A Basket of Trouble: A Claire Hanover Mystery

In Groundwater’s engaging third whodunit featuring gift-basket designer Claire Hanover (after 2009’s To Hell in a Handbasket), a string of suspicious deaths disrupts life in idyllic Colorado Springs, Colo. Claire is eager to see her brother, Charley, get his new riding stable up and running. But the opening of Charley’s business gets off to a rocky start when one of his employees, Kyle Mendoza, is found trampled to death in a horse’s stall. Soon afterward, Charley learns that the apparently accidental death might cost him a contract to run trail rides through a local public park, the Garden of the Gods. When more deaths occur, Claire calls on an informant, local drug lord Leon Fox, who’s aided her in the past, for help in uncovering the culprit’s identity. Groundwater’s well-crafted cozy comes complete with numerous red herrings and a picturesque setting. (Nov.)