Pet Shop Witches, Food Truck Corpses, and Lake Resort Secrets: This Week's Free Mysteries

by Amy Boyles

Pepper Dunn finds out she's a witch, inherits a magical pet shop, and gets accused of murder, all before she's had time to unpack. It's a pure comfort read for cozy fans who like their sleuthing with a familiar or two. At 4.03 with nearly 6,000 ratings, plenty of people have already signed up for the series.

by Rosa Lee

I'll be straight with you: this is a dark stepbrother romance, not a mystery. The blurb is all about three cruel, identical triplets with emerald eyes and a heroine caught in their orbit. It's sitting at 3.78 with over 3,000 ratings, so it clearly has an audience, but if you came here for a whodunit, skip it.

by Rosie A. Point

Ruby Holmes takes her food truck to Carmel Springs, Maine, gets asked out, and then finds the date dead. The mean small-town detective eyeing her as the prime suspect is a classic cozy setup, and I'm always up for it. It holds a solid 3.93 across almost 1,600 readers, and it should suit anyone who likes a baking-themed mystery that doesn't take itself too seriously.

by Rich Curtin

This is book 12 in the Manny Rivera series, so it's a jump-in-late pick, though it opens gently. A father and his eight-year-old son are tagging monarch butterflies in the LaSal Mountains, and that quiet scene is clearly the calm before something goes wrong. It has the highest rating of the week at 4.49 with nearly 600 readers, which says a lot for a series this deep in. If you like a slow-burn Western setting, start here and see how it goes.

by N. S. Wikarski

Buried artifact, coded truth, a murderous extremist cult, and a secret society trying to stop them. It's a lot of conspiracy for a free book. The reader reviews are lukewarm. One reviewer, who got a free copy, called it a treasure hunt and wasn't glowing, and another found it entertaining but not amazing, with some doubts about the premise of such an ancient civilization. At 3.89 with over 1,000 ratings, it's best for archaeology-puzzle fans who can forgive a shaky premise.

“I received a free copy of this book in exchange for doing a review. Unfortunately, the review will not be very glowing. This is a hunt for ancient treasures - the granite key being a stone with etchings that is supposed to unlock the mysteries to finding some major artifacts having to do with the...”

by Annie McEwen

Emmy Cooper's life in Chicago falls apart, so the young interior designer retreats to her family's lake cottage resort in the Wisconsin Northwoods. Readers say the descriptive writing makes them feel like they're there, and one called it a new favorite series. It's at 4.02 with a few hundred ratings and reviews that are more enthusiastic than most on this list. Good pick if you want a lakeside mystery with a slower pace.

“I enjoyed this first of the Northwoods Mysteries series set in Wisconsin in an area of lakes and resorts. Emmy returned home to her family's resort after losing her job in Chicago. Just to regroup. But she only thought things were bad. A large development group wants to buy up small resorts, like...”