A Very Merry Murder
(2026)(The seventh book in the Bizzy Devlin Cozy Mystery series)
A Story by TJ Costello
The reindeer is a Labradoodle.
Photographer Bizzy Devlin has one job this December: survive the Christmas Stroll and Jacko's Bing Crosby playlist. Then her crankiest client, owner of the world's least festive Irish gift shop, wants her to find out who broke his sign. Bored teenagers, probably. An easy no.
Two days later, the town's most beloved baker collapses at the gingerbread-house contest in front of a storeful of witnesses, and the Christmas Stroll acquires police tape. Everyone in Pullen Pointe loves her cookies, which makes everyone a suspect. The police start with the feuding shopkeeper who told her exactly what he wished would happen to her.
Bizzy has promised Detective Doug Williams she doesn't go looking for trouble. She has never once kept that promise. With a handful of days before Christmas and Luigi in a reindeer suit, she starts looking at what everybody else is too busy decorating to notice, and somebody notices her looking.
Luigi agreed to the reindeer suit. He has made his position on the antlers extremely clear.
Book 7 of the Bizzy Devlin Cozy Mysteries. A Christmas novella and a fair-play whodunit wrapped in snow, string lights, and one very good dog: every clue on the page so you can solve it right alongside Bizzy and Jacko, no gore, no cliffhangers. Each mystery stands alone, and the town is best moved into from Book 1.
Revised edition. A Very Merry Murder first appeared in third person in the anthology Silent Fright, then as a Christmas giveaway in December 2023. This is the same story in Bizzy's own voice, first person, a little longer for it. New cover, same mystery.
Amateur sleuth Dog cozy mystery Christmas cozy Small-town New England Clean & cozy
Genre: Mystery
Photographer Bizzy Devlin has one job this December: survive the Christmas Stroll and Jacko's Bing Crosby playlist. Then her crankiest client, owner of the world's least festive Irish gift shop, wants her to find out who broke his sign. Bored teenagers, probably. An easy no.
Two days later, the town's most beloved baker collapses at the gingerbread-house contest in front of a storeful of witnesses, and the Christmas Stroll acquires police tape. Everyone in Pullen Pointe loves her cookies, which makes everyone a suspect. The police start with the feuding shopkeeper who told her exactly what he wished would happen to her.
Bizzy has promised Detective Doug Williams she doesn't go looking for trouble. She has never once kept that promise. With a handful of days before Christmas and Luigi in a reindeer suit, she starts looking at what everybody else is too busy decorating to notice, and somebody notices her looking.
Luigi agreed to the reindeer suit. He has made his position on the antlers extremely clear.
Book 7 of the Bizzy Devlin Cozy Mysteries. A Christmas novella and a fair-play whodunit wrapped in snow, string lights, and one very good dog: every clue on the page so you can solve it right alongside Bizzy and Jacko, no gore, no cliffhangers. Each mystery stands alone, and the town is best moved into from Book 1.
Revised edition. A Very Merry Murder first appeared in third person in the anthology Silent Fright, then as a Christmas giveaway in December 2023. This is the same story in Bizzy's own voice, first person, a little longer for it. New cover, same mystery.
Amateur sleuth Dog cozy mystery Christmas cozy Small-town New England Clean & cozy
Genre: Mystery