Sherry Harris books in order

Welcome to Black Cat Weekly #58.

This issue kicks off our Halloween celebrations with a holiday-inspired tale. An incomplete draft of “Had a Wife...” was found in Janet Fox’s papers following her death, and I completed it. I hope you enjoy it. Keeping up the fantasy theme, we have a powerful tale by Craig Laurance Gidney inspired by the music of Joni Mitchell (selected by our acquiring editor Cynthia Ward). 

Our other acquiring editors have been busy, too—Michael Bracken presents an original mystery by the talented Kaye George (in which an ancient cave painting holds a clue to a murder), and Barb Goffman presents a tale by Sherry Harris, in which Stew Davis finds himself walking a dusty road in Who Knows Where, Wyoming after his car is stolen.

On the mystery front, we have our ever-puzzle solve-it-yourself story from Hal Charles, plus a pair of historical novels—one by Frank C. Robertson (it’s a mystery-western) and one by John T. McIntyre (set near the turn of the 20th century in New York City).

For our fantasy and science fiction readers, we have the first Darby O’Gill story (most famously filmed by Walt Disney), plus a pair of vintage pulp novellas by Fletcher Pratt and Murray Leinster. Fun stuff!

Here’s the complete lineup:

Mysteries / Suspense / Adventure:

“Discovery,” by Kaye George [Michael Bracken Presents short story]

“Nothing to Sneeze At,” by Hal Charles [Solve-It-Yourself Mystery]

“Last Chance Lost,” by Sherry Harris [Barb Goffman Presents short story]

The Boss of the Double E, by Frank C. Robertson [novel]

In the Dead of Night, by John T. McIntyre [novel]

Science Fiction & Fantasy:

“Maeve’s Quilt” by Craig Laurance Gidney [Cynthia Ward Presents short story]

“Had a Wife…” by Janet Fox and John Gregory Betancourt [short story]

“Darby O’Gill and the Good People,” by Herminie Templeton Kavanagh [short story]

“Potemkin Village,” by Fletcher Pratt [short novel]

“The Boomerang Circuit,” by Murray Leinster [short novel]

A whip smart librarian’s fresh start comes with a tart twist in this perfect cocktail of murder and mystery—with a romance chaser.  

MURDER ON TAP

With Chicago winters in the rearview mirror, Chloe Jackson is making good on a promise: help her late friend’s grandmother run the Sea Glass Saloon in the Florida Panhandle. To Chloe’s surprise, feisty Vivi Slidell isn’t the frail retiree Chloe expects. Nor is Emerald Cove. 

It’s less a sleepy fishing village than a panhandle hotspot overrun with land developers and tourists. But it’s a Sea Glass regular who’s mysteriously crossed the cranky Vivi. When their bitter argument comes to a head and he’s found dead behind the bar, guess who’s the number one suspect?

In trying to clear Vivi’s name, Chloe discovers the old woman isn’t the only one in Emerald Cove with secrets. Under the laidback attitude, sparkling white beaches, and small town ways something terrible is brewing. And the sure way a killer can keep those secrets bottled up is to finish off one murder with a double shot: aimed at Chloe and Vivi.

BAD TO THE BONE 

Chloe loves her new life pouring beers and mixing cocktails at the Sea Glass Saloon in the Florida Panhandle town of Emerald Cove. But on the job, the only exercise she gets is walking from one end of the bar to the other, so in the mornings she loves to run on the beach. On this morning’s foggy run, she spots a sailboat washed up on a sandbar. Hearing a cry, she climbs aboard the beached vessel to investigate and finds not only a mewling kitten—but a human skeleton in the cabin.

The skeleton is tied back to Chloe’s friend Ralph, whose wife disappeared on a sailboat with three other people twelve years ago. Believing his wife was lost at sea, Ralph remarried. Now he finds himself a murder suspect. Chloe is determined to find out who’s been up to some skulduggery, but her sleuthing will lead her into some rough waters and some bone-chilling revelations…

DEAD EXES TELL NO TALES 

Saloon owner Chloe Jackson appears to have a secret admirer. She’s pouring drinks at the Sea Glass Saloon in Emerald Cove when an airplane flies by above the beach with a banner reading I LOVE YOU CHLOE JACKSON. She immediately rules out Rip Barnett. They are in the early stages of dating and no one has said the L word. Then a bouquet of lilacs—her favorite flower—is delivered to the bar, followed by an expensive bottle of her favorite sparkling wine. It couldn’t be . . .

Sure enough, her ex-fiancé from Chicago has flown down to Florida for an accountants’ convention. But is he trying to mix business with pleasure and win her back? Unfortunately he’s not in a hotel conference room, he’s floating facedown in the lake next to her house, clutching a photo of Chloe. Who murders an accountant on a business trip—it just doesn’t add up. When Rip becomes the prime suspect, Chloe is determined to find the secret murderer. But if she isn’t careful, it may be closing time and lights out for her . . .

Chloe Jackson runs a saloon in Emerald Cove, Florida—and she also happens to be an expert at putting people behind bars . . .

LAST CALL 

The Florida Panhandle Barback Games are coming up and Chloe’s been drafted to represent the Sea Glass Saloon—competing in various obstacle-course events that conclude with rolling an empty keg up a hill. The rivalries are so fierce that some of the participating bars even stoop to bringing in ringers.

Meanwhile, Chloe’s friend Ann—a descendant of the famed pirate Jean Lafitte—asks her to come along for a boat ride as Ann dives into the Gulf of Mexico. She’s found some old papers that may identify the location of sunken treasure. Instead, she finds a sunken body—of one of the ringers hired for the Barback Games. Now that murder is in the mix, Chloe has to figure out whether one of the competitors went overboard . . .

When cozy mystery writers meet Edgar Allan Poe, the result is Edgar Allan Cozy. Each story in this suspenseful new anthology is inspired by the work of Poe. "The Raven," "The Lighthouse," "MS. Found in a Bottle," "The Tell-Tale Heart," "The Cask of Amontillado," and "Annabel Lee" have been updated and set in the fictional town of Raven Harbor, Maine. Edited by Sadie Hartwell.

A garage sale fanatic searches for evidence to clear her cheating ex of murder.

Starting your life over at age thirty-eight isn’t easy, but that’s what Sarah Winston finds herself facing when her husband CJ runs off with a 19-year-old temptress named Tiffany. Sarah’s self-prescribed therapy happily involves hitting all the garage and tag sales in and around her small town of Ellington, Massachusetts. If only she could turn her love for bargain hunting into a full-time career.

But after returning from a particularly successful day searching for yard sale treasures, Sarah finds a grisly surprise in one of her bags: a freshly bloodied shirt . . . that undoubtedly belongs to her ex, CJ, who now happens to be Ellington’s chief of police. If that’s not bad enough, it seems Tiffany has gone missing. Now it’s up to Sarah to prove that her cold-hearted ex is not a cold-blooded killer . . .

ONE MAN’S CLUTTER

When Sarah Winston turns Ellington, Massachusetts, into New England’s largest garage sale for a day, it’s the small town’s biggest event since the start of the Revolutionary War—but without the bloodshed. That is, until a valuable painting goes missing…and the lifeless body of an Air Force officer is found in Carol Carson’s painting studio, his face perfectly framed with the murder weapon—a metal picture frame.

IS ANOTHER MAN’S CLOVER

Sarah is mad as heck that someone used her town-wide garage sale to commit a crime—and frame her good friend Carol. She is definitely on this case…but it’s not easy rummaging through increasingly strange clues that point to cheating spouses, downright dirty investment schemes—even the mob. And Sarah will have to be very careful if she wants to live to bargain another day…

Her Next Sale

When Sarah Winston started the virtual garage sale, it seemed like a keystroke of genius and the next logical step in her business. No more collapsing card tables and rainy-day washouts. But what began as a fun way to run garage sales during the long New England winter has become a nightmare of managing people and putting out fires. Online, she can avoid the crowds--but not the crazies.

May Be Her Last

She certainly never bargained on dealing with frightening threats. And when a client is murdered, it's time for Sarah to swallow her pride and seek the help of her ex--C.J. Hooker, chief of police. Forging a tense alliance, they search--online and off--for the killer. But solving this crime before someone else gets tagged seems virtually impossible…

HER BROTHER IS NO BARGAIN

When Sarah Winston’s estranged brother Luke shows up on her doorstep, asking her not to tell anyone he’s in town—especially her ex, the chief of police—the timing is strange, to say the least. Hours earlier, Sarah’s latest garage sale was taped off as a crime scene following the discovery of a murdered Vietnam vet and his gravely injured wife—her clients, the Spencers. 

BUT IS HE A KILLER?

All Luke will tell Sarah is that he’s undercover, investigating a story. Before she can learn more, he vanishes as suddenly as he appeared. Rummaging through his things for a clue to his whereabouts, Sarah comes upon a list of veterans and realizes that to find her brother, she’ll have to figure out who killed Mr. Spencer. And all without telling her ex ...

FOUL PLAY IN THE GYM

When it comes to running a successful garage sale, Sarah Winston believes in doing her homework. She also believes in giving back. But when she agrees to manage an athletic equipment swap, she doesn't bargain on an uncharitable killer. The day of the event, the school superintendent is found dead in the gymnasium. 

HAS SARAH PLAYING DEFENSE

Suddenly the murder suspects are the school board members—including the husband of a very difficult client who's hired Sarah to run a high-end sale and demands she do her bidding. In between tagging and haggling, Sarah studies the clues to see who wanted to teach the superintendent a lesson. But as she closes in on the truth, the killer intends to give her a crash course on minding her own business . . .

A garage sale specialist gets mixed up with a book worth killing for.

A wealthy widow has asked Sarah Winston to sell her massive collection of mysteries through her garage sale business. While sorting through piles of books stashed in the woman’s attic, Sarah is amazed to discover a case of lost Hemingway stories, stolen from a train in Paris back in 1922. How did they end up in Belle Winthrop Granville’s attic in Ellington, Massachusetts, almost one hundred years later?

Before Sarah can get any answers, Belle is assaulted, the case is stolen, a maid is killed, and Sarah herself is dodging bullets. And when rumors spread that Belle has a limited edition of The Sun Also Rises in her house, Sarah is soon mixed up with a mobster, the fanatical League of Literary Treasure Hunters, and a hard-to-read rare book dealer. With someone willing to kill for the Hemingway, Sarah has to race to catch the culprit—or the bell may toll for her...

SHE’S GOT THE GOODS . . .

As a former military spouse, Sarah Winston’s learned a little about organizing, packing, and moving. Her latest project sounds promising: a couple of tech-industry hipsters, newly arrived in her Massachusetts town, who need to downsize. Unfortunately, when Sarah tries to sell their stuff, she discovers it’s all stolen—and she’s the unwitting fence. 

BUT SARAH’S PROBLEMS ARE JUST BEGINNING

Michelle, an old friend of Sarah’s from the Air Force base, is in line for a promotion—but not everyone is happy about it, and she’s been hit with an anonymous discrimination complaint. When one of the men she suspects is behind the accusations turns up dead in Michelle’s car, Sarah needs to clear Michelle’s name—as well as her own for selling hot merchandise. And she’ll have to do it while also organizing a cat lady’s gigantic collection of feline memorabilia, or they’ll be making room for Sarah in a jail cell . . .

ONE WOMAN’S TRASH . . .

Sarah Winston’s garage sale business has a new client: the daughter of a couple who recently died in a tragic accident while away on a trip to Africa. Their house is full of exotic items from around the world that need to be sold off. When Sarah learns that the deceased were retired CIA agents, the job becomes more intriguing—but when an intruder breaks in and a hidden camera is found, it also becomes more dangerous. And Sarah has enough on her plate right now since she’s investigating a murder on the side at the nearby Air Force base, where her status as a former military spouse gives her a special kind of access. 

. . . IS ANOTHER WOMAN’S TROUBLE

With so much work piling up, Sarah decides to hire some help. But her assistant, Harriet—a former FBI hostage negotiator—has a rare talent for salesmanship. Which is good, because Sarah may have to haggle for her life with Harriet’s assistance . . .

For bargain hunter extraordinaire Sarah Winston, starting life over in Ellington, Massachusetts, has been a true trash-to-treasure success story, except when there’s a run on dead bodies . . .

Sarah’s latest client, Alice Krandle, is sure she has a fortune in antiques on her hands. She’s already gotten a generous offer for the whole lot before her garage sale has even begun, but she thinks she can earn more with Sarah’s expert help. The problem is that while Sarah’s sorting through items from decades past, her landlady, Stella, faces a clear and present danger.

Stella’s kidnapper has contacted Sarah with a set of instructions, and “Don’t call the police” is at the top of the list. But they didn’t say anything about Sarah’s friend Harriet—who happens to be a former FBI hostage negotiator . . .