Lena's best friend, Allison, is in a panic. On a walk in the woods by her home, Allison discovers the body of her mail carrier, an argumentative man who recently had a falling out with Allison's husband. Lena quickly realizes that Allison has nothing to worry about as the murder weapon points to a different suspect altogether: Lena's embattled boyfriend, Sam West.

"A novelist attempts to write a book about Mary Shelley, author of Frankenstein, a mother and artist whose harrowing pregnancies reveal the cost of human reproduction. Soon, however, the novelist's own painful experiences of pregnancy and childbirth, as well as her increasing awareness of larger threats from climate change to pandemic, force her to give up on the book and turn instead to writing a contemporary Frankenstein, based on the story of an...

When the lustful but impotent professor-novelist Lee Youngdahl encounters the beautiful Mariolena Sunwall, a student in his writing class, he learns of a novel she's eager to have published and decides he can help her land a book contract with one of New York's most prestigious publishing houses. But he has his own agenda and some extracurricular activities in mind. Working for Mariolena gives him the inspiration he needs to break out of his paralyzing

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At the Historical Romance Writers of the World conference in New York, which Jacqueline Kirby attends, Dubretta Duberstein, the scandal columnist, dies under mysterious circumstances. Then, Valerie Valentine, one of the most popular writers at the conference, asks for Jacqueline for help because someone is threatening to kill her.

Kara Sullivan's life is full of love--albeit fictional. As a bestselling romance novelist and influential bookstagrammer, she's fine with getting her happily-ever-after fix between the covers of a book. But right now? Not only is Kara's best friend getting married next week--which means big wedding stress--but the deadline for her next novel is looming, and she hasn't written a single word. The last thing she needs is for her infuriating first love,...

"When western novelist Sadie Goodwin must pen a romance novel to rescue her lackluster sales, there's only one tiny problem: she's never been in love. Desperate to salvage her career, Sadie accepts an invitation to hole up at her friend's beach duplex for the summer and devote herself to this confounding genre. After all, where better to witness love than on the beautiful South Carolina shore? But Sadie soon finds many ways to procrastinate the dreaded...

Beautiful actress Martha Lawrence has a problem. Her once loving husband, Dirk, has become violent and controlling, and she doesn't know why. When she reaches out to their friend, mystery-solver Ellery Queen for help, Dirk interrupts their meeting in a drunken rage. He is convinced that the two are having an affair.
Martha needs Ellery's help to convince Dirk that she's never cheated and never will. But from the clues he uncovers, it looks as if...

"East-coast novelist Patrick Hamlin has come to Hollywood with simple goals in mind: overseeing the production of a film adaptation of one of his books, preventing starlet Cassidy Carter's disruptive behavior from derailing said production, and turning this last-ditch effort at career resuscitation into the sort of success that will dazzle his wife and daughter back home. But California is not as he imagined: drought, wildfire, and corporate corruption...

"New in the USA Today bestselling series-Jessica Fletcher finds herself in a tropical paradise where "aloha" means both hello and goodbye. But sometimes, the goodbye is permanent;Jessica is on the Hawaiian island of Maui, giving a lecture at Maui College on community involvement in police investigations-a subject she knows well. Her co-lecturer is legendary retired detective Mike Kane, a behemoth of a man who shares his love of Hawaiian lore, legends...

Death Valley lives up to its name when a murder draws Ellery Queen into the strange practices of a religious cult.
 
It’s 1943, the war is raging, and sleuthing scribe Ellery Queen wants to do his bit. After a tortuous cross-country drive, he takes a job writing scripts for a Hollywood propaganda house—twelve hours a day of hack work that quickly turns his mind to jelly. After a few weeks, he is so worn down that...