The Scum of All Fears: Squeaky Clean Mysteries, Book 5
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Death of the Couch Potato’s Wife (Book 1, Suburban Sleuth Mysteries)
You haven’t seen desperate until you’ve met Laura Berry, a career-oriented city slicker turned suburbanite housewife. Well-trained in the big city commandment, “mind your own business,” Laura is persuaded by her spunky 70-year-old neighbor Babe to check on another neighbor who hasn’t been seen in days. She finds her neighbor, Candace Flynn, wife of the infamous “Couch King,” dead, and at last has a reason to get up in the morning in suburbia: murder. Someone’s determined to stop her from digging deeper into the death of her neighbor, but Laura is just as determined to figure out who’s behind the death-by-poisoned-pork-rinds.
The Trouble with Perfect
Since the death of her fiancé two years ago, novelist Morgan Blake’s life has been in a holding pattern. She has a major case of writer’s block, and a book signing in the small mountain town of Perfect sounds like just the solution to help her clear her head. Her trip takes a wrong turn when, on her way there, she’s involved in a hit and run—she’s hit a man, and he’s run from the scene. Before fleeing, he mouthed the word “help.” She plans to give him that help, but first she must find him. In Perfect, she finds a town that offers everything she’s ever wanted. But is something sinister going on behind the town’s cheery exterior? Was she invited as a guest of honor simply to do a book signing? Or was she lured to town for another purpose—a deadly purpose?
The Good Girl
Tara Lancaster can sing Amazing Grace in three harmonies, two languages, and interpret it for the hearing impaired. She can list the Bible canon backward, forward, and alphabetized. And the only time she ever missed church was at seventeen because she had pneumonia and her mom made her stay home. But when her life shatters around her and her reputation is left in ruins, Tara decides escape is the only option. She flees halfway across the country to dog-sit, but the quiet anonymity she needs isn’t waiting in her sister s house. Instead she finds a knife with a threatening message, a fame-hungry friend, a too-hunky neighbor, and evidence of...a ghost? Following all the rules has gotten her nowhere. And nothing she learned in Sunday school can tell her where to go from there.
Home Before Dark
Nothing good ever happens after dark.
Those were the words country singer Daleigh McDermott’s father always repeated.
Now her father is dead, and Daleigh fears she’s returned home too late to make things right. As she’s about to flee back to Nashville, she finds a hidden journal belonging to her father. His words hint that his death was no accident.
Small town mechanic Ryan Shields is the only one who seems to believe that Daleigh may be on to something. Her father trusted the man, but Daleigh’s instant attraction to Ryan scares her. She knows her life and career, however dwindling it might be, are back in Nashville and that her time in the sleepy North Carolina town is only temporary.
As Daleigh and Ryan work to unravel the mystery, it becomes obvious that someone wants them dead. They must rely on each other—and on God—if they hope to make it home before the darkness swallows them whole.
Home Before Dark offers a blend of Nicholas Sparks meets Mary Higgins Clark, a mix of charming small town life in North Carolina tangled in a gripping suspense.
About the Author
Christy Barritt is an author, freelance writer and speaker who lives in Virginia.
She’s married to her Prince Charming, a man who thinks she’s hilarious—but only when she’s not trying to be. Christy’s a self-proclaimed klutz, an avid music lover who’s known for spontaneously bursting into song, and a road trip aficionado. She’s only won one contest in her life—and her prize was kissing a pig (okay, okay… actually she did win the Daphne du Maurier Award for Excellence in Suspense and Mystery also… and a couple of others, but she’d hate to brag). Her current claim to fame is showing off her mother, who looks just like former First Lady Barbara Bush.
When she’s not working or spending time with her family, she enjoys singing, playing the guitar, and exploring small, unsuspecting towns where people have no idea how accident-prone she is.
For more information, visit her website at: www.christybarritt.com.
Other Books by Christy Barritt
Squeaky Clean Mysteries:
#1 Hazardous Duty
#2 Suspicious Minds
#2.5 It Came Upon a Midnight Crime
#3 Organized Grime
#4 Dirty Deeds
#5 The Scum of All Fears
#6 To Love, Honor, and Perish (coming soon!)
Suburban Sleuth Mysteries:
#1 Death of the Couch Potato’s Wife
Stand-Alone Romantic-Suspense:
Keeping Guard
The Last Target
Race Against Time
Ricochet
Key Witness
Lifeline
High-Stakes Holiday Reunion (November 2013)
Standalone Romantic Mystery:
The Good Girl
Suspense:
The Trouble with Perfect
Home Before Dark
Nonfiction:
Changed: True Stories of Finding God through Christian Music
The Novel in Me: The Beginner’s Guide to Writing and Publishing a Novel
Table of Contents
CHAPTER 1
Chapter 2
CHAPTER 3
CHAPTER 4
CHAPTER 5
CHAPTER 6“Gabby?
CHAPTER 7
CHAPTER 8
CHAPTER 9Five, Six
CHAPTER 10
CHAPTER 11I
CHAPTER 12
CHAPTER 13
CHAPTER 14
CHAPTER 15It
CHAPTER 16
CHAPTER 17
CHAPTER 18
CHAPTER 19
CHAPTER 20
CHAPTER 21
CHAPTER 22
CHAPTER 23
CHAPTER 24Sure
CHAPTER 25
CHAPTER 26
CHAPTER 27
CHAPTER 28
CHAPTER 29
CHAPTER 30
CHAPTER 31
CHAPTER 32“Gabby!”
CHAPTER 33
CHAPTER 34
CHAPTER 35
CHAPTER 36
CHAPTER 37
Don’t Miss These Other Books in the Squeaky Clean Mystery Series:Hazardous Duty