Hitch Mystery Books in Order

The Hitch Mystery series spins out of a clever idea and runs with it. Kelly "Hitch" Reville is a film student with a deep knowledge of Alfred Hitchcock, and she pays the bills by working as a crime scene videographer for a sheriff's department in North Florida. That means she stands with one foot in movie language and the other in real violence.

In Dial M for Matrimony, those two worlds crash together. Someone is staging murders that echo famous Hitchcock scenes, turning film students into unwilling cast members in a deadly private production. The set-up gives the book its flavor. This is a mystery for readers who enjoy references, structure, and the unsettling idea that a killer might see murder as art.

Hitch is a fun protagonist because she is not a standard sleuth. She knows cameras, scenes, framing, and suspense, and she uses that knowledge in ways a cop would not. At the same time, the story keeps her grounded in a real community, with real fear, jealousy, and academic rivalry feeding the danger.

The North Florida setting helps too. Lister moves from crime scenes to classrooms to a weekend wedding on a small island, keeping the plot mobile and visual. There is an almost playful energy in the premise, but the stakes are real and the killings are not treated lightly.

If you like mysteries built around movies, genre awareness, and a heroine who has to outthink a killer on both artistic and practical terms, Hitch is a memorable one-book stop in Lister's larger body of work.