Dakota Mysterys

Stevie Cartwright-Winterbottom here! Witch and afterlife specialist, along with my reincarnated ghost-talking husband and ex-British spy, Crispin Alistair Winterbottom. After solving one of our hardest cases yet (on our wedding day, no less), we're back from our gloriously perfect, ghost-free Italian honeymoon, rested and ready to begin our lives together! There's just one problem . . . The long line of people outside our door (literally) who've come from parts near and far in Washington, hoping we'll help them solve all their mystery needs.

I'm Halliday Valentine, a psychic witch who's recently moved from New York City back to my very human hometown of Marshmallow Hollow, where I run the family factory that caters to all things Christmas. Digby Dainty (known as Hobbs), the tall drink of water who rents my guest cottage, and I have a lot in common, including a love of true crime. So as macabre as it sounds, when a shady real estate tycoon shows up dead in the middle of the annual ice festival, I'm thrilled to spend time with Hobbs, flexing our amateur sleuthing skills.

It's a week before Christmas, and my quaint holiday town, Marshmallow Hollow, is chock-a-block with seasonal activities. Some less fun than others...like the ice sculpting competition my bestie, Stiles, has talked me into. Let's just say, as a pair, Michelangelo we ain't. I'm secretly relieved when our epically awful ice display gets damaged. It gives me a chance to watch my new beau, Hobbs, compete in the sled race. But not five seconds in, and Hobbs' sled-loving dog, Stephen King, escapes my grip to get in on the action - and boy, does he.

Hellooo! I'm at it again, and only a day after my last run-in with a killer! Hobbs and I are growing closer and closer, but there always seems to be a mystery waiting for us just around the corner, nipping at our heels and thwarting our hot romance. A very nice waiter named Joey Scarpetti, from the Marshmallow Hollow Ski Lodge, is dead, and it happened in my backyard in my pear tree, no less. So what's a girl to do but investigate?

For an adorable little Christmas town, Marshmallow Hollow sure sees a lot of action. Just days off the last murder - solved by moi, Halliday Valentine, and my gorgeous tenant, Hobbs - I'm eagerly awaiting a visit from my dear Uncle Darling and his husband, Monty, when my phone blows up. Another murder, this time at the convenience store on the edge of town, and Uncle Monty was hurt in the process.

My name is Sister Trixie Lavender, and I'm an occasionally possessed excommunicated nun. I was booted from the convent after doing something unspeakable. Something I had no control over. Something that lives inside me to this day, exploding out like that chest-burster in Alien when I least suspect it.

This time I'm the case that needs solving. Almost all of the criminals dead or alive that we've captured or we've had a hand in doling out their fate, have been stalking me via the ghost of my very first case. Sal Finch. Win's vengeful cousin, angry and bitter when he lost all of Win's inheritance to me and tried to kill me, has somehow figured out how to read people on this plane and get them to do his bidding. How do I, mostly a mere mortal, fight off someone from the afterlife still holding a big, fat grudge?

Unalived recently? Lose your head? Need someone to help you get to the other side-with your head? Then I'm your girl—Evanora Dark at your service! During a design competition for charity Tambi Schubert, local Buttermilk Bay's star stager and designer has a little accident. Okay, it's a not so little (read big—my word, so big). I find her, relieved of her head via a power tool, in the house I'm designing for the competition, bringing a screeching halt to the contest and an investigation that leaves me as a suspect.

No matter how great or small, I love to help solve a crime. When I find my mother's ex-boyfriend murdered in our convenience store bathroom with a piece of his skull missing, and my mom's a suspect in a murder investigation, my mystery solving goes from zero to 100. To really make matters worse, the town's local conspiracy theorist and official doomsday prepper, Cappie, somehow finds out the victim isn't just missing a piece of his skull - he's missing a piece of his brain!

Things have been going pretty great for us these days. Inkerbelle's Tattoos is doing well financially. Our clientele is growing by the day, and we're about to purchase the guest house we've been living in from our dear friend Knuckles. Finally, we'll have the roots we've so desperately yearned for. Now, if only we could figure out how to get rid of the troublesome demon inside me... We've also been focusing on Coop and her efforts to live her best life. As a newb to Earth, she's on a quest to experience as much as she possibly can and that includes her latest passion, makeup.

Sister Trixie Lavender, reporting for Miss Marple duty! It's been months since the evil residing inside me has reared his violently helpful head. My demon sidekick Coop continues to assimilate with the unsuspecting humans, our tattoo shop is busier than ever...heck, I'd even begun to attend the occasional Sunday sermon (after safely confirming my body wouldn't burst into flames upon entering Our Lady of Perpetual Grace, of course). Yep, life is pretty good. Until the shocking murder of our new friend, Sister Ophelia, during a church-sponsored speed-dating event.

If you want to know who unalived you, I'm your girl. Evanora Lavinia Dark at your service! Heart attack/stroke/open-heart surgery survivor, new-lease-on-life starter, astral-projecting-ghost-talker. And most importantly, a witch over fifty with bursitis, blood pressure meds, and zero effs to give. I'm done with corporate life. So I moved back to my hometown and my passion. Interior design. Nowadays, you can find me happily decorating houses for my best friend, house flipper, and real estate agent, Fabiola Fabrizio. There's only one problem. Ghosts.

Hello. My name is Stevie Cartwright, and I've been witchless for 30 days. If only there was a support group for down-on-their-luck ex-witches who've had their powers slapped right out of them (literally). Just as I was licking my wounds after returning to my hometown of Ebenezer Falls, Washington, and navigating my suddenly nonmagical existence with the help of my familiar, Belfry, things got sticky. Enter an ex-spy and newly departed spirit named Winterbottom, who's infiltrated my life with his sexy British accent and a couple of requests....

Stevie here, reporting to you live from Ebenezer Falls, Washington, with my disaster of a day. It started off like any other day, with the exception of Win's strange behavior, that is. But it's all gone downhill from there and I have questions. So many questions.... For instance, why is everyone else in Eb Falls behaving as strangely as my International Man of Mystery? And who the heck is Donna? For that matter, who's Candy Cane and why does she have snow? Who's the blonde picking up Win in our driveway? And was that an Aston Martin I just saw drive by?

Kai Pettigrew is a twenty-something TikTok star with millions of followers. He's dedicated his young life to serving his community by helping the homeless with Kickstarter funds and drumming up donations to get the less fortunate back on their feet. While helping film an overnight ghost-hunt in one of the spookiest places in the country with his best friend, sweet, generous Kai allegedly takes his life by jumping from a ledge, leaving nothing behind but a short note. But Kai informs me that's not true at all. Yet, he can't remember what really happened that fateful night.

Paige Barrett was living her dream as a journalist in New York City, racking up bylines as a staff writer at The Razor, a cutting-edge online magazine. But when she’s suddenly fired from her job and dumped by her boyfriend, she finds herself back home in the quaint seaside town of Shoreham, Florida, waiting tables and living in her sister’s guesthouse. Restless and itching for something meaningful to occupy her time, she decides to launch a true-crime podcast about the death of Jessica Cady, a beloved teacher who died mysteriously 20 years earlier.

When last we met, good people, the biggest wish I've ever made came to fruition. My outrageously handsome, smart, sometimes persnickety (read mostly persnickety) Spy Guy, Winterbottom, is finally here on earth with me, recuperating from his afterlife jaunt. Sure, he can be a difficult patient. Add in the fact that some of the spells I've cast to make this dream a reality have had repercussions (an understatement), and it's been sheer chaos. When my favorite men decide that I should take a day for myself, I hesitantly head out. And then I die. You can imagine, it only goes downhill....

Business is booming, a certain silver-fox contractor named Cary Mann is hot in pursuit (wink-wink), and me and my bestie Fab are as tight as ever. Life is good—newly inherited boggart-in-a-crystal ball aside (don't ask; he's a handful. And libidinous. And it's more of a snow globe than a crystal ball . . .) Good, that is, until the next ghost shows up with an untimely demise to solve. Turns out, she's a blast from my past . . . a painful one at that, one I could have gone the rest of my life without ever seeing again. My loved ones—both living and dead—all have my back though.

Goin' to the chapel and we're gonna get married! No, silly. Not us. Team #Stewin is still enjoying being engaged and a nice long winter hiatus from murder and ghost chasing. Until we open up Madam Zoltar's for the beginning of tourist season and the first customers are a bridal party from the seventh level of you-know-where!

Now that Win is up and about, he's been a very busy bee. He's jumped in with both feet, getting involved in our community and living his best life now that he's unencumbered by his spy past. He even joined the Ebenezer Falls garden club and made all the female member's toes curl with his British charm. On a flower-scouting trip for the garden club's annual spring planting in the town square, while Win is ogling lavender bushes and pansies, I fall headfirst into a pile of soil where a body's buried.