A Brew for Chaos

Addison’s third mystery featuring telepathic apothecary worker Alex Daniels (after A Hex for Danger) is a sparkling supernatural cozy. After announcing that the case of the Fisherman—a serial killer who stalked Bellamy Bay, N.C., in the 1980s—will be reopened, Bellamy Bay Bugler editor Jonah Fox is found dead. Horrified, Bugler reporter Pepper Bellamy tells Alex that she believes Fox had figured out the Fisherman’s identity and was killed before he could go public with his accusation. Alex—who learned she was descended from a Polish mermaid after moving to Bellamy Bay, lending her telepathic abilities—has sworn off mystery solving but soon fears that the stakes of the case are too high for her to sit on the sidelines. Reluctantly, she plunges back into the sleuthing game with help from her boyfriend, police detective Jack Frazier, and unearths a host of secrets seething beneath Bellamy Bay’s placid surface. Addison seamlessly folds fantasy lore into her well-oiled whodunit plot, sprinkling the reversals and red herrings with an extra bit of magic. Fans of Cindy Stark’s Crystal Cove series should check this out. Agent: Nikki Terpilowski, Holloway Literary. (Sept.)