Sommelier Mystery Books in Order

The Sommelier Mystery books center on Katie Stillwell, a young sommelier working in San Francisco and studying hard for her certifications. She knows wine down to the label, the vintage, and the story in the bottle, but she does not set out to become a detective. Then Decanting a Murder drops her into a Napa Valley killing, and the series takes off from there.

This is California wine country, seen from the inside.

That matters because Nadine Nettmann uses the wine world as more than pretty scenery. Wineries, collectors, private tastings, vineyards, and festivals shape the crimes and the people around them. Katie's training gives her a useful way of reading a room. She notices what seems authentic, what does not fit, and how money and status can hide behind polished hospitality. Even if you do not know much about wine, the books make the details easy to follow.

The first novel sets the pattern. Katie heads to an exclusive winery party, a body turns up, and her friend Tessa becomes the main suspect. Katie steps in because loyalty matters to her, but also because she hates loose ends. As the series goes on, that combination of curiosity and stubbornness keeps pulling her deeper into trouble, often alongside Detective John Dean, who becomes an important presence both in the investigations and in her personal life.

The later books widen the map. Uncorking a Lie moves into the world of rare bottles and counterfeit wine at a Sonoma estate, while Pairing a Deception brings Katie and Dean to a Santa Barbara wine and food festival just as Katie is preparing for her Advanced Sommelier exam. Across the series, her professional goals keep running next to the mysteries. She wants to prove herself, and that ongoing push gives the books a steady personal arc.

Katie is smart, but she is not unflappable.

That balance is part of the charm. These are cozy-leaning mysteries with real danger around the edges, warm enough to make room for wine talk and relationships, tense enough to keep the stakes up. If you pick up this series, expect amateur sleuthing, strong California settings, and crimes tied to the social side of wine, who serves it, who collects it, who fakes it, and who profits from it. It is a good fit for readers who like character-driven mysteries with a specific world at the center.