Sandra Balzo Books in Order

Divorced Maggy Thorsen is opening a Wisconsin coffeehouse with friends when one partner is found murdered on the floor. With Brookhills gossip swirling and Sheriff Jake Pavlik watching, Maggy starts digging into secrets powerful locals would rather keep hidden.

At a Milwaukee coffee trade convention, Maggy discovers the body of a rival coffeehouse-chain owner beneath a banquet table. Her public clashes with the victim make her look guilty, so she must sort through a packed field of enemies and competitors.

Maggy's ex-husband's new wife asks for help proving he is cheating again, then disappears and is found murdered. Though Ted once broke Maggy's heart, she cannot accept that he is a killer, especially with their son caught in the middle.

A freak spring snowstorm traps Maggy and her fellow Benson Plaza merchants in their dark, freezing strip mall. When their landlord is found stabbed outside, his plan to evict the tenants leaves Maggy with plenty of suspects and nowhere to go.

Maggy's rebuilt coffeehouse is ready to open, complete with an oversized inflatable coffee cup for the celebration. When the display collapses and reveals a missing event manager's body, clues point toward Sheriff Jake Pavlik, forcing Maggy to question everything.

After her coffeehouse is destroyed, Maggy plans a fresh start in an old Brookhills train depot with Sarah as her new partner. Then Sarah's uncle dies in a suspicious crash, and a string of accidents threatens the shop before it can reopen.

Television producer Wendy "Jake" Jacobus is filming a family fireworks business when its patriarch dies in an explosion on camera. Working with the federal agent on the case, she must untangle family tensions before another catastrophic blast hits the county's Fourth of July celebration.

Wisconsin reporter AnnaLise Griggs returns to her North Carolina hometown to help her mother, only to find murder and mayhem waiting in Sutherton. Her reporter's instincts make her determined to uncover the truth, even when home proves far more complicated than expected.

This compact collection gathers four suspenseful short stories, including award-winning work and two original tales. It offers a sharper, more psychological side of Balzo's crime writing, with quick setups, uneasy turns, and standalone mysteries.

A fading television star comes to Brookhills to revisit a 1974 shootout involving the FBI, the Mafia, six deaths, and missing money. Maggy gets drawn into the old case when the past proves far from settled.

AnnaLise is caring for her mother in North Carolina when her former lover arrives with his wife and daughter. After his wife dies in a mountain-road crash, AnnaLise is pulled into a deadly web and lands at the top of the suspect list.

Maggy and Jake head to South Florida for a crime writers' conference and a train event inspired by a famous mystery. Stolen manuscripts, professional rivalries, and real murder leave the passengers stranded in the Everglades with danger on every side.

Journalist AnnaLise Griggs learns that Sutherton tycoon Dickens Hart may be her biological father. At his uneasy Thanksgiving reunion for former lovers and possible heirs, Hart is murdered, and AnnaLise becomes the police department's prime suspect.

When dental surgeon William Swope falls from his tenth-floor office window, police see a likely suicide. Maggy suspects murder, and investigating the death draws her into the Swope family's secrets while putting new strain on her relationship with Jake.

A shooting at Brookhills Manor leaves Sheriff Jake Pavlik hospitalized and rattles Maggy's regular coffee group. When two of its older members die soon afterward, Maggy wonders whether the deaths are connected and starts asking unwelcome questions.

After rescuing a lost chihuahua named Mocha, Maggy learns that its dog-sitter, Arial Kingston, has vanished. A body in the dog's owners' home turns Arial into a murder suspect, and Maggy must find her before the case gets worse.

Maggy's barista Amy becomes the leading suspect after her older boyfriend, financial adviser Kip Fargo, is shot dead. To clear Amy, Maggy digs into Kip's unhappy clients and complicated household, finding that his respectable image hid plenty of resentment.

A temporary barista believes her online boyfriend is coming to Brookhills to propose, until he is killed by a runaway snowplow outside Uncommon Grounds. Maggy investigates whether it was truly an accident while lies, a bracelet, and a passport complicate the case.

Maggy's barista Amy is planning a future with grocer Jacques Oui until a woman from Paris arrives claiming to be his still-legal wife. When Jacques's market burns and bodies are found inside, Maggy faces a web of old relationships and new danger.

When Maggy's dog digs up an infant's bone near a planned tea shop, a decades-old mystery returns to Brookhills. A later murder suggests the past is still dangerous, sending Maggy after answers buried within a complicated counterculture family history.

Maggy reluctantly joins Sarah at a remote Wisconsin writers' retreat, where the host demands painful personal revelations. A storm cuts off heat, power, and phone service, then a murder turns the isolated lodge into a trap for everyone inside.

At Sarah Kingston's mother's wake, her sister Ruth fails to appear and is later found unconscious from carbon monoxide exposure. Maggy, Sarah, and Sarah's niece Arial investigate whether it was an accident, uncovering family secrets that reach back to California.

Dog-sitter Arial Kingston inherits a property in Pacific Grove, California, but termite fumigation reveals a body beneath the guesthouse floor. New to town and warned to stay out of it, Arial follows the clues with help from a canine client and a wary veterinarian.