Auld Lang Crime
(2025)(The third book in the Kayla Brodie Holiday Murder Mystery series)
A Story by Vivian Vale
When the countdown to midnight becomes a countdown to murder...
Travel photographer Kayla Brodie thought documenting the Grand Ole Opry's New Year's Eve special would be her most peaceful assignment yet. Nashville's music royalty, glittering performances, and the magic of America's most beloved venue—what could go wrong?
Everything.
When influential music promoter Donnie Wheeler hijacks his midnight moment to expose shocking secrets about stolen songs and plagiarized careers, he destroys reputations on live television. By sunrise, Wheeler is dead, found backstage with a custom guitar pick beside his body. Two of country music's most beloved performers have vanished without a trace.
But this murder has roots that run twenty-eight years deep.
As Kayla and her faithful black lab Nox investigate, they uncover a web of corruption that reaches back to a young songwriter's mysterious death in 1995. Harold Monroe was supposed to be country music's next big star—until his car went off a rain-slicked road the night before signing his first recording contract. Now someone wants the world to know that his death was no accident.
What secrets are worth killing for?
What legacy is worth dying for?
And how far will a daughter go to honor her father's memory?
With her photographer's eye for detail and instinct for justice, Kayla must navigate the cutthroat world of Nashville's music industry, where million-dollar deals are made in shadows and careers can be destroyed with a single revelation. From the hallowed halls of the Grand Ole Opry to the dark secrets of Music Row, she'll discover that some songs carry more than melody—they carry the weight of murder.
But when the killer strikes again, Kayla realizes she's not just solving a crime—she's uncovering a family's desperate quest for truth that spans nearly three decades. In a city where dreams come to die and legends are born, can justice finally be served? Or will the music industry's most guarded secrets claim another victim?
Genre: Mystery
Travel photographer Kayla Brodie thought documenting the Grand Ole Opry's New Year's Eve special would be her most peaceful assignment yet. Nashville's music royalty, glittering performances, and the magic of America's most beloved venue—what could go wrong?
Everything.
When influential music promoter Donnie Wheeler hijacks his midnight moment to expose shocking secrets about stolen songs and plagiarized careers, he destroys reputations on live television. By sunrise, Wheeler is dead, found backstage with a custom guitar pick beside his body. Two of country music's most beloved performers have vanished without a trace.
But this murder has roots that run twenty-eight years deep.
As Kayla and her faithful black lab Nox investigate, they uncover a web of corruption that reaches back to a young songwriter's mysterious death in 1995. Harold Monroe was supposed to be country music's next big star—until his car went off a rain-slicked road the night before signing his first recording contract. Now someone wants the world to know that his death was no accident.
What secrets are worth killing for?
What legacy is worth dying for?
And how far will a daughter go to honor her father's memory?
With her photographer's eye for detail and instinct for justice, Kayla must navigate the cutthroat world of Nashville's music industry, where million-dollar deals are made in shadows and careers can be destroyed with a single revelation. From the hallowed halls of the Grand Ole Opry to the dark secrets of Music Row, she'll discover that some songs carry more than melody—they carry the weight of murder.
But when the killer strikes again, Kayla realizes she's not just solving a crime—she's uncovering a family's desperate quest for truth that spans nearly three decades. In a city where dreams come to die and legends are born, can justice finally be served? Or will the music industry's most guarded secrets claim another victim?
Genre: Mystery
Used availability for Vivian Vale's Auld Lang Crime