Mailbox Monday

Mailbox Monday is hosted by Marcia at The Printed Page.

We share what books that we found in our mailboxes last week.

Here's what I got ~




Death in Show: A Dog Walker Mystery by Judi McCoy (For Review) ~ Professional dog walker Ellie Engleman doesn't know much about the ins and outs of dog shows. But when one handler is killed, Ellie will learn that it's a dog-eat-dog world. Especially since the killer might now have it out for her. She and her sometime boyfriend, Detective Sam Ryder, will have to dig up the truth faster than a speeding bulldog... (Release date June 1st)

A Cast-Off Coven: A Witchcraft Mystery  by Juliet Blackwell (For Review) ~ Lily Ivory is not your average witch. She runs a vintage clothing store called Aunt Cora's Closet and has the magical ability to sense vibrations of the past from clothing and jewelry. When students are spooked at the San Francisco School for the Arts, Lily is called in to search for paranormal activity. She finds a dead body00and a closet full of old clothes with some very bad vibes. (Release date June 1st)

Reel Murder: A Talk Radio Mystery  by Mary Kennedy (For Review) ~ Florida's newest talk show radio psychologist Maggie Walsh has no sooner gotten involved with a local movie production than the leading lady turns up dead. Now Maggie has to find the killer before the credits roll-or it might be her final performance. (Release date June 1st)

Death Threads (Southern Sewing Series)  by Elizabeth Lynn Casey (For Review) ~ Yankee librarian Tori Sinclair is basking in the warmth of her new circle of friends from South Carolina's Sweet Briar Ladies Society sewing circle. That is until local author Colby Calhoun reveals an unflattering secret about the town's historic past-and then disappears, leaving a bloody trail behind him. And when Tori begins to see a pattern of the townsfolk's age-old Southern pride standing in the way of justice, she knows it's time to unravel the mystery.

Beachcombers: A Novel  by Nancy Thayer (For Review) ~ After her husband leaves her for one of her best friends, middle-aged Marina Warren takes a friend's advice and retreats to Nantucket, the stomping grounds of her youth. She rents a cottage from handsome local widower Jim Fox, who has recently welcomed back his two older daughters, Emma and Abbie, into the house he shares with his third daughter, Lily. Emma has recently lost her job and been left by her fiancé, while Abbie has decided to start an odd-jobs company servicing the wealthy summer crowd. Lily, meanwhile, earns a living as a society reporter for the local magazine and stews in her resentment toward her sisters (who return the sentiment) and newcomer Marina, who clearly has eyes for her father. As each search for fulfillment (and a man), they encounter vexing villains, class struggle, and good old-fashioned romance. (Release date June 22nd)

Small Change  by Sheila Roberts (For Review) ~ These Heart Lake, Wash., neighbors become divas living on a dime when harsh economic times hit. Still recovering from a miscarriage, Tiffany Turner is a shopaholic who becomes frantic when her out-of-control credit card spending prompts her husband, Brian, to leave her. Rachel Green is a struggling divorcée with two children who's just lost her teaching job and professes to not need a man until she meets Chad Alvarez. And stay at-home wife and former musician Jess, when informed by her banker husband that he might lose his job, wonders if she can be a rocker chick again. To cope, the Small Change Club members decide to simplify their lifestyles and take control of their future. Homing in on issues many readers can identify with, Roberts's women search for practical solutions to a common challenge with humor and froth

 Such A Pretty Face by Cathy Lamb (For Review) ~ In this warm, funny, thoroughly candid novel, acclaimed author Cathy Lamb introduces an unforgettable heroine who's half the woman she used to be, and about to find herself for the first time. Two years and 170 pounds ago, Stevie Barrett was wheeled into an operating room for surgery that most likely saved her life. Since that day, a new Stevie has emerged, one who walks without wheezing, plants a garden for self-therapy, and builds and paints fantastical wooden chairs. At thirty-five, Stevie is the one thing she never thought she'd be: thin. But for everything that's changed, some things remain the same. Stevie's shyness refuses to melt away. She still can't look her neighbors' gorgeous great-nephew in the eye. The Portland law office where she works remains utterly dysfunctional, as does her family-the aunt, uncle, and cousins who took her in when she was a child. To top it off, her once supportive best friend clearly resents her weight loss.By far the biggest challenge in Stevie's new life lies in figuring out how to define her new self. Collaborating with her cousins to plan her aunt and uncle's problematic fortieth anniversary party, Stevie starts to find some surprising answers-about who she is, who she wants to be, and how the old Stevie evolved in the first place. And with each revelation, she realizes the most important part of her transformation may not be what she's lost, but the courage and confidence she's gathering, day by day.As achingly honest as it is witty, Such A Pretty Face is a richly insightful novel of one woman's search for love, family, and acceptance, of the pain we all carry-and the wonders that can happen when we let it go at last. (Release date August 1st)


Sometimes Mine by Martha Moody (For Review) ~ Genie Toledo is a spitfire who too young married the wrong guy, had a daughter, quickly divorced, and now, in her forties, has filled the emotional gap by throwing herself into her work and holding friends and family at arm's length-even her college-age daughter. The only person to penetrate her thick shell is Mick Crabbe, with whom she's had a decade-long affair. He's a charming guy-famous even, a well-known college basketball coach-but the fact that they live in different states and see each other only once a week, and that Mick is committed not only to his wife and kids, but also to his basketball team and all those fans, suits Genie just fine. She can take care of herself. She doesn't need him.That is, until Mick becomes fatally ill and the nature of their relationship is forced to change. Genie sets her heart free for the first time and is ultimately altered by the experience. As she becomes intimately involved in Mick's care, and makes herself known to his family, Genie finally understands the importance of making connections with others, and earns, even from the outside world, the extremely moving validation of her significance in Mick's life.Narrated with the warmth, humor, and compassion that readers have come to expect from Martha Moody, Sometimes Mine is an emotionally engaging story of learning to appreciate the value of the people in your life, and the realization that sometimes the most meaningful relationships are those that go unrecognized.

And Then There Was One  by Patricia Gussin (For Review) ~ One is the loneliest number.
Nine years ago, Katie and Scott Monroe were blessed beyond their wildest dreams with identical triplets, Sammie, Alex, and Jackie. Three beautiful daughters and two adoring parents formed the picture-perfect party of five. But this tight-knit family unravels when the three little girls go to see a movie, but only one emerges from the darkness of the theatre. How could Sammie and Alex vanish without a trace?
Plunged into the abyss of a parent's worst fear, Katie and Scott hang by a thread-waiting, worrying, not knowing, and confronting the terrifying realization that the kidnapping may not have been a random act.
Who took Sammie and Alex? Why? Where are they? When will they be found? And what if they're never found, or not found alive? When Jackie, the remaining triplet, crumbles under the weight of grief and survivor's guilt, Katie and Scott struggle to hold out hope and hold on to what remains of their family.Until-or unless-Sammie and Alex are found safe, this picture-perfect family can't be put back together again. (Release date October 4th)

How to Crash a Killer Bash: A Party-Planning Mystery (Party Planning Mystery)  by Penny Warner (For Review) ~ Presley Parker is hosting a Murder Mystery party thrown by a notorious yet benevolent curator, Mary lee Miller. But when the role play becomes terrifyingly real, and Mary Lee is found dead, Presley kicks her sleuthing into high gear-only to find that someone wants the life of the party dead too... (Release date August 3rd)

In Winter's Grip  by Brenda Chapman (For Review) ~ Maja Cleary has turned her back on her family and her hometown of Duved Cove, Minnesota, after her mother s suicide. Now in her early forties and a successful plastic surgeon in Ottawa, she ignores the dreams that disturb her days and the growing dissatisfaction with her marriage and unfulfilled life. She is not brave enough to make changes until a desperate phone call one cold February evening reveals that her father has been murdered in his backyard. Her brother Jonas arrest for her father s murder forces her from her safe world in Ottawa. Even as she works to prove her brother innocent, Maja discovers that others had equally good reason to want him dead. The frigid, stormy Minnesota landscape sets the mood as Maja battles against time, the local police, and the relentless snow. All the while, the murderer prepares to kill again. (Release date September 25th)

Murder on Lexington Avenue (Gaslight Mystery)  by Victoria Thompson (For Review) ~ In Thompson's fine 12th mystery set in turn-of-the-20th-century New York City (after 2009's Murder on Waverly Place), Det. Sgt. Frank Malloy investigates the murder of Nehemiah Wooten, who was bludgeoned with a loving cup Wooten won for sculling at Harvard more than 30 years earlier. A follower of Alexander Graham Bell's views on eugenics, Wooten was opposed to two deaf people getting married on the grounds that such unions would produce only deaf offspring, an attitude that earned him an enemy within his own home. Wooten's attractive 16-year-old daughter, Electra, who could not hear, was hoping to marry a deaf teacher. When Malloy visits Wooten's pregnant widow and her water breaks, he calls in midwife Sarah Brandt. Thanks to her access to the victim's household, Sarah proves invaluable in helping him uncover the killer. (Release date June 1st)

Skein of the Crime (A Knitting Mystery)  by Maggie Sefton (For Review) ~ While Kelly's romance with her longtime architect boyfriend, Steve Townsend, suffers, she helps her IT consultant friend, Megan Smith, plan Megan's upcoming wedding and teach a House of Lambspun knitting class. When Holly Kaiser, a college student who had been dating the son of a Lambspun knitting teacher, dies of a drug overdose, Kelly once again turns amateur sleuth. The more Kelly learns about Holly, who was far too fond of Ecstasy, the more she suspects the fatal overdose was no accident. The action builds to an intriguing cliffhanger. Directions for a braided knit scarf and a carrot cake recipe are a bonus (Release date June 1st)