Creston Valley Public Library

Back home in the Kootenays after her Arizona honeymoon, Lane offers her assistance when neither the outgoing teacher, Rose, nor her replacement, Wendy, show up at the local schoolhouse one blizzardy Monday in December. But when she finds the teachers' cottage ransacked with Rose unconscious and bleeding, and Wendy missing, Lane delivers Rose to the hospital in Nelson and turns the case over to her exasperated husband, Inspector Darling, and his capable colleagues, Sergeant Ames and Constable Terrell. Who has been tormenting these women, and where has Wendy gone?

"Evie Austin, native of Hatteras Island, North Carolina and baddest girl on the planet, has not lived her life in a straight line. There have been several detours-career snafus, bad romantic choices, a loved but unplanned child-not to mention her ill-advised lifelong obsession with boxer Mike Tyson. Evie is not plucky, but when life's changes smash over her like the rough surf of the local shoreline, she muddles through-until that moment of loss and longing when muddling will no longer suffice. This is the story of what the baddest girl on the planet must find in herself when a bag of pastries, a new lover, or quick trip to Vegas won't fix anything, and when something more than casual haplessness is required. The Baddest Girl on the Planet is inventive, sharp, witty, and poignant. Readers will want to jump in and advise this baddest girl on the planet-or at least just give her a shake or a hug-at every fascinating turn."-- Provided by publisher.

"Esme is born into a world of words. Motherless and irrepressibly curious, she spends her childhood in the Scriptorium, a garden shed in Oxford where her father and a team of dedicated lexicographers are collecting words for the very first Oxford English Dictionary. Young Esme's place is beneath the sorting table, unseen and unheard. One day a slip of paper containing the word bondmaid flutters beneath the table. She rescues the slip, and when she learns that the word means "slave girl," she begins to collect other words that have been discarded or neglected by the dictionary men. As she grows up, Esme realizes that words and meanings relating to women's and common folks' experiences often go unrecorded. And so she begins in earnest to search out words for her own dictionary: the Dictionary of Lost Words. To do so she must leave the sheltered world of the university and venture out to meet the people whose words will fill those pages."-- Provided by publisher.

Ravaged and sore from giving birth to her first child, Megan is mostly raising her newborn alone while her husband travels for work. Physically exhausted and mentally drained, she's also wracked with guilt over her unfinished dissertation-a thesis on mid-century children's literature. Enter a new upstairs neighbour: the ghost of quixotic children's book writer Margaret Wise Brown-author of the beloved classic Goodnight Moon-whose existence no one else will acknowledge. It seems Margaret has unfinished business with her former lover, the once-famous socialite and actress Michael Strange, and is determined to draw Megan into the fray. As Michael joins the haunting, Megan finds herself caught in the wake of a supernatural power struggle-and until she can find a way to quiet these spirits, she and her newborn daughter are in terrible danger.

Launching an investigation of his own when his instincts tell him that more is behind a political shooting on Chicago's west side, SOS Detective Billy Harney uncovers a spate of murders connected to his troubled past.

"The Palm Beach Murders (previously published as Let's Play Make-Believe): Both survivors of the divorce wars, Christy and Martin don't believe in love at first sight and certainly not on a first date. But from the instant they lock eyes, life becomes a sexy, romantic dream come true. That is, until they start playing a strangely intense game of make-believe—a game that's about to go too far. Stingrays: When a teenager goes missing on a Caribbean beach, the local police are baffled. It's up to the Stingrays, a world class team that solves the unsolvable, to unearth the truth: a truth that no one will believe. Nooners: Everyone who knows Tim says he's a good guy. But the popular advertising exec has a problem: a lot of the people who know him are getting murdered. And by the time he figures out why, Tim won't feel so good anymore."--

Pushing away her devoted husband, a once-successful writer moves back into her bohemian childhood home, where she struggles to come to terms with the mental illness that has overshadowed her life.

"Kurt Austin races to Antarctica to stop a chilling plot that imperils the entire planet."-- Provided by publisher.

A retelling of the Trojan War from the perspectives of its women follows the stories of a vigil-keeping Penelope, an Amazon princess rival of Achilles, and three goddesses whose feud sparks a tragic conflict.

"Tea maven Theodosia Browning brews up trouble in the latest Tea Shop Mystery from New York Times bestselling author Laura Childs. It is the week before Halloween and Theodosia Browning, proprietor of the Indigo Tea Shop, and her tea sommelier, Drayton, are ghosting through the dusk of a cool Charleston evening on their way to the old Bouchard Mansion. Known as the Gray Ghost, this dilapidated place was recently bequeathed to the Heritage Society, and tonight heralds the grand opening of their literary and historical themed haunted house. Though Timothy Neville, the patriarch of the Heritage Society, is not thrilled with the fund-raising idea, it is the perfect venue for his grandniece, Willow French, to sign copies of her new book, Carolina Crimes & Creepers. But amid a parade of characters dressed as Edgar Allan Poe, Lady Macbeth, and the Headless Horseman, Willow's body is suddenly tossed from the third-floor tower room and left to dangle at the end of a rope. Police come screaming in and Theodosia's boyfriend, Detective Pete Riley, is sent to Willow's apartment to investigate. But minutes later, he is shot and wounded by a shadowy intruder. Timothy begs Theodosia to investigate, and shaken by Riley's assault, she readily agrees. Now, she questions members of the Heritage Society and a man who claims the mansion is rightfully his, as well as Willow's book publisher and her fiancé, all while hosting a Sherlock Holmes tea and catering several others. But the Gray Ghost holds many secrets, as do several other key suspects, while this murder mystery plays out on the eve of Halloween."-- Provided by publisher.

"Hamid, a college student, has entered Israeli territory illegally for work. Rushing past soldiers, he bumps into Vera, a German journalist headed to Jerusalem to cover the story of Salem, a Palestinian boy beaten into a coma by a group of revenge-seeking Israeli teenagers. On her way to the hospital, Vera runs in front of a car that barely avoids hitting her. The driver is Ido, a new father traveling with his American wife and their baby. Ido is distracted by thoughts of a young Jewish girl murdered by a terrorist who infiltrated her settlement. Ori, a nineteen-year-old soldier from a nearby settlement, is guarding the checkpoint between Bethlehem and Jerusalem through which Samar - Hamid's professor - must pass. These multiple strands open this magnificent and haunting novel of present-day Israel and Palestine, following each of these diverse characters as they try to protect what they love. Their interwoven stories reveal complicated, painful truths about life in this conflicted land steeped in hope, love, hatred, terror, and blood on both sides."--Provided by publisher.