A Cup Of Holiday Fear

It’s Christmastime and everyone is heading to Torte, the most cheerful bakery in town. There’s no place like home for the homicide... Ashland, Oregon, looks as pretty as a postcard this holiday season. The halls are decked, stockings hung, and eyes are all aglow—mostly thanks to the buttered rum. Jules Capshaw and her staff at Torte are busier than ever. . . still, even the town’s most in-demand bakers need to take a break. So Jules invites everyone to celebrate at the local Winchester Inn’s Dickens Feast, a six-course extravaganza with Yorkshire Pudding, Christmas goose, and all the trimmings. But as the weather outside becomes frightful, things inside turn less delightful when one of the guests ends up as dead as Scrooge’s doornail. Now it’s up to Jules and her helpers to make a list of suspects—and check it twice—to try to find out who’s naughty, who’s nice, and who’s guilty of murder... The Bakeshop mysteries are: “Delicious.” —RT Book Reviews “Marvelous.” —Fresh Fiction

Ellie Alexander's Live and Let Pie is the most delicious installment yet in the fantastic Bakeshop Mysteries set in Ashland, OR! Life is sweet once you step into Torte, everybody’s favorite small-town bakeshop. But what happens when it becomes the scene of a crime? The heat is on for pastry chef, family business operator, and unlikely sleuth Jules Capshaw. Just when she thought she could enjoy some time away from the kitchen, Jules manages to discover a skull during a picnic by the lake. As if unearthing remains that may be connected to a missing-persons case from the 1960s isn’t enough on her plate, Jules must contend with the unsolved matter of her own marriage while her estranged husband Carlos sails the open seas, awaiting a verdict. Then there’s Jules’s bitter landlord Edgar, who is intent on making a sweet deal on a vacant lot down the block from Torte—until he turns up dead. If only Jules could find a recipe that would let her bake her cake and eat it, too... The Bakeshop mysteries are: “Delectable.”—Portland Book Review “Delicious.”—RT Book Reviews “Marvelous.”—Fresh Fiction

Torte—the small-town bakeshop no one can resist—is hosting a midsummer night’s wedding . . . where merry-making and murder are served up in equal measure. Till Death Do Us Tart is Ellie Alexander's eighth delectable novel in the Bakeshop mystery series. Jules Capshaw has too much on her plate—and she’s feeling the pinch: the whole town of Ashland, Oregon, is in on the surprise Elizabethan-themed wedding she’s planning for her mom and soon-to-be stepdad. But is her secret scheme half-baked? She’s hiding racks overflowing with sweet treats while Torte is topsy-turvy with a major remodel and the return of Jules’s estranged husband, Carlos. And until now, Jules had no clue about the bitter family feud that has her friend Lance frazzled and suspicious. But when a party crasher takes someone out with a serving of poisoned wine and Jules discovers the deadly cup was intended for her, it’s time to turn the tables on a killer. The Bakeshop mysteries are: “Delectable.”—Portland Book Review “Delicious.”—RT Book Reviews “Marvelous.”—Fresh Fiction

This time, Torte’s pastry chef and amateur sleuth finds herself coming out of the oven and straight into the fire in Ellie Alexander's Nothing Bundt Trouble: A Bakeshop Mystery. Spring has sprung in Ashland, Oregon, and everything at Torte seems to be coming up buttercream roses. But just when Juliet Capshaw seems to have found her sweet spot—with her staff set to handle the influx of tourists for this year’s Shakespeare festival while she moves back into her childhood home—things take a dramatic turn. Jules discovers a long-forgotten dossier in her deceased father’s belongings that details one of the most controversial cases in Ashland’s history: a hit-and-run accident from the 1980s. Or was it? Now it’s up to Jules to parse through a whole new world of details from another era, from unraveling cassette tapes to recipes for Bundt cakes, before an old enemy brings the Capshaw “pastry case” to a modern-day dead end. The Bakeshop Mysteries are: “Delicious.”—RT Book Reviews “Marvelous.”—Fresh Fiction “Delectable.”—Portland Book Review

Ellie Alexander's Bake, Borrow, and Steal, the most delicious installment yet in the Bakeshop Series set in Ashland, Oregon! As the autumnal hues of November fall over the Shakespearean hamlet of Ashland, Oregon, Jules and her team at Torte are working on their biggest event ever. They’ve been invited to create chocolate showpieces for the gala opening of a new exhibit, Shakespeare’s Lost Pages at SOMA. The museum, located on the campus of Southern Oregon University, is getting ready to unveil the Bard’s lost manuscript, Double Falsehood, which is being touted as the greatest artistic discovery of modern times. In addition to molding luscious, silky chocolate into magnificent structures, Torte will be serving an authentic Elizabethan feast straight from the pages of a sixteenth century cookbook featuring Lardy cakes, Frangipane tarts, and jellies with chestnut cream. Jules has underestimated the amount of work required to pull off such a culinary feat. She finds herself in the strange position of feeling frazzled and stressed as the day of the gala approaches. However, her team rallies around her and once the massive works of chocolate art are safely installed at the museum, she can finally let out a sigh of relief and revel in the excitement of the grand celebration. But her relief is short-lived. Right before the unveiling, news quickly begins to spread that Shakespeare’s lost manuscript is missing. Not only that, but the security guard tasked with keeping the priceless artifact safe has been killed. Is this a case of a heist gone terribly wrong? Or could it be that a killer is lurking in the museum archives?

On a lonely Christmas a nephew remembers his beloved great-aunt and realizes the value of her legacy, a message of advice revealing the true spirit of the season.

Welcome to Torte-a friendly, small-town family bake shop where the treats are so good that, sometimes, it's criminal... After graduating from culinary school, Juliet Capshaw returns to her quaint hometown of Ashland, Oregon, to heal a broken heart and help her mom at the family bakery. The Oregon Shakespeare Festival is bringing in lots of tourists looking for some crumpets to go with their heroic couplets. But when one of Torte's customers turns up dead, there's much ado about murder... "Sure to satisfy both dedicated foodies and ardent mystery lovers alike." --Jessie Crockett, author of Drizzled with Death The victim is Nancy Hudson, the festival's newest board member. A modern-day Lady Macbeth, Nancy has given more than a few actors and artists enough reasons to kill her...but still. The silver lining? Jules's high school sweetheart, Thomas, is the investigator on the case. His flirtations are as delicious as ever, and Jules can't help but want to have her cake and eat it too. But will she have her just desserts? Murder might be bad for business, but love is the sweetest treat of all... "Alexander weaves a tasty tale of deceit, family ties, delicious pastries, and murder." Edith Maxwell, author of A Tine to Live, A Tine to Die

Looking for a new cozy series? In the new edition of Cozy Case Files, Minotaur Books compiles the beginnings of six charming cozy mysteries publishing in Winter 2022 for free for easy sampling. The fourteenth edition of Cozy Case Files features the latest cozies by the following authors: Korina Moss, Gigi Pandian, Diane Kelly, Ellie Alexander, and Paige Shelton. Feeling hungry? Check out these two series debuts. In Cheddar Off Dead, a cheesemonger discovers that her new home in a small Sonoma Valley town is ripe for murder... something here stinks to high heaven, and it's not the cheese. An impossible crime. A family legacy. The intrigue of hidden rooms and secret staircases. Under Lock & Skeleton Key layers stunning architecture with mouthwatering food in an ode to classic locked-room mysteries. Continuing with the architecture theme: Nashville’s killer real estate market returns in Batten Down the Belfry: Here is the church, here is the steeple... Open the doors, and see all the trouble. Celebrate the greats in these next two offerings. Bake, Borrow, and Steal finds Oregon’s favorite bakery, Torte, catering an authentic feast to celebrate a museum’s unveiling of Shakespeare’s lost manuscript. After being invited to a traditional Scottish celebration to honor poet Robert Burns, bookseller Delaney Nichols faces off against an elusive arsonist in The Burning Pages. Travel to 1907, New York: Beloved heroine Molly Murphy returns in Wild Irish Rose, from New York Times bestselling author Rhys Bowen, now writing in partnership with her daughter, Clare Broyles.