Most Read Cozy Mystery Books

In a peaceful retirement village, four unlikely friends meet weekly to discuss unsolved crimes. But when a real murder occurs on their doorstep, the Thursday Murder Club finds themselves in the middle of their first live case. With their unique skills and sharp wits, this group of septuagenarians sets out to catch a killer, proving that age is just a number when it comes to solving mysteries.

• found family
• multiple povs
• epistolary

Molly Gray is a hotel maid at the Regency Grand, and she loves her work: the trolley stocked just so, the satisfying return of a messy room to a state of perfection, the quiet dignity of a job done well. Molly sees the world a little differently from other people — she takes language literally, misses social cues, and has relied since childhood on her late Gran's rules to navigate a world she finds bafflingly complicated. As long as everything is in its proper place, she is content. Then Molly lets herself into the suite of the wealthy, frequently unpleasant Mr. Black and finds him dead in his bed. Because she behaves nothing like people expect a witness to behave, and because she knows more about the hotel's guests and staff than she lets on, Molly quickly becomes the police's prime suspect. To clear her name, she will have to accept help from an unlikely group of allies and learn to tell the difference between the people who mean her well and those who don't. Nita Prose's debut is a warm, twisty contemporary mystery with the comfort of a cozy and a genuinely original narrator. The Maid is as much a story about being underestimated and finally seen as it is a whodunit, balancing a hotel full of secrets with real tenderness toward its heroine.

• found family
• unreliable narrator
• betrayal
• workplace romance

The Thursday Murder Club is enjoying a quiet retirement at Coopers Chase — until an old friend of Elizabeth's from her intelligence days arrives asking for help. He has stolen twenty million pounds in diamonds from some very dangerous people, and he needs Elizabeth to keep him alive. Soon Elizabeth, Joyce, Ron, and Ibrahim are chasing leads on international criminals and missing jewels, and a body turns up before they've even started. The second Thursday Murder Club mystery blends twisty plotting with the warmth and humour that made the series a phenomenon.

• found family

Vera Wong is a lonely tea shop owner in San Francisco who finds a dead body in her store and decides she is better equipped to solve the crime than the police. After swiping a flash drive from the scene, she begins investigating her new customers to find the killer. Instead of a murderer, she finds a group of people who desperately need her motherly care and a good cup of tea.

• found family
• mystery box
• mentor figure

The Thursday Murder Club finds their quiet year interrupted by a wedding, but festivities quickly turn sinister when a guest fears for their life. Elizabeth's encounter ignites a new investigation as a ruthless villain seeks an uncrackable code. The gang must race against time to solve a complex puzzle and prevent a murder.

• found family

The Thursday Murder Club finds themselves embroiled in another mystery when a decade-old cold case resurfaces, involving a local news legend and a murder without a body. Simultaneously, Elizabeth faces a deadly ultimatum: kill or be killed. As the stakes rise, the club must race against time, chasing clues and navigating dangerous threats to solve the mystery and protect one of their own.

• found family

The Thursday Murder Club faces their most personal case yet when an old friend is killed and a dangerous package goes missing. Elizabeth, Joyce, Ibrahim, and Ron must navigate the world of art forgery and drug dealers to find a killer before the killer finds them. It is a race against time that tests the limits of their friendship and their wits.

• found family

A NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER A Jimmy Fallon’s Book Club Finalist for 2024 | A Goodreads Choice Awards Finalist | A GMA Buzz Pick | A USA Today Bestseller One of Amazon's Top 10 Best Books of April, One of Jimmy Fallon's favorite books for Spring 2024, The Top LibraryReads pick for March 2024, A Publishers Marketplace 2024 BuzzBook, One of NPR's Books We Love Frances Adams always said she’d be murdered. She was right. In 1965, Frances Adams is at an English country fair where a fortune-teller makes a bone-chilling prediction: One day, Frances will be murdered. It is a prediction that sparks her life’s work—trying to solve a crime that hasn’t happened yet. Nearly sixty years later, Annie Adams is summoned to a meeting at the sprawling country estate of her wealthy and reclusive great-aunt Frances. But by the time Annie arrives in the quaint English village of Castle Knoll, Frances is found murdered, just like she always said she would be. Annie is determined to catch the killer, but thanks to Frances’s lifelong habit of digging up secrets and lies, it seems every endearing and eccentric villager might just have a motive for her murder. Can Annie safely unravel the dark mystery at the heart of Castle Knoll, or will dredging up the past throw her into the path of a killer? As Annie gets closer to the truth, and closer to danger, she starts to fear she might inherit her aunt’s fate instead of her fortune.

• dual timeline
• mystery box
• betrayal

Molly Gray, a meticulous Head Maid at the Regency Grand Hotel, prides herself on maintaining perfection. However, her orderly world is upended when a famous mystery writer is found dead in the grand tea room, leaving Molly with a most unusual clean-up. As whispers and suspicions spread through the hotel, Molly realizes she holds a crucial piece of the puzzle. Unlocking the truth means confronting her past, her grandmother, and long-buried memories, as she discovers a hidden connection to the deceased guest.

• locked room

Two women swap places for twelve hours to expose one of their husbands. By morning he is dead, and the alibi they built for each other is the only thing holding.

• secret identity
• multiple povs
• betrayal
• morally grey

1923, London: research assistant Saffron Everleigh is trying to make her name in University College London's male-dominated botany department when a professor's wife collapses, poisoned, at a faculty dinner party. With her mentor the prime suspect, Saffron turns her scientific expertise to solving the crime — venturing into greenhouses, gardens, and the university's darker corners with fellow researcher Alexander Ashton at her side. The first novel in the Saffron Everleigh Mystery series.

• slow burn
• workplace romance
• mentor figure

Stephen King delivers four intense novellas that explore the dark consequences of retribution. These stories examine how ordinary people react when pushed to their absolute limits, revealing the terrifying lengths they'll go to for justice. Prepare for tales of desperation and the chilling paths taken when vengeance calls.

• revenge
• morally grey
• anti hero
• survival

Hannah already has her hands full trying to dodge her mother's attempts to marry her off while running The Cookie Jar, Lake Eden's most popular bakery. But once Ron LaSalle, the beloved delivery man from the Cozy Cow Dairy, is found murdered behind her bakery with Hannah's famous Chocolate Chip Crunchies scattered around him, her life just can't get any worse. Determined not to let her cookies get a bad reputation, she sets out to track down a killer. But if she doesn't watch her back, Hannah's sweet life may get burned to a crisp.

• slow burn
• small town

"Lana Lee is a dutiful daughter, waiting tables at her family's Chinese restaurant even though she'd rather be doing just about anything else. Then, just when she has a chance for a "real" job, her parents take off to Taiwan, leaving Lana in charge. Surprising everyone--including herself--she turns out to be quite capable of running the place. Unfortunately, the newlyweds who just opened the souvenir store next door to Ho-Lee have turned up dead. . .and soon Lana finds herself in the midst of an Asia Village mystery." --

• fish out of water
• found family

"The last place Lana Lee thought she would ever end up is back at her family's restaurant. But after a brutal break-up and a dramatic workplace walk-out, she figures that helping wait tables is her best option for putting her life back together. Even if that means having to put up with her mother, who is dead-set on finding her a husband. Lana's love life soon becomes yesterday's news once the restaurant's property manager, Mr. Feng, turns up dead--after a delivery of shrimp dumplings from Ho-Lee. But how could this have happened when everyone on staff knew about Mr. Feng's severe, life-threatening shellfish allergy? Now, with the whole restaurant under suspicion for murder and the local media in a feeding frenzy--to say nothing of the gorgeous police detective who keeps turning up for take-out--it's up to Lana to find out who is behind Feng's killer order ... before her own number is up."--Adapted from back cover.

The third Noodle Shop Mystery. Now managing her family's Cleveland restaurant, Lana Lee enters Ho-Lee in the city's Best Noodle Contest — until a food critic is found dead, face-down in a bowl of lo mein.

A holiday novella following Molly Gray of the Regency Grand Hotel. A Secret Santa exchange among the hotel staff raises questions about who Molly can trust, testing her relationship with her boyfriend Juan Manuel just as she wants the season to be perfect.