Dive into a Cozy Mystery
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Mystery Writer Maya Corrigan
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Welcome! I write mysteries about people caught up in crimes who pursue justice, armed with quick thinking and courage. My Five-Ingredient Mysteries feature a café manager who solves murders with her live-wire grandfather in a historic Chesapeake Bay town. Each book has five suspects, five clues, and Granddad's five-ingredient recipes.
Scroll down for more about the seven books in the series. |
Gingerdead Man Is Out!Read the Kirkus review of Gingerdead Man, the 7th Five-Ingredient Mystery.
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By Cook or by CrookAs Val adjusts to a new life with her curmudgeonly grandfather, he takes up cooking and she takes us sleuthing to find the killer who framed her cousin for murder.
Haunted by the car accident that ended her career as a cookbook publicist, Val Deniston has left New York City for a quieter life near the Chesapeake Bay. She now lives with her curmudgeonly grandfather in the tourist town of Bayport and enjoys running the Cool Down Café at the fitness club. When a club patron is murdered, Val whips us a scheme to find the killer. While she investigates, Granddad takes up cooking, creating havoc in the kitchen. But kitchen disasters are the least of Val's problems when a murderer targets her. |
ISBN: 978-1-61773-138-9
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Buy from Kensington Books, Amazon, Barnes & Noble, Walmart, or a local bookstore through Indie Bound. |
Scam ChowderWhen a con man preying on retirees dies after eating Granddad’s clam chowder, Val must prove her grandfather innocent of murder.
Val loves the historic town where she lives with her grandfather, the Codger Cook. Running the fitness club’s Cool Down Café—and salvaging the five-ingredient dishes Granddad messes up—keeps her busy. She’s used to his catastrophes in the kitchen, but not in the dining room. When a dinner guest, a scammer who preys on retirees, goes face down in the chowder, Granddad's in the soup. As the police gather the ingredients for a murder conviction against him, he and Val dredge up secrets that could save him or get them both killed. Read more about Scam Chowder. Scam Chowder is currently available only as an e-book. If you want a hard copy, fill out the contact form in the footer. I'll locate a bookshop that can mail you the paperback. |
ISBN: 978-1-61773-138-9
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Order from Kensington Books, Amazon, Barnes & Noble, Walmart, or a nearby bookstore on Indie Bound. |
Final FondueWhen one woman is murdered while eating chocolate fondue and another almost bids her life a fondue farewell, Val and Granddad must stop a killer bent on re-creating Hitchcock’s creepy scenarios.
As Val helps her grandfather prepare for houseguests, visitors to Bayport’s Tricentennial Festival, he reminisces about the fondue parties of the 1970s, hauls down a fondue pot from the attic, and makes chocolate fondue to greet his guests. One guest eats her final fondue that night. In the dark the murderer might have mistaken her for another houseguest or even for Val. When a fondue fork and a kitchen knife disappear, Val and Granddad team up to keep the killer from making another stab at murder. Read more about Final Fondue. |
ISBN: 978-1-61773-142-6
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The Tell-Tale TarteThe search for the murderer of an actor famed for his Poe portrayal leads Val and Granddad to a “House of Usher” on the Chesapeake Bay and to the cemetery where Poe is buried.
Val fears for her grandfather’s life when an actor famed for his Poe one-man show is murdered while dressed and made up to look like Granddad. She soon learns the actor isn’t the only one doing an impersonation. The search for his murderer takes Val and Granddad to the home of a Poe-inspired author, Rick Usher. When they are stranded at the "House of Usher" by an ice storm, they uncover clues to the murder, but will they live to tell the tale? Read more about The Tell-Tale Tarte. |
ISBN: 978-1-4967-0917-2
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S'more MurdersWhen Val caters a dinner on a yacht in the Chesapeake Bay and re-creates the final meal served on the Titanic, long-submerged grievances lead to murder.
As warm April weather brings boaters to the Chesapeake Bay, Val agrees to cater a dinner party aboard a yacht. Its Titanic-obsessed owner asks her to re-create the final meal served on that doomed ship. On the anniversary of the Titanic’s sinking, the yachtsman welcomes his guests aboard and assigns them roles in a murder mystery game. Val soon reaches the chilling conclusion that the host is fishing for the culprit in a real crime. When someone disappears from the boat, Val has to reel in a killer before s’more murders go down. Read more about the last dinner on the Titanic and S'more Murders. |
ISBN: 978-1-4967-0919-6
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Crypt Suzette
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When a murder masquerades as an accident after a Halloween costume party, it takes Granddad's ghost-busting, Val's haunted house visit, and a Halloween ruse to unmask the killer.
When Val caters a Halloween party at Bayport’s new bookshop, the members of a creative writing group, the Fictionistas, dress up as book characters for a costume contest. One of them, the secretive Suzette, is renting a room from Granddad as she works her way through college. When she’s found dead of an apparent accident, Val and Granddad suspect foul play. So do her fellow Fictionistas, who accuse each other of murder. Did one of them kill her or was her death rooted in the past she’d worked hard to escape? As Val tries to answer that question, she nearly becomes the next “accident” victim. Read more about Crypt Suzette. |
ISBN: 978-1-4967-2242-3
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Gingerdead Man
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When Santa keels over after eating a gingerbread gift at the holiday tea party Val caters, she and Granddad must stop a killer from baking more deadly treats.
During Bayport's Dickens of a Holiday festival, Val is hosting a private tea party serving the costumed volunteers, who range from Dickens divas like Madame Defarge and Miss Havisham to Scrooge and the Ghost of Christmas Past. Santa and Mrs. Claus also come to tea. An unexpected guest arrives, "shrouded in a deep black garment" like the eeriest Dickens ghost, and hands out gingerbread men with white icing skeleton bones. Though the creepy treat called a gingerdead man looks like a Halloween leftover, cookie addict Santa can't resist it. When the man in red turns blue, Val and Granddad have to find the cookie-cutter killer fast to keep the holiday spirit alive. Read the first chapter of Gingerdead Man. |
ISBN: 978-1496722447
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