed.

I followed a dim shaft of light to the bottom, where I found Nana Jo dripping water from the hood of her slicker with two poodles clutched to her chest. “It’s not often that tornadoes actually touch down this close to Lake Michigan, but we’ll be safe here,” she said. Her voice sounded confident, but there was a flash of unease behind her eyes, which was the only sign that she was as nervous as I was.

Tornadoes were a hazard of living in the Midwest, and I remember going through drills in elementary school and during the years when I taught English in the high school before I quit to open a mystery bookshop. However, even with decades of practice, I couldn’t recall a tornado actually touching down.

“I’m glad Dawson’s away at football camp,” I said with as much conviction as I could muster up. Even to my own ears, my words didn’t sound convincing. My assistant, Dawson Alexander, was a quarterback for Michigan Southwest University, or what the locals called Miss You. He was over six feet tall and two hundred pounds of pure muscle. In my head, I knew there wasn’t much he could do to keep us safe from forces of nature, but I think his bulky presence would have helped my emotional state.

“Sam, come here and sit down.” Nana Jo patted a spot on the workbench, which was under the chimney. She pulled Oreo out from inside her coat and attempted to hand him to me. However, his claws gripped her sweater, and it took both of us to pry that ten-pound poodle off. At five foot ten and two hundred pounds, Nana Jo was no lightweight.

Once freed from the warmth and safety of Nana Jo, Oreo leaped onto my chest, clasped my neck, and held on for dear life. I held his shivering body close and whispered soothing words of nonsense to comfort him.

The rain crashed against the metal doors of the cellar, but the old brick brownstone was steady and strong. The storm raged outside, and at one point, Oreo lifted his head and howled, something I’d never heard him do before. However, after a few moments, the tempest subsided. When the wind was barely more than a bluster, Nana Jo walked up the steps and listened for a few seconds before opening the door.

Outside, the night was eerily quiet. The moon glowed and cast a yellow beam of light through the night sky that mixed with the darkness to form a purplish haze.

Nana Jo climbed up and out, with Snickers still wrapped tightly inside her raincoat.

Oreo and I followed.

Once out of the dank-smelling basement, the air had a fishy smell that felt heavy and close.

“That certainly was an adventure.” I looked around to survey the damage done by the storm. Apart from leaves, branches, and a few pieces of debris that floated through our yard, all was well.

I glanced down at my phone and wasn’t surprised to see that I didn’t have cell service. Given the force of those winds, it would have been surprising if I did. I prayed my family were all well and walked around to the front to look at the street.

Everything that wasn’t bolted to the ground was rolling around the street. Garbage and recycle bins, patio furniture, trash, and a mangled piece of metal that had once been a bicycle. Thankfully, the shops that lined Market Street appeared to have only sustained minor damage. All of the front windows were spared, and nothing more significant than a few tree limbs had landed on the property. I walked the short distance to North Harbor Café, the restaurant owned by my fiancé, Frank Patterson, and let out a sigh of relief. His restaurant was unharmed. I pulled out my phone to send him a text before I remembered that I didn’t have cell service.

“What did we do before cell phones?” I asked.

Nana Jo shrugged. “Wrote letters, sent telegrams, and if we were really desperate, we actually talked face-to-face after we finished beating our clothes with rocks at the river.”

“Very funny. You know what I mean.”

She grinned. “I do know what you mean. Modern conveniences have made our lives a lot easier. When they work, they’re fantastic.”

“When they don’t, it reminds us how much we rely on technology.”

“They’ll have it back on soon.”

“Let’s drive by Jenna’s, and then we can drive out to Shady Acres.” I turned to walk around the building and headed toward the garage.

Nana Jo cleared her throat. “Sam, don’t you think you should put on some clothes first?”

I glanced down. I was still wearing galoshes and the raincoat I’d grabbed earlier on top of the long T-shirt that I slept in. I didn’t need a mirror to see that my face was red. I could feel the heat as it moved up my neck.

I clutched the jacket and hurried upstairs to change into outside clothes. I pretended not to notice my grandmother laughing.

It didn’t take long to change. The longest part was extracting Oreo, who had his claws in my nightshirt and refused to let go. The poor little guy was shivering and determined. Snickers curled up in the center of the bed and waited. Once I had on pants and a sweatshirt, I scooped up both poodles and hurried out.

I handed Snickers to Nana Jo and got behind the wheel. Once I was seated, she helped me extract Oreo, who quickly latched onto her.

Nana Jo reached into her purse and pulled out a small glass bottle. She unscrewed the lid, which was a dropper. I watched as she filled the dropper and then squirted it in Oreo’s muzzle. “Good thing you had some of that CBD oil left over from the Fourth of July.”

“I was wondering if we had any more of that stuff. It worked wonders to settle the poor guy down after the fireworks.” I pushed the button to raise the garage door, put the car in reverse, and pulled out.

“I’m not sure if it’s the oil or the bacon flavoring, but he loves this stuff, and it sure helps reduce his anxiety.”

Not to be left out, Snickers scratched at Nana Jo’s arm until she gave her a smaller dose of the oil. Oreo held on to Nana Jo’s shoulder, but his shivering lessened. Snickers made two small circles in Nana Jo’s lap and then curled into a ball and went to sleep.

Most of the damage to North Harbor that we saw involved fallen tree limbs. However, a few of the branches had fallen on power lines that forced us to take detours. The drive from my store to my sister Jenna’s house shouldn’t have taken more than fifteen minutes. However, nearly forty minutes later, I pulled in front of my sister’s Victorian home.

Despite its location on the shores of Lake Michigan, where lakefront property typically garnered big bucks, North Harbor was still recovering from the race riots of the sixties and the manufacturing exodus of the late seventies and early eighties. With both the St. Thomas River and Lake Michigan as lures, North Harbor had all of the ingredients to attract tourists, as did its twin city of South Harbor. Sharing the same Lake Michigan shoreline, North and South Harbor, Michigan, were identical in that respect but exact opposites in practically everything else. South Harbor had a thriving economy fueled by the tourists who traveled near and far to walk its cobblestoned streets, tour lighthouses, or play on the sandy beaches. Cross the St. Thomas River into North Harbor, and the downtown was full of old, boarded-up brick buildings that had been allowed to decay and crumble from years of neglect. Diehard residents with long memories of the days when manufacturing plants that supported the Motor City brought high-paying jobs to town worked to rebuild the economy. That was one of the reasons that my late husband, Leon, and I wanted to open our mystery bookshop in North Harbor. We dreamed of quitting our mundane jobs and indulging in our passion.

The city’s historic district was a perfect reflection of the area’s once regal history. From its days as home to a religion known as the House of David, to the home of manufacturing tycoons who supported the state’s automotive industry, North Harbor’s historic district held grand old Victorian and Georgian homes, cobblestoned streets, and yards enclosed by wrought-iron fences. When the manufacturing companies fled the city, many of the houses fell into disrepair. Those that remained were either converted into rentals or left to decay. In one of the waves of economic renovation that hit the area, the city bought many of the derelict homes and sold them for one dollar to individuals willing to rehab and live in them versus renting. My sister and her husband, Tony, were among the first to buy and had spent the last quarter of a century turning what my father used to refer to as their “money pit” into their dream home.

I breathed a sigh of relief when I saw the large oak trees that shaded their home were still there, albeit minus a few limbs that had abandoned their trunks but thankfully had fallen on the ground rather than the house.

“Thank God they’re safe, and the twins are at school,” Nana Jo said.

Jenna and Tony were standing on the porch with two suitcases when we arrived.

My sister was four years older than me, but you couldn’t tell it by looking at her. We were both about the same height, five foot four, but I’m pretty sure I had about twenty pounds on her . . . maybe thirty. Although my sister kept her hair short and immaculately coiffed, we both had brown eyes and brown hair. I was doing better at taking care of my hair since my sister had staged an intervention and introduced me to . . .