Bøger af Patricia Sprinkle

Long ago, the cozy southern town of Hopemore, Georgia fell on dark times after the murder of a little girl shook its easygoing citizens, sending one man to prison and changing the lives of two young boys forever. Years later, residents all settled back into their routines, the suicide of one of the town's most beloved teachers, Dwanye Evans, brings Hopemore's dark past back into the present. Southern lady, county magistrate and co-owner of the local nursery, MacLaren Yarbrough knows how to keep busy-and that's not even counting her rather large extended family-but now she's ready to add amateur sleuth to the list. It's not that she doubts the reasons the police give for Mr. Evans' suicide; she just can't help but wonder if someone drove him to it...In this sleepy Southern town where 'crime, ' is usually no harsher than a speeding ticket, McClaren may need to seek out the criminal herself if she plans to discoverthe hidden truth... "This series is a winner." -Tamar Myers "As Southern as Sunday fried chicken and sweet tea... Come for one visit and you'll always return." -Carolyn Hart

"Patricia Sprinkle is a modern master of the classic cozy mystery."--Nancy Pickard State bridge champ, Edie Whelan, may win card games, but the hand that life deals her isn't quiet as rosy. But she has her job at the library and her beautiful thousand-acre pecan grove-a stressful life, but an acceptable one. But then the pecan grove's foreman suddenly dies...and then Edie goes too-and not from natural causes. Now, county magistrate Mac Yarbrough is on the case to prove the foreman's son innocent of murder, and figure out who's got a card up their sleeve... "This series is a winner." --Tamar Myers "As Southern as Sunday fried chicken and sweet tea... Come for one visit and you'll always return." --Carolyn Hart "Sprinkle has a gift for developing a full, rich world."-Publisher's Weekly "Sprinkle entertains and enchants her readers. Her characters are so real you'll find yourself believing you grew up with them." -Christian Retailing "Sprinkle has a real eye for regional culture and traditions. . . . She tackles weighty subject matter with a steady hand and a reassuring touch."-Atlanta Journal Constitution "Sprinkle's characters are fantastic, her Southern settings shine, and her stories always mesmerize."-Roundtable Reviews

Sixty-something-year-old MacLaren Yarbrough has celebrated enough birthdays in her lifetime to think she's seen it all. But this year, at a birthday gala hosted in honor of her husband Joe Riddley, a mysterious murder is about to shake up the party. With a man lying dead in her house with a bullet in his head, MacLaren must track down the killer and clear her family name before the authorities wrap up their own investigation-all the while managing Yarbrough's Feed, Seed, and Nursery, tackling her newfound duties as the town magistrate, and caring for a spouse suffering from severe brain trauma. In a race against the clock, MacLaren must use her sweet-talk sleuthing to unravel the secrets of Hopemore, Georgia, because in a town with no strangers, a homicide is the strangest it gets. "Sprinkle has a gift for developing a full, rich world." -Publisher's Weekly "Sprinkle entertains and enchants her readers. Her characters are so real you'll find yourself believing you grew up with them." -Christian Retailing "Sprinkle has a real eye for regional culture and traditions. . . . She tackles weighty subject matter with a steady hand and a reassuring touch." -Atlanta Journal Constitution "Sprinkle's characters are fantastic, her Southern settings shine, and her stories always mesmerize." -Roundtable Reviews

Strike one is waking up to find a buffalo munching on her rose bushes. Strike two is walking outside to confront the beast, only to find out that it is owned is a past lover, Burlin Bullock, a man she never thought she' d see again. Strike three is the dead body that turns up shortly thereafter... When MacLaren's old college boyfriend comes to town on the heels of his son' s political campaign, Mac is ready to scram out of Hopemore faster than the family's gubernatorial buffalo mascot. But when a homeless Bullock campaign supporter winds up dead in this small southern town, MacLaren and her ex-boyfriend are suddenly thrust onto center stage together, and for all the wrong reasons. With the campaign trail gaining heat and Burlin Bullock's presence kicking up long-settled memories from her past, Mac must solve her way out of a scandal that threatens not only her marriage, but also her life... "Patricia Sprinkle takes the reader on a trip to the 'real' South, the South of family traditions, community customs, church-going, and craft, down-home politics. Reading it is like spending an afternoon in the porch swing on Aunt Dixie' s veranda. Fun and family values triumph in a delightful book."- JoAnna Carl, author of The Chocolate Frog Frame-Up "Sprinkle has a gift for developing a full, rich world." -Publisher's Weekly "Sprinkle entertains and enchants her readers. Her characters are so real you' ll find yourself believing you grew up with them." -Christian Retailing "Sprinkle has a real eye for regional culture and traditions. . . . She tackles weighty subject matter with a steady hand and a reassuring touch."-Atlanta Journal Constitution

"Old family histories and...secrets, combined with smooth, suspenseful writing, make this a new series a reading pleasure!" -Margaret Maron Katharine Murray is a typical Atlanta housewife, but she's far from ordinary. She's found a fascinating distraction from her empty nest in researching family history and genealogy. And it seems that she can put her genealogy-sleuth skills to work, helping her friend Dr. Flo Gadney, a retired professor, track down her own family tree. Their search takes them to an old graveyard on an island off the coast of Georgia-just as greedy local patriarch Burch Bayard is about to start building sparkly new McMansions all over the island-including the gravesite-a property scheme that would literally bury any local history. But as they hunt for clues to Flo's past, the two friends soon realize that the islanders are trying to keep Flo's connection to Bayard Island dead and buried along with her ancestors! The mysterious murder of a combative local confirms their suspicions, forcing the women to embark on a dangerous chase to unravel the truth. Together, Katherine and Flo will dig up more than Georgia dirt, unearthing secrets to the island's history that could make the whole town crumble.

MacLaren Yarbrough, county magistrate, business owner, wife, mother, and amateur sleuth is surprised when she finds an invitation to the elite Magnolia Ladies' Investment Club addressed to her. She is even more surprised when at her first meeting club president, Willena Kenan, is found brutally murdered on the bathroom floor during a coffee break. With everyone out of the room at the time, every club member is under suspicion, especially when police find a mysterious trench coat full of incriminating evidence. MacLaren will put her sleuthing to the test in this cozy southern mystery. "Patricia Sprinkle is a modern master of the classic cozy mystery."--Nancy Pickard "As Southern as Sunday fried chicken and sweet tea... Come for one visit and you'll always return."-Carolyn Hart "Sprinkle has a gift for developing a full, rich world." -Publisher's Weekly "Sprinkle entertains and enchants her readers. Her characters are so real you'll find yourself believing you grew up with them." -Christian Retailing "Sprinkle has a real eye for regional culture and traditions. . . . She tackles weighty subject matter with a steady hand and a reassuring touch."-Atlanta Journal Constitution "Sprinkle's characters are fantastic, her Southern settings shine, and her stories always mesmerize."-Roundtable Reviews

At a prestigious school for diplomats, some lessons are learned the hard way.The body of beautiful young bad girl Melanie Forbes--who delighted in making others the butt of her cruel jokes--is found wrapped in an Oriental rug in an unused basement storeroom of Chicago's elite school of diplomacy, the Markham institute.Sheila Travis, new administrative assistant to the president, has years of diplomatic experience behind her. Though unfamiliar with the protocol for dealing with a murder in one's new workplace, her nose for crime pulls Sheila--and her eccentric Aunt Mary--into the investigation.Another murder follows and Melanie's ex-boyfriend is charged with both crimes. But Sheila thinks the police might have nabbed the wrong man. She's convinced of it when the killer comes after her.

Sheila Travis ruefully agrees when dispatched by her colorful Aunt Mary to Charleston to investigate several mysterious accidents at the historic home of Mary's childhood friends. However, Sheila can't help remembering what her dad always said about his sister: "Trouble follows that woman like fleas follow a dog."Sheila's hostesses are such gracious purveyors of Southern hospitality that Sheila has to keep reminding herself this is not a social visit. Even if she is initially inclined to write the accidents off as coincidence, the first murder changes her mind. The second begins to unearth dark secrets amidst the roses and honeysuckle. Wills and family history come under close scrutiny as Sheila closes in on a killer . . . unwittingly putting herself in deadly danger.

Prominent television personality Dean Anderson was as popular as he was respected, but he had incurred a good deal of animosity among family, friends and co-workers. Though the police are willing to rule his shooting death a suicide, his old friend Sheila Travis is not. As usual, it's irrepressible Aunt Mary, a perpetual busybody, who manages to get Sheila involved in finding Dean's killer. The list of suspects is long as it is remarkable: a resentful ex-wife, an enraged daughter, a jealous, vindictive co-worker, a mobster with a grudge. The truth goes deeper than either Aunt Mary or Sheila suspects. And it may prove equally fatal.

After her most recent foray into detection, Sheila Travis is more than happy to concentrate on her job as Director of International Relations for Hosokawa International. Unfortunately, her relative peace and quiet is short-lived. Coming home from an exhausting business trip, all Sheila wants to do is go to sleep. Instead, she is dragooned by her young neighbor. Sara Sims Tait into a Sims family dinner out in Gwinnett County. Each day, the greater metropolitan area of Atlanta moves a little further into Gwinnett County, and Sara Sims's contentious family--part upwardly mobile, part solid dirt farmers--sees big dollar signs when major developers express interest in Grandma Sims's farmland. Too bad she won't sell. Greed and anger are powerful influences, but when the murderer strikes, Grandma Sims is not the victim, and it is up to Sheila and her irrepressible, aristocratic Aunt Mary to untangle the complicated web of motives, opportunities, and relationships that connect the Sims family to murder.

Katharine Murray's elegant Atlanta home has been viciously vandalized! She's prepared to devote all her time to getting it back in tip-top shape?until she meets Bara Weidenauer. Once a picture-perfect socialite, Bara has fallen on some hard times. Her husband, Foley, has hightailed it out of their marriage, and she's convinced he'll try to take her for every penny she's got. While scouring her house for anything of value to hide from her greedy ex, Bara finds a box of military medals that once belonged to her father, a beloved war hero. Eager to know the story behind these precious trinkets, she enlists Katharine's help.But as Katharine digs deeper into Weidenauer family history, she discovers that everything Bara believed about her father may have been a lie. And when Foley is found shot to death, Bara's world turns to complete chaos. It's up to Katharine to expose this family's secrets from the past and the present . . . or the future will be very grim indeed.

2005 Tradepaper reprint. Fifth in the Sheila Travis Mysteries. What does a Dunwoody matron wear to a funeral? Her black tennis dress. It's no joke, however, when the funeral is given for your high school buddy's wife, and she has been brutally murdered. Sheila Travis, successful corporate executive and attractive fortyish widow, has met Yvonne Delacourt once, at a party. Yvonne is stunning, ambitious -- and intensely disliked. Under the local residents' gracious veneer of Southern hospitality, Sheila senses their seething antagonism to young Mrs. Delacourt. When Yvonne is found stabbed to death, the police focus on her husband, Walt, as the most likely suspect. Sheila sets out to clear the pal of her youth by finding out more about those Dunwoody residents who loathed the alluring victim. The spirited search reveals dark secrets more carefully kept than the manicured lawns of this exclusive enclave -- from a respected matron's double life, to a retired couple's vile secret, to an arrogant gardener who has no gardening tools. But the real shocker comes when Sheila, following lurid hints about Yvonne's slippery past, arrives in the dead woman's Florida hometown. Horrific discoveries reveal a soul-chilling evil and elicit unexpected sympathy for Yvonne's killer. Back in Dunwoody, Sheila finds her emotions stirred by an undeniably appealing man with a disturbing connection to the crime. Her maverick investigation startlingly reveals that the biggest secret of all was Yvonne's.

Help and encouragement in this revised edition for overwhelmed women who desire to know what God created them to do and how to accomplish it.

Are you tired of doing things for other people? Are you overwhelmed with work, guilt and stress? Patricia Sprinkle in 'Women Who do too Much' shows women how to do less, by directly attacking those problems and priorities. Helps you to determine what God created you for and to concentrate on that. It also shares the secret of how to deal with the demands of life.

In the second MacLaren Yarbrough mystery, MacLaren finds herself trying to single-handedly solve two mysteries: Was it really Pastor Luke Blessed who killed gentle young Amanda Kent -- and who shot MacLaren's husband, Joe Riddley?

A teenage girl has been missing from her Montgomery, Alabama, home for six weeks. What's amazing is other people's lack of concern. Just one person cares that she's gone: a spunky amateur sleuth on the sunset end of sixty.