Tangled Web Mystery Books in Order

The Tangled Web mysteries start with a very cozy setup and a real sense of disruption. In Yarned and Dangerous, Josie Blair comes back to Dorset Falls, Connecticut after her New York career fizzles, only to find herself dealing with family grief, an injured great-uncle, and her late aunt's yarn shop. What looks like a temporary stop quickly becomes the center of her new life.

Josie is a good fit for this kind of series because she is not an expert sleuth, or even much of a knitter, when the books begin. She is smart, restless, and a little bruised by life, which makes her reactions feel grounded. As she gets drawn into local mysteries, she is also figuring out whether Dorset Falls is still home and whether Miss Marple Knits is something she wants to save.

The setting matters a lot. Dorset Falls is not a postcard town polished for tourists. It is a fading Connecticut downtown with empty storefronts, old grudges, and people who remember one another's pasts. That worn-in atmosphere gives the series its tension. The crimes are cozy in presentation, but the town itself has enough sadness and history to give the stories some bite.

And yes, the yarn shop is more than a cute backdrop.

Miss Marple Knits becomes the series hub, both business and gathering place. The knitters around Josie bring humor, gossip, friendship, and plenty of opinions, and the books use that circle well without making everyone feel interchangeable. Hartwell also folds in original knitting patterns, which fits the world rather than feeling tacked on.

In A Knit before Dying, Josie is more settled in Dorset Falls, but that does not make life simpler. A new antiques business opens nearby, vintage needlework turns up, and soon the shop's owner, Lyndon Bailey, is murdered while his partner Harry looks like the obvious suspect. That plot shows what the series does well: it mixes the rhythms of small business and community life with a murder that keeps spreading trouble through the neighborhood.

Overall, these books are classic craft cozies with a bit of edge. Readers can expect an amateur sleuth learning as she goes, a close community full of allies and irritations, and mysteries tied to the people and places of town rather than giant outside conspiracies. If you like knitting, village gossip, and heroines who have to rebuild their own lives while solving someone else's death, this is a good place to start.