John Brownjohn

"On her sixtieth birthday, Auntie Poldi retires to Sicily, intending to while away the rest of her days with good wine, a view of the sea, and few visitors. But Sicily isn't quite the tranquil island she thought it would be, and something always seems toget in the way of her relaxation. When her handsome young handyman goes missing--and is discovered murdered--she can't help but ask questions. Soon there's an investigation, a smoldering police inspector,...

"There's only one Auntie Poldi: bewigged, cursing in Bavarian, and knocking back a wee shot of grappa as a pre-breakfast aperitif . . . or is there? No one is as they seem (and sound) in this hilarious new mystery featuring Sicily's sultriest sleuth... Strange dealings are afoot in the Apostolic Palace--a nun leapt to her death shortly after participating in a seemingly routine exorcism. But when a priest clad in Gammarelli and a Vatican commissario...

"When prosecco-loving Auntie Poldi retired to Sicily from Germany, she never dreamt her tranquil days would be interrupted by murder. But Sicily had other plans, and Poldi found herself honor-bound to solve the disappearance of her beloved (and cute) handyman. Now, she's finally ready for some peace and quiet--interrupted by romantic encounters with handsome Chief Inspector Montana, of course--when the water supply to her neighborhood is cut off and...

An eighteenth-century figurehead, the journal of a ship's quartermaster, and supernatural occurrences at a seaside resort lead twelve-year-old Vicki and her friend Peter on a quest to lift a curse and set right a horrible deed committed two hundred and thirty years in the past.

"It has been more than two hundred years since Bookholm was destroyed by a devastating fire, as told in Moers's The City of Dreaming Books. Optimus Yarnspinner, hailed as Zamonia's greatest writer, is on vacation in Lindworm Castle when a disturbing message reaches him, and he must return to Bookholm to investigate a mystery. The magnificently rebuilt city has once again become a metropolis of storytelling and the book trade. Yarnspinner encounters...

Freddy, a remarkably intelligent golden hamster, learns how to read and how to write on a computer and escapes captivity to become an independent and civilized creature.

Wine and murder - nothing is more likely to rouse Auntie Poldi's love of the chase. Still relishing the notoriety from her spectacular resolution of the Candela case, Poldi is alive to the faintest whiff of criminality.What to others might seem a series of misfortunes - the water supply cut off, a poisoned dog - is clearly, to Poldi, an escalation: the Mafia have had her in their sights ever since she solved Valentino's murder. Poldi has tasted blood....