On Spine of Death (By the Book Mysteries, 2)

2023 EDGAR AWARD NOMINEE, LILIAN JACKSON BRAUN PRIZE for Buried in a Good Book

"In 'Keystone Kops'-style scenes set around the morgue, a muddy mountain, and the hardware store, bones and books disappear and reappear...[On Spine of Death] is a quirky story for those who enjoy funny cozies."--Library Journal

Bestselling author Tess Harrow and her teenage daughter Gertrude have decided to make Winthrop their home. Their cabin is fixed up and now they're turning to the family hardware store that Tess inherited from her late grandfather into the town's first independent bookstore.

But when renovations unearth bones from a cold case and send them toppling--literally--onto Tess's head, the work comes to a grinding halt. With the whole town convinced that her grandfather was a serial killer, Tess has to call in a fellow horror author for reinforcements. Together, they'll come up with a perfect story to make all the clues fit...and solve a mystery more than thirty years in the making.