by Maddie Day
Part of Cozy Capers Book Group Mystery
First published 2019
Mackenzie Almeida runs a bicycle shop in Westham, Massachusetts, where summer brings crowds of tourists to the seaside town. Instead of customers, Mac discovers Jake Lacey's body. Someone has stabbed the struggling handyman, and the police consider Mac their prime suspect. Witnesses saw her arguing with Jake hours before his murder. The situation grows worse when Mac recognizes the murder weapon as her brother Derrick's fishing knife. Mac has never solved a real crime, but she reads cozy mysteries with her book club, the Cozy Capers. She decides to investigate Jake's death herself, hoping to clear both her name and possibly her brother's. The other book club members agree to help her search for the real killer. Westham may be small, but Mac discovers the town holds many people with motives for murder. She must use everything she has learned from detective novels to solve this case before the police arrest her.
Genres: fiction, mystery, crime, contemporary, cozy-mystery, amateur-sleuth
Vibes: amateur-detective, community-driven, cozy, lighthearted, suspenseful
Tropes: amateur-sleuth, community-investigation, found-family, wrongly-accused
Setting: Westham, Massachusetts, Cape Cod
Period: contemporary, summer
310 pages · Mass Market Paperback · Kensington
Content warnings: murder