The Secret Poison Garden

By Maureen Klovers

If you love cozy mysteries with strong, funny female sleuths, mouth-watering food, and small-town secrets, you'll fall hard for Rita Calabrese in The Secret Poison Garden.

Perfect for fans of M.C. Beaton's Agatha Raisin and Alexander McCall Smith's No. 1 Ladies' Detective Agency, this delightful culinary cozy mystery introduces Rita Calabrese, a no-nonsense Italian-American matriarch who stumbles into sleuthing-and stirs up trouble-in her charming Hudson Valley town.

After a lifetime of cooking for her boisterous famiglia, sneaking cannoli into her husband's lunch, and meddling (with love ) in her adult children's lives, Rita is ready for something new. When she lands a job writing human interest stories for the local paper, she quickly becomes a local celebrity-especially after profiling a shy science teacher who secretly grows poisonous plants in his backyard.

But things take a deadly turn when the town's beloved football coach is found murdered. As rumors swirl about a love triangle gone wrong-and a possible link to Rita's own son-Rita's instincts as a mother and a reporter go head-to-head. Can she uncover the truth before the killer strikes again?

Set against the picturesque backdrop of New York's Hudson Valley, The Secret Poison Garden is a warm and witty mystery full of Italian flavor, neighborly drama, and eight delicious, garden-to-table Italian-American recipes.

Fans of cozy whodunits, amateur sleuths, family dynamics, and foodie fiction won't want to miss this first book in the Rita Calabrese Culinary Mystery Series

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0999494120
• ISBN13: 9780999494127
• Release Date: May 2018
• Publisher: Chesapeake Books
• Length: 332 Pages
• Weight: 0.89 lbs.
• Dimensions: 0.7" x 5.3" x 8.0"