Backdrop Dead: A Magnolia Showboat Mystery, Book One

In 1898, the placid life of Apple Creek, Ohio, librarian Gwen Barlow, the heroine of this charming series launch from Thomason (Firefly Nights), is upended when she learns that her maternal uncle, Eli Willoughby, has died in an accident and left to his sister, Gwen’s mother, Lillian, a Mississippi River showboat, Eli’s Magnolia Palace. Lillian leaps at the opportunity for a new life, and Gwen, despite her misgivings about leaving her “routinely quiet life of industry and comfortable apathy on the edge of a cornfield,” agrees to help “operate a floating palace in the sinful center of America.” That considerable challenge is magnified when Gwen learns that her uncle was crushed by a portion of a stage backdrop onboard Eli’s Magnolia Palace. Though the death was ruled accidental, there were plenty of people with reason to wish him dead, and Gwen turns sleuth as she struggles to keep the business financially afloat. Well-developed characters complement the solid plot, and the transition from librarian to detective doesn’t feel forced. Cozy fans will look forward to Gwen’s further adventures. (Self-published)