Jessica Fletcher & Donald Bain •
Brandy and Bullets •

Jessica Fletcher’s old friend Norman is so enamored of the label maker his wife gave him for his birthday that he labels everything in sight—including the device itself, which now bears a tag reading LABEL MAKER.

You wouldn’t expect someone with a sense of humor like that to take his own life. So when Norman disappears, leaving behind a suicide note, Jessica is immediately suspicious. She decides to investigate the creativity institute where Norman had been staying, and feigns a bout of writer’s block to gain admittance. What she uncovers there is both hair-raising and very nearly fatal, but for the timely intervention of a Maine snowstorm.

There is no Jessica Fletcher, of course, although Angela Lansbury succeeded in making the character feel real to the myriad viewers of Murder, She Wrote. The book series by the same name is a spin-off of the TV show, and it’s much to Donald Bain’s credit that he doesn’t coast on the popularity of his “co-author.” Instead, he has given us a string of stories that are deeply engaging in their own right, with inventive plots, appealing characters, and solid writing throughout. Following Bain’s death, ghostwriting duties passed into the capable hands of Terrie Farley Moran. (For someone who doesn’t exist, Jessica demonstrates excellent taste in her choice of collaborators.)

Brandy and Bullets also uses a sly story-within-a-story trope. At the same time that the book’s events unfold, Jessica is at work on her next mystery novel, to be titled—Brandy and Bullets.

If you miss the long-running TV series, here’s your chance to catch up with Jessica, Mort, Seth, and the rest of the Cabot Cove gang.

Spoiler: Norman survives to label again.