Midlife Strikes Books in Order

Midlife Strikes takes one of Mara Webb's favorite starting points, a woman whose life has just blown up, and pushes it into a more midlife, more first-person direction. The series begins when the narrator catches her husband cheating, moves into a run-down motel left to her by her grandmother, and finds a body floating in the pool before she has even figured out what starting over is supposed to look like.

Then a ghost informs her that she has come of age.

That is the series in miniature. The everyday crisis is real, the heartbreak is real, and the bills are real, but the paranormal side barges in anyway. Hidden magic, an inherited property, a coastal town called Kettle Harbor, and a grandmother who remains a problem even after death all help give the books their own voice within Webb's larger catalog.

The tone is still cozy, but there is a little more midlife frustration in the humor, which helps the series stand out. These books are about rebuilding after betrayal, learning that life is not over at forty, and discovering that your weird second act might be much more interesting than the first one.

If you like paranormal women's fiction energy mixed with light mystery, this series is a good fit. It keeps the magic and the murder, but it also makes room for the messy work of starting again.