by Barb in Key West, saying good-bye today to a boatload of family. It’s bittersweet.
In recent years, Kensington has been offering the novellas from its holiday collections as standalone ebooks approximately a year after the mass market paperback of the anthology comes out. This means a new cover for Scared Off, coming August 22, 2023, and now available for pre-order.
What do you think? I kind of love it. Kensington has really been on a roll with my covers lately.
In Scared Off, three teenage girls having a sleepover on Halloween night get spooked when high schoolers crash the house for a party. But no one expected to find a crasher like Mrs. Zelisko, the elderly third floor tenant, dead in the backyard—dressed in a sheet like a ghost. With her niece traumatized, Julia Snowden must uncover who among the uninvited guests was responsible for devising such a murderous trick . . .
“…my favorite novella in the collection. I enjoyed getting to spend some time with the characters, and I loved how the mystery unfolded.”
“Barbara Ross always gives us solid characters that cleverly enhance her atmospheric cozies. Scared Off is a tasty Halloween morsel not to be overlooked this holiday season!”
“The final story is from my favorite cozy author, Barbara Ross, who provides us with another excellent installment of her Maine Clambake Mystery series.”
Criminal Element, Cooking the Books
In the Maine Clambake saga (as it is shaping up to be), Scared Off is book 9.5. coming in between Shucked Apart and Muddled Through. I enjoyed writing it very much, especially because, unusually, I got to write it in the season in which it is set.
These standalone ebooks make the novellas available for a very reasonable price. For those who don’t like ebooks, the novella is still available in mass market paperback in Halloween Party Murder.
Readers: What do you think? Do you like the cover? Do you like the opportunity to acquire these standalone ebooks?