Sweet, adorable Lacy has stolen Marcia Banks’ heart, but money is tight. Like it or not, the service dog trainer needs to complete the human phase of the training and deliver the dog to her new owner in order to get paid. But the former Army nurse client turns out to be a challenging trainee. On top of her existing neuroses–which go beyond the psychological damage from a sexual assault during her second tour in Afghanistan–the veteran is now being stalked.When Marcia receives a bizarre warning to stay away from her client and Lacy is also caught in the stalker’s malicious orbit, Sheriff Will Haines steps in to investigate. Marcia finds this both endearing and annoying, especially when he expects her to stay on the sidelines. The training fee would make her solvent again, but how can she put her dogs at risk?Maybe Marcia should be more worried about herself, since the stalker has decided to pay her off in a very different way.

Nothing about her new client is what service dog trainer Marcia Banks expected—from the posh house that says family money to his paranoid preoccupation with his sister’s love life—but when he dangles a thousand dollar retainer under her nose, she can’t resist playing private detective. In between training sessions, Marcia digs into the sister’s boyfriend’s sketchy past. But the deeper she digs, the more questions arise. How is a disastrous fraternity party five years ago linked to blackmail, prostitutes, and murder today? And who’s driving the black SUV that keeps trying to turn Marcia and her dog Buddy into roadkill? She can’t let it go, not when there are innocents at risk who are depending on her to find the truth. But the deepest, darkest truth is the one she wishes she never uncovered. If you like books by Annie Bassett, B.R. Snow, and Mary Hiker, you may also enjoy the Marcia Banks and Buddy Mystery series! The Marcia Banks and Buddy Mystery Series: To Kill a Labrador Arsenic and Young Lacy Call of the Woof A Mayfair Christmas Carol Patches in the Rye The Legend of Sleepy Mayfair Keywords: cozy, mystery, mystery books, cozy mysteries, murder mysteries, dog mystery books, dog mysteries, cozy mystery books, female detective, amateur sleuth, female sleuth, good mystery books, murder mystery books, therapy dog, PTSD, veterans, fiction books, mystery novel, first in series, crime fiction, pet sleuth, animal mysteries, private investigator, series books, cozy mystery series, dog mystery series.

Can love rise from the ashes...of murder? When Kate O’Donnell runs into her old college sweetheart, Ed Huntington at a U2 concert, the last thing she expects to be dealing with is murder. Ed’s date is found dead and not only is he the prime suspect, but he unwittingly gets Kate involved as a potential accessory. Kate’s always loved a good puzzle and she’s discovering she still has feelings for Ed. She can’t let him go to prison for something she knows he’s incapable of doing. Their love is rekindling as they try to find the real culprit...but will the killer find them first?

Family can save you...or destroy you. With accusations flying between her client and the client’s parents, psychotherapist Kate Huntington is caught in the middle. And when the parents sue her for planting “false memories” in her client’s head, she ends up a murder suspect. Plus, someone is sending her anonymous and vaguely threatening notes. There is one bright spot though; she’s falling in love. Now if she can just get her dead husband's ghost out of her head. As the romance heats up, the note sender ups the anté, threatening to “destroy” Kate’s family. Her closest friend, Rob, has misgivings about her too-handsome-to-be-trusted suitor. But now the two men must work together, to help the woman they both love find a killer…and protect her baby girl. female sleuth, child sexual abuse, false memories, romantic suspense, private detective, women detectives, mystery & detective, women sleuths, women sleuths series, mystery series

Training service dogs shouldn’t be dangerous... Unless you are dog trainer Marcia Banks. She has two personality traits that represent both her best and her worst selves—she can’t let a “wrong” stand without at least trying to make it “right,” and she’s nosy. In To Kill A Labrador (no dogs die!), she’s reunited with her first trainee, a Black Labrador/Rottie mix named Buddy. When his former Marine owner is accused of murdering his wife, Marcia is called in to dog-sit. Outraged that his small town is assuming him guilty until proven innocent, she tries to uncover the real killer. Even after the hunky local sheriff politely tells her to butt out, Marcia keeps poking around...until the killer finally pokes back. In Arsenic and Young Lacy, Marcia deals with a challenging client, a neurotic former Army nurse who is being stalked. When Marcia receives a bizarre warning to stay away from her client and even sweet Lacy is caught up in the stalker’s maliciousness, Marcia is torn. The young woman needs her service dog, and Marcia needs the training fee to bolster her perpetually tight finances, but how can she put her dogs at risk? Not to mention herself... In The Call of The Woof, Marcia’s former client, a motorcycle enthusiast and traumatic brain injury sufferer, is accused of robbery and murder. Marcia and Buddy set out to clear his name, fighting misconceptions about bikers and TBI along the way. Her boyfriend isn’t very happy, though, that she’s putting herself at risk...again...and taking him along on her wild ride. In A Mayfair Christmas Carol, when Mayfair, Florida’s newly-minted Chamber of Commerce goes off the rails and decides to build an ice skating rink for a Christmas extravaganza, a decades-old skeleton is uncovered and its secrets threaten more than the town’s Christmas plans. Marcia is determined to help her police detective boyfriend solve the mystery—whether he wants her help or not. Can she and Buddy keep the ghost of Christmas past from destroying what is left of Mayfair’s founding family? (This is the first of several holiday novellas that are an integral part of the series. They focus more on the town where Marcia lives than on her veteran clients.)

A story ripped from real-life headlines. A police detective is found in an alley, standing over the body of an unarmed African-American boy. Groggy from a concussion, he has no memory of what happened, and he is literally holding the smoking gun. To the Baltimore County Internal Affairs division, it’s a slam-dunk. But various forces push psychotherapist Kate Huntington and her P.I. husband to investigate behind the scenes, and what they find doesn’t add up. Why did the boy’s oldest brother disappear on the same day? And did the third brother, who’s on the autism spectrum and nonverbal, witness something relevant? When seemingly unrelated events emerge as a pattern of intentional obstruction and diversion, it becomes apparent that what happened in that alley was more than just a bad shoot by a stressed-out cop. For Kate, the case has become personal as she’s connected with the grieving mother, whose dead son was the same age as her Billy. The answers may come from unexpected sources, but she and Skip better find them soon... before another life is lost.