Books for your birthday

It’s that time of year again. The arrival of my birthday, Canada Day, and Independence Day. Amazing that three such important birthdays fall so close together.

Even if you don’t live in Canada or the USA, consider this your birthday celebration too. I have rounded up some free and $0.99 books for you, so celebrate by filling your Kindle with some inexpensive summer reads!

My deals:

In the Tick of Time

Things creep and crawl in the woods. Things that can wreak havoc with your life. Things that can be deadly. 

As an infectious disease expert for the DOH’s vector-borne disease division, Matt Malloy knows this. What he doesn’t know is who, or why, someone would want to deliberately infect innocent people. Adding insult to injury, his co-workers think he’s either paranoid or losing his mind because of erratic behavior and disordered sleep habits.

Behavior he can’t help. A traumatic head wound can have that effect on a man. He was clocked hard while interviewing a patient with Lyme disease weeks ago, and he’s still suffering from it.

But he’s definitely not crazy. 

Or paranoid.

Someone is deliberately infecting people. Maybe even someone he knows. Very soon, that someone will know Matt’s on to him.

Can he prove his suspicions before he’s targeted, too?

A nail-biting, creepy-crawly, medical-thriller that fans of Robin Cook will devour because it could happen to you. Maybe it already has. 

Read it today.

Free on Kobo and Apple Books, $0.99 on Kindle, free on Bookfunnel.

Read sample Download

Gluten-Free Murder

Erin Price moves to Bald Eagle Falls, a place where everyone knows everyone as well as everyone else’s business, taking over the store left to her by her aunt to start up a gluten-free bakery. The grand opening is marred by just one thing, the death of her business rival, Angela Plaint. It appears that Angela was poisoned by one of Erin’s cupcakes, making her a prime suspect.

Equipped with cupcakes, her desire for the truth, and new bakery assistant Vicky’s help, Erin goes head-to-head against Detective Terry Piper to solve the murder. Rumors of treasure hunting, drug dealing, and a missing boy swirl around Bald Eagle Falls as Erin tries to sort the clues from the red herrings and find the killer before the killer can take care of her.

$0.99 on Kindle, $2.99 on Kobo, free with newsletter sign-up.

Read sample SIGN UP

And more…

Don’t forget to double-check prices before purchasing, these deals may not be available in all countries or all the way through Independence Day.

Dead Man’s Hand

What happens when the deck is stacked against you…

From NFL rising-star prospect to wanted fugitive, Calvin Watters is a sadistic African-American Las Vegas debt-collector framed by a murderer who, like the Vegas Police, finds him to be the perfect fall-guy.

…and the cards don’t fall your way? 

When the brutal slaying of a prominent casino owner is followed by the murder of a well-known bookie, Detective Dale Dayton is thrown into the middle of a highly political case and leads the largest homicide investigation in Vegas in the last twelve years. 

What if you’re dealt a Dead Man’s Hand? 

Against his superiors and better judgement, Dayton is willing to give Calvin one last chance. To redeem himself, Calvin must prove his innocence by finding the real killer, while avoiding the LVMPD, as well as protect the woman he loves from a professional assassin hired to silence them.

$0.99 July 1 – 7

Dead Man's Hand

What You Did

Former FBI-profiler, Eva Rae Thomas, faces the most personal case in her career, as bestselling author Willow Rose’s new hit series continues. 

Three girls disappear on prom night at the local high school. One of them is the prom queen. 

FBI profiler Eva Rae Thomas is chasing her long-lost sister when detective—and boyfriend—Matt Miller asks her to join the investigation of the three girls’ disappearance. They were last seen walking home together after the dance. 

When the body of a young girl shows up in her backyard, Eva Rae knows she can no longer watch from the sidelines, and soon she realizes not only is she involved in this investigation, she’s also this killer’s target.

What You Did

One Slip

When Connie Silverstein agreed to babysit her friend’s four-year-old son, she never dreamed it would end in disaster. Now the usually dependable medical student finds herself responsible for the boy’s near drowning and subsequent brain damage.

Connie is desperate to help the boy recover, but the grieving mother no longer trusts her. Consumed by guilt, Connie attempts to deaden her pain with alcohol. But there’s not enough vodka in the world to right the wrong she’s done. Family and friends attempt to intervene in her downward spiral, assuring her that tragic accidents can happen to anyone.
But only Connie knows the terrible secret that what happened was no accident.

One Slip

Dead Witch on a Bridge

Is her magic strong enough to stop a killer?

On her first assignment as a demon-hunting witch, Alma was unable to kill. Now broke and unemployed at twenty-six, she lives in Silverpool, a remote town in a redwood forest north of San Francisco, where she sells magic-infused jewelry and tries to live a drama-free life.

When fairies draw her to the dead body of her ex-boyfriend, she must defend herself and the hidden power in Silverpool from an influx of supernatural trouble. The only way to make peace—and stay alive—is to find the killer.

Drawing upon years of formal magical training she’d rather forget, and using other abilities she’d like to keep secret, Alma goes up against bloodthirsty fae, a dangerously charming demon, her infamous father, and other ambitious witches with agendas of their own.

This time, an inability to kill might be not just the end of her job, but of her life…

Dead Witch on a Bridge

Dead of Winter

When the fingers of dead women start showing up in the Supreme Court’s mail, ex-FBI Agent Jeremy Winter is brought back to the Bureau to aid in the investigation.

Agent Maggie Keeley, his girlfriend and now boss, leads the search for the serial killer. Together, Jeremy and Maggie learn the five remaining cities on the murderer’s list, but they have no idea when the killer will strike or whom he will target. When they stumble upon a clue at the scene of a young woman’s death, the case focuses on an abandoned ramshackle home in sparsely populated west Texas.

As the FBI closes in, the ante is upped in ways no one could have imagined, forcing Jeremy to choose between justice and revenge.

Dead of Winter

Don’t Lie to Me

When twelve-year-old Sophie Williams went on a Girl Scout summer camp, she never returned home.

Three months later, her body is found inside her sleeping bag in the most frequented area of Cocoa Beach, and the town is outraged. 

The girl isn’t just any child. She’s the town’s most beloved surf idol, and it was believed that she could be the next Kelly Slater. 
As another child, the son of a well-known senator is kidnapped, and the parents receive a disturbing video, FBI profiler Eva Rae Thomas â€” who has just returned to her hometown, divorced and out of a job — plunges into the investigation, breaking her promise to her children not to do police work again. 

Local law enforcement, with her old flame Matt Miller in charge, are the ones who ask for her help in a case so unsettling that only she can solve it. But the deeper they dig, the deadlier it becomes for Matt and Eva Rae. Soon, everyone she holds dear is in grave danger as this case hits a little too close to home.

Don't Lie to Me

Arsenic in the Azaleas

After her ex-husband leaves her high and dry, former socialite Doreen Montgomery’s chance at a new life comes in the form of her grandmother, Nan’s, dilapidated old house in picturesque Kelowna … and the added job of caring for the animals Nan couldn’t take into assisted living with her: Thaddeus, the loquacious African gray parrot with a ripe vocabulary, and his buddy, Goliath, a monster-size cat with an equally monstrous attitude.

It’s the new start Doreen and her beloved basset hound, Mugs, desperately need. But, just as things start to look up for Doreen, Goliath the cat and Mugs the dog find a human finger in Nan’s overrun garden.

And not just a finger. Once the police start digging, the rest of the body turns up and turns out to be connected to an old unsolved crime.

With her grandmother as the prime suspect, Doreen soon finds herself stumbling over clues and getting on Corporal Mack Moreau’s last nerve, as she does her best to prove her beloved Nan innocent of murder.

Arsenic in the Azaleas

Murder at the Old Abbey

White Monk Abbey is a local landmark and its resident patriarch, Caradoc Mansell, a foreboding presence. He runs his household and family as if he is still in the army. And he’s been known for rubbing people up the wrong way.

So, when he is found murdered, the challenge Chief Inspector Matt Lambert of the Newport police faces is that many people had a powerful grudge or good reason to want him dead.

And when it is discovered that Caradoc had children from dalliances in his youth, his family also fall under suspicion â€“ their substantial inheritance having been put in doubt.

Murder at the Old Abbey

Honeymoon Cottage

Camilla Stewart’s ex-fiancé ripped her off and disappeared, leaving her to care for his eight-year-old son alone. But when she arrives in Pajaro Bay, she finds a village full of cute cottages, quirky characters… and a killer on the loose who is somehow linked to her, the young boy, and the darling little house known as the Honeymoon Cottage. 

Honeymoon Cottage

Red Phoenix

In the aftermath of a series of student riots in Seoul, the U.S. Congress rushes a bill into law calling for the complete withdrawal of American troops from South Korea. This sets off a chain reaction: North Korea attacks across the DMZ, Russia supports North Korea, the Chinese remain neutral, and the United States fights again alongside its South Korean allies.

The full range of ground, air, and naval forces take part in vicious combat, first to hold off the North Korean onslaught, then drive them back.

Red Phoenix

Death of a Crafty Knitter

After solving a murder, gift shop owner Stormy Day is famous in Misty Falls. 

When she lets a mysterious fortune teller offer romance advice, Stormy is drawn into a world of deception. When a body shows up, more secrets and lies follow, confounding the investigation.

Even Jeffrey, the mischievous Russian Blue cat, seems puzzled by the Death of the Crafty Knitter. As Stormy races to find the killer, the danger escalates, bringing the amateur sleuth and the cold-blooded killer face-to-face for a startling climax. 

Death of a Crafty Knitter

Tragedy at Piddleton Hotel

1932. Growing bored in the autumn of her years, Londoner Annabel Churchill decides to buy a private detective agency in a Dorset village. The purchase brings with it the eccentric Doris Pemberley and it’s not long before the two old ladies have their first case.

No one has made more enemies than the local busybody, Mrs Furzgate, but when she suffers a fatal fall at Piddleton Hotel everyone assumes it was an accident. The detective duo, Churchill and Pemberley, suspect murder and are soon on the case. But is it possible they’ll upset even more people than Mrs Furzgate managed to?

With the subtlety of two bulls in a china shop, Churchill and Pemberley employ unconventional sleuthing techniques. What appears to be a shortcoming is actually a skill: being consistently underestimated enables them to spring a clever surprise.

Tragedy at Piddleton Hotel

One Summer

Down-and-out pastry chef Star Bloom has no choice but to swallow her pride and take a job at a mom and pop diner. But the goofy antics of a fellow waiter and the attentions of a sexy patron are starting to lift her sour mood. When her new friends help her land a spot on a televised cooking show, she’s hopeful it’ll be the big break she needs to open up her own bakery. 

Tyler Jackman would rather be animating cartoons than waiting tables. But when a blue-eyed beauty joins the diner staff, he starts counting down the hours to his next shift. Determined to get out of the friend zone, he hatches a plan to launch her dreams into the spotlight. But as his crush preps for the bake-off, Tyler faces his own tough competition in the battle to win her heart.

One Summer

The Closer I Get

Tom is a successful author, but he’s struggling to finish his novel. His main distraction is an online admirer, Evie, who simply won’t leave him alone.

Evie is smart, well read and unstable; she lives with her father and her social-media friendships are not only her escape, but everything she has.

When she’s hit with a restraining order, her world is turned upside down, and Tom is free to live his life again, to concentrate on writing.

But things aren’t really adding up. For Tom is distracted but also addicted to his online relationships, and when they take a darker, more menacing turn, he feels powerless to change things. Because maybe he needs Evie more than he’s letting on.

The Closer I Get

Lady Justice and the Living Trust

On his deathbed, the ninety-year-old former bookkeeper for the Kansas City mafia names Walt as the successor trustee on his Living Trust.

An unsuspecting Walt soon discovers that his duties include keeping an eye on the heirs who must complete some very specific tasks before claiming their inheritance. When things start to go south, Walt soon learns that the heirs will resort to anything, including murder, to get their hands on their grandfather’s money.

Lady Justice and the Living Trust

And Then She Was Gone

The silhouette stood at the edge of the woods like a spider watching a fly enter its carefully crafted web. Only a few more steps and she’d be within its grasp. 

Stacy Shaw has her whole life ahead of her. New job, new house and now a baby on the way–everything she’s ever hoped for is finally coming true. But on a warm summer night on the way home from work, she vanishes. The police race to find her, but the clues don’t add up. Conflicting facts emerge as her story twists and turns, sending the trail spiraling in all directions. 

A hometown hero with a heart of gold, Jack Stratton was raised in a whorehouse by his prostitute mother. Jack seemed destined to become another statistic, but now his life has taken a turn for the better. Determined to escape his past, he’s headed for a career in law enforcement. When his foster mother asks him to look into the girl’s disappearance, Jack quickly gets drawn into a baffling mystery. As Jack digs deeper, everyone becomes a suspect–including himself. 

And Then She Was Gone

Murder is a Monkey’s Game

Madi is horrified when she witnesses a strange, fatal paragliding incident. But when her private detective boyfriend, Lowell, arrives on the scene, he recognises the dead man right away.

Does someone know about Lowell’s dark past that he shared with the victim?

Who are the man and woman – who turn up in the village wearing suits and asking questions – really working for?

All of a sudden, Lowell is on the list of suspects for a crime where the only witness to murder is a monkey. 

Murder is a Monkey's Game

The Birthday Mystery

Jenny Starling is catering the twenty-first birthday party of upper-class twins, Alicia and Justin.

She arrives at their parents’ country house and is immediately met by the police. A young man has drowned in the pond. Was it an accident or murder?

But the birthday party goes ahead. Then just after midnight, everyone gathers for a champagne toast . . . and one of the guests falls down dead. The police are baffled and there is a whole party full of suspects. 

When it comes to someone adding the extra ingredient of poison to her own precious recipes, Jenny isn’t going to take it lying down. She has a reputation to protect.

The Birthday Mystery

If She Saw

Kate’s brilliant mind and unrivaled ability to enter the mind of serial killers is just too indispensable, and the FBI needs her to crack this baffling case. Why were two couples found murdered, 50 miles apart, and in the same manner? What can they possibly have in common? 

The answer, Kate realizes, is urgent—as she is certain the killer is about to strike again.

But in the deadly game of cat and mouse that follows, Kate, entering the dark canals of the killer’s twisted mind, may just find herself a moment too late.

If She Saw

The Last Cabin

Life has hardened Joanna Mercer, and she has spent the past four years since her husband’s death preparing herself against the uncertainties of life. After an EMP destroys the nation’s power grid, every ounce of that strength will be tested.

The Last Cabin

Someone Else’s Daughter

THE SEARCHING MOTHER
Miranda Steele.
Feisty. Independent. Skeptical.
Thirteen years ago her abusive husband stole her baby and gave it up for adoption.
She comes to Atlanta to find her daughter.

THE PI
Wade Parker.
Ace detective.
Wealthy owner of the Parker Investigative Agency.
The most eligible forty-four-year-old bachelor in Atlanta.
Still mourning the death of his socialite wife, he must solve a disturbing murder case.
Before the killer strikes again.

THE MURDERER
A serial killer strangling young girls in a bizarre ritual.
Why?

She doesn’t need a man.
He needs to find a killer.
Together, can they save a thirteen year old girl?

Someone Else's Daughter

Ice Cream with a Side of Danger

A family tragedy. A chilling final conversation. A sleuth pushed to the brink. And ice cream. Lots of ice cream.

Sabrina Carlson hasn’t spoken to her father since they had a big falling out.  

In fact, as time goes by, she wonders if she will ever see him again.  

So, when her father turns up dead one morning, Sabrina is shaken to her core.  

As much as she wants to take time to grieve, she knows that isn’t possible while a killer is on the loose.

Truthfully, Sabrina won’t be able to rest until her father’s killer is brought to justice.  

Unfortunately, her dad had a knack for making enemies.

Ice Cream with a Side of Danger

Dangerous Places

When teenager Heather Young disappeared from the small town of Himmel, Wisconsin, everyone believed her boyfriend Eric had killed her—though her body was never found. Twenty years later, Eric’s little sister Sammy returns to town. She begs her childhood friend, true crime writer Leah Nash, to prove her brother isn’t a murderer.

But Sammy has no new evidence, and her brother doesn’t want Leah’s help. Leah says no—but she can’t help feeling guilty about it. That feeling gets much worse when Sammy is killed in a suspicious car accident. It’s then that the independent, irreverent, unstoppable Leah takes up her cause. The investigation leads Leah to some dark and dangerous places, and a shocking personal connection to the crime.

Dangerous Places

Close to the Bone

FBI Special Agent Cate Wilde is back home on a remote Pacific Northwest island when she gets the call: a teenager’s skeletal remains have been found on a nearby island.

Together with Tessa Black, a childhood friend turned local deputy, Cate confronts dreary weather and bleak leads to make sense of the death. The complications pile up as Cate is distracted by the coroner on the case—and by nagging memories that draw her twenty years into the past.

The remains suggest eerie similarities between this victim, and Cate and Tessa’s friend Samantha, who disappeared when she was fourteen.

Close to the Bone

Tell me what you think!

Scroll to Top