Glenn Ickler books in order

Normally a church board meeting doesn’t end up in murder, but at the Unitarian Universalist Church, it does. Mitch and Al, no strangers to a good mystery, investigate the scene and find three things: • poisoned coffee • liberal congregation • murdered homosexual Is this a hate crime? Is the coffee-making minister a murderer? Or is the church-going pharmacist filling her own prescription for poison?

Al Jeffrey and "Mitch" Mitchell are two pun-loving pals who work for a daily newspaper in St. Paul, Minnesota. When a local doctor's patients begin dying in droves, Al and Mitch decide to investigate. But the doctor's nurse gives them nothing but misinformation, and the doctor himself seems suspicious. Al and Mitch are convinced that the doctor is a killer, but how can they prove it?

Who is killing these unhappy campers?

After millionaire bank president John Eichelberger is reported missing on Martha's Vineyard, newspapermen Mitch Mitchell and Al Jeffrey are sent to cover the story. When the banker's body washes up on the beach, Mitch and Al uncover no shortage of potential murderers.

When another victim surfaces, Mitch and Al add a suspect to their list: the mysterious "Kyle Miller," mentioned in the second victim's diary. The two pun-loving journalists will have to deal with kidnappers, vicious storms, and gun-toting madmen if they are to have a prayer of cornering the Cape Cod killer.

It’s curtains for this theater…and the actors. What is causing all the accidents that threaten to ruin the Glock Family Theatre? To find out, intrepid journalist “Mitch” Mitchell and his pal Al Jeffrey visit the Glock Resort to experience the theater’s troubles first-hand. One actress is nearly clobbered by a falling sandbag, an actor literally shoots himself in the foot, and twenty free-range rabbits wreak havoc among the audience. When Mitch and Al find the owner of the theater dead and an actress missing, the real drama begins to unfold.

When reporter Mitch Mitchell and photographer Al Jeffrey are sent to cover a huge square dance convention, they promenade straight into murder. The victims: two well-known square dance callers. As Mitch and Al investigate, they turn up a dance-floor full of suspects, including a blonde bombshell who spent the night with one of the victims. Mitch and Al have a plan for exposing the killer, but that s not all that will be exposed. Laughs and suspense combine in this sexy, enthralling mystery set in the colorful world of do-si-do, allemande left and kill your partner.

When Mitch Mitchell goes to see his friend Al's daughter play softball, he doesn t plan to become embroiled in a murder investigation involving the grotesque death of the game's umpire...nor does he expect that Al will be charged with the murder! Faced with a host of suspects who hated the ump, Mitch must track down the real killer, stave off crazies who predict an alien invasion, and sort out his extremely complicated love-life...all before the league's championship game. The puns fly like fast balls in this hilarious murder mystery romp by this master of humor and murder.

The famous duo Mitch and Al are at it again. Things couldn’t be finer on Martha’s Vineyard for the two "nosy newsmen." They have a new murder and a new mystery. Keys to solving the mystery: A treasure map, a shipwreck, a secret code and of course, a dead body. A Deadly Vineyard is Ickler at his best.

IT’S SO COLD THAT THE FLASHERS IN DOWNTOWN ST. PAUL ARE ONLY SHOWING PICTURES OF THEMSELVES when newspaper reporter Warren “Mitch” Mitchell and photographer Alan Jeffrey are called out to cover the discovery of the frozen body of a young woman.

The victim is a former St. Paul Winter Carnival performer who played the role of saloon singer Klondike Kate. She was last seen leaving a bar with what appeared to be a member of the Winter Carnival’s Vulcan Krewe, throwing suspicion on the entire eight-man group.

Mitch and Al ride with Vulcanus Rex and his Krewe on the coldest day of the year and the Winter Carnival threatens to explode over the possibility that a Vulcan could be the killer. The only thing keeping Mitch warm is the sultry brunette coordinator of the Klondike Kates, who wears red boots and a come-hither look. When at last he confronts the killer, the tables are turned and bullets fly in one of St. Paul’s finest hotels.

When Mitch Mitchell and his buddy, photographer Alan Jeffrey, receive a hot tip on a bone-chilling day in March, they arrive on the scene of an apparent missing-persons case, neither knowing quite what they’ve gotten themselves into. Mitch, hoping to keep his job at the Daily Dispatch in the midst of proposed layoffs, investigates the case in an attempt to crack it—like the ice on the St. Croix in spring—wide open.

While the sheriff is at risk of losing his patience, the intrepid reporter risks losing his girlfriend to the plains of Fargo, not to mention his job and his life. Can Mitch solve the case before the melting St. Croix destroys all the evidence?

The Minnesota State Fair is famous for its endless variety of foods on a stick, so reporter Warren “Mitch” Mitchell and his photographer buddy Alan Jeffrey are surprised when they’re sent to the fairgrounds to cover the introduction of still another stick-bound treat.

The new novelty, called Square Meal on a Stick, is introduced by its celebrity inventor, Vinnie Luciano, owner of one of St. Paul’s most successful restaurants. The program is held at Heritage Square, backed by square dancers and their handsome caller. The square is broken when Vinnie falls dead after taking three bites from his concoction.

Will Mitch and Al square-off against the killer who poisoned the Square Meal?

Marilee Anderson disappeared twenty-five years ago at the age of fifteen, but police are digging up the rose garden behind her parents’ home in search of new evidence on a hot summer day in St. Paul. Marilee was last seen on a Sunday morning, when her father sent her off to a convenience store three blocks from home to buy a loaf of bread.

Reporter Warren “Mitch” Mitchell and photographer Alan Jeffrey of the Daily Dispatch are the first newsmen on the scene at the Anderson home, but they learn almost nothing from closed-mouthed police until the diggers turn up a human skeleton. To everyone’s amazement, the bones prove to be those of a young adult male.

Police suspect that the mysterious remains are those of Jimmy Bjornquist, a teenager who worked at the convenience store and disappeared the same day as Marilee. But Jimmy turns up living on the West Coast, and he tells Mitch what happened at the store on the day Marilee vanished. Jimmy’s story raises the possibility that Marilee is still alive somewhere. 

After a man who offers to give them some current information about Marilee turns up dead, Mitch and Al respond to an invitation from an anonymous phone caller and find themselves staring down the barrel of a gun.

The sun isn’t even over the horizon at Madrigal’s Lodge on Gull Lake, and an empty motorboat is slowly circling the bay. The Governor’s Fishing Opener just got a lot more exciting. Luckily, St. Paul Daily Dispatch reporter Warren “Mitch” Mitchell and photographer Alan Jeffrey are on the scene.

They discover the boat had been rented out by the governor’s press secretary, whose body is soon found by a dive team. The autopsy reveals some unexpected results, and soon Mitch and Al are trying to get to the bottom of the mess―and still get home in time for Mitch’s wedding.

When an autopsy reveals arsenic in the dead man’s stomach, “a few days” visit on Martha’s Vineyard to settle the affairs of his recently departed octogenarian Uncle Walt becomes a longer, more adventurous stay for Minnesota cartoonist Dave Jerome and his buddies, St. Paul Daily Dispatch reporter Warren “Mitch” Mitchell and photographer Alan Jeffrey.

Because Uncle Walt was a former editor of the Daily Dispatch, Mitch and Al are ordered to stay on the Vineyard and report on the murder investigation. Dave stays with them in the “one for all and all for one” spirit of Alexandre Dumas’ Three Musketeers. But when another senior citizen, who claims to be either Teddy Roosevelt or Teddy Kennedy, turns up dead of arsenic poisoning, the puzzled investigators begin to identify more with the Three Stooges than the Three Musketeers.

Toss in a naked lawyer on a clothing-optional beach and a dazzling duo of identical twin sisters holding Uncle Walt’s financial investments, and the troubled trio is faced with many questions that seem to have no answers.

It’s no April fool joke when Sister Rebekah, leader of a religious sect called The Faithful United for Beatification at the Second Coming of Our Blessed Lord and Savior, tells her followers on April 1 that the Rapture will occur in two weeks on Easter Sunday.

Watching the television news clip of Sister Rebekah’s proclamation, Warren “Mitch” Mitchell, reporter for the St. Paul Daily Dispatch, tells his wife, Martha Todd, that he’s glad he won’t have write the sect’s long name because the story about the second coming will be covered by the newspaper’s religion writer.

However, the religion writer calls in sick the next day, so Mitch and his photographer buddy, Alan Jeffrey, are sent to interview Sister Rebekah. They find her frighteningly sincere in her claim that she communicates directly with the lord and that only her followers will be led to heaven on Easter Sunday. All others, she says, will be doomed to an unknown—and possibly very short—future.

The next morning, Sister Rebekah is found dead in her bed with a silver bullet in her head and a wooden stake driven into her heart. The doors of her hotel suite are locked from the inside and surveillance cameras show no one entering or leaving after Sister Rebekah’s last phone call.

As they often do, Mitch and Al set out to unlock the mystery of the murder. The task becomes more complicated when two members of the Faithful United, Sister Salome and Brother Noah, both claim to have been chosen by the lord to succeed Sister Rebekah as the cult’s spiritual leader.

Members choose up sides and downtown St. Paul becomes overrun with news media from all around the world. Hotels and bars are filled with reporters and photographers and the streets are jammed with sound trucks and SUVs. More chaos ensues when a pacifist group tries to join in the Rapture and a militant group attempts to hang Sister Salome.

“Timing is everything,” says St. Paul Daily Dispatch photographer Alan Jeffrey when he’s asked why somebody always gets killed when he and Daily Dispatch reporter Warren “Mitch” Mitchell are visiting Martha’s Vineyard.

Mitch and Al and their cartoonist companion, Dave Jerome, are on the celebrated vacation isle to testify for the prosecution in the trial of identical twins Ima and Ura Jewell, who are accused of murdering Dave’s uncle, Walter Jerome. The twins, who were Walter’s financial advisers, had also tried to murder this answer-hungry trio after confessing that they’d killed Walter because he’d caught them stealing $500,000 from his account.

As the trial of the glamorous twins begins, a new mystery arises when two visitors from St. Paul are shot to death by a professional killer on Grand Illumination Night on the grounds of the historic Martha’s Vineyard Camp Meeting Association.

While Mitch, Al and Dave puzzle over who hired the killer and why, another shooting takes place in the same Campgrounds cottage. The search to identify the person who paid the killer leads the three friends, who fashion themselves as The Three Musketeers, into a fast and furious deep water boat chase and a too-close encounter with a fast-moving airplane.

Meanwhile, the murder trial moves on toward an uncertain verdict as the defense goes on offense against Mitch, Al and Dave.

Louie Stein has a story that he is dying to tell—a story so special that Louie believes newspaper reporter Warren “Mitch” Mitchell will want to write a story about the story for the St. Paul Daily Dispatch. Mitch and his photographer buddy, Alan Jeffrey, are vacationing with their wives, Martha Todd and Carol Jeffrey, in the historic little town of Jonesborough, Tennessee, where they are attending the annual National Storytelling Festival.

The foursome has been lured to the festival by Louie Stein, an 82-year-old master storyteller from southern Minnesota. They are waiting in eager anticipation for Louie’s special story in one of the festival’s huge tents on Sunday afternoon when the audience is told that, “due to circumstances beyond our control,” Louie will not be appearing. The two couples hurry out of the tent and rush to Louie’s motorhome, where they had joined a group of storytellers at a party the previous evening.

To their astonishment, the vehicle is surrounded by yellow police tape, and Al is recruited by the police to enter the motorhome and photograph the bloody body of Louie Stein, who has been slashed and stabbed during the night.

A week later, another storyteller, who calls herself Thumbelina, says in her blog that she thinks she knows who killed Louie. Hours later, Thumbelina is also fatally slashed and stabbed, and Mitch and Al find themselves on the trail of a shadowy two-time killer. Will the killer be caught, or will the story that Louie Stein was dying to tell die with him and Thumbelina?

Led by their wives in a search for fun and friendships, newspaper reporter Mitch Mitchell and photographer Alan Jeffrey promenade into the world of square dance lessons. The two couples' newfound fun takes a shocking downturn when Andy Wetherbee, a nationally-famous visiting caller, is murdered while taking a cigarette break at the intermission of their first club dance. As they join police in a search for the killer's identity, Mitch and Al uncover long-time jealousies and private passions among the members of the Grand Squares Club.

Mitch is distracted when his mother accidentally shoots a late-night prowler on her farm, but a pistol pointed at his head brings him back into focus on the Wetherbee murder. Soon he and Al are caught up in the flight of three fugitives: Wetherbee's killer, the killer's accomplice and an unseen rifleman who blows out his mother's bedroom window in the middle of the night.