ANY POT IN A STORM

Wisconsin coffee shop owner Maggy Thorsen proves that she can solve murders even when she’s outside her home venue.

It’s not clear at first why Maggy’s business partner, Sarah Kingston, wants to leave Brookhills to travel to the frigid northern reaches of Wisconsin and attend a writers workshop at Payne Lodge, the remote family home of Lita Payne, part owner of the Brookhills Observer. The workshop promises to be an emotional disaster since its host, acid-tongued Observer editor Kate McNamara, insists that the attendees center their writing on their most traumatic personal experiences. Soon enough, it’s a literal disaster as well. A storm cuts off power to the house, depriving everyone of light and heat. And when the inevitable bodies start to crop up, there’s no way to call the police since the isolated lodge is, of course, out of cellphone range. Here’s where shopkeeper-cozy veteran Maggy shows her adaptability, shifting seamlessly into old-dark-house mode. Far from the comforts of her suburban home base, she becomes a wary hunter, alert to the dangers that surround her, protective of her fellow storm-soaked refugees, and, most important of all, able to pierce the veil of deception that temporarily shields the culprits. It isn’t easy to unravel the tangled motives that drive this cascade of crimes, but Maggy proves herself up to the challenge.

An inventive mashup of cozy subgenres.