I have to say, I have a life I never dreamed of until a few months ago—a life many people would envy. But it comes with a price.

My name is Emily Cavanaugh. Until last June, I was a widowed professor of literature at Reed College in Portland, Oregon. Then my great aunt Beatrice died and left me almost her entire fortune—enough to make me perfectly comfortable for the rest of my life.

The bequest included her grand Victorian home, Windy Corner, in Stony Beach, Oregon, and I ended up taking a sabbatical from Reed and moving in there. Life suddenly became quite eventful, as I reconnected with my first love from high school, Lieutenant Sheriff Luke Richards, and we soon discovered that Aunt Beatrice had been murdered. I came close to being the next victim myself. (See Arsenic with Austen.)

Once that was cleared up, I decided to remodel Windy Corner and open it occasionally as a writers’ retreat center. More murders happened during the remodeling process in the fall (see Bloodstains with Brontë). Then my amazing young single-mother housekeeper/assistant, Katie, and I opened the retreat center for the first time at Christmas—and one of the guests was murdered. (See Cyanide with Christie.)

So now I’ve come to accept that this is my life:

Most days, I wake up in my third-floor tower bedroom and look out my window toward the ocean to see what sort of weather Stony Beach is serving up today. Usually it’s some mixture of cold, grey, rain, and wind, but occasionally we get a dazzlingly clear, mild day, which means a walk on the beach will be on the day’s agenda.

Once I’m dressed, I go down to breakfast in the dining room. Katie is a fantastic cook who loves to try new things, so I’m always eager to discover what creative culinary delights await me. But honestly, even if she gave me plain scrambled eggs every morning, I’d still be grateful I don’t have to scramble those eggs myself.

After breakfast, I tend to any business that needs tending to and then settle down in front of the fire in the library to read, knit, or play with the cats. Windy Corner came equipped with one cat, and I brought two more of my own when I moved in.

Lunch often entails meeting Luke at the one restaurant in town that stays open all winter, the Crab Pot. Luke is my steadfast rock in the sea of troubles that occasionally threatens to overwhelm us both. We’re opposites in many ways: he’s an extrovert, I’m an introvert; he’s tech-savvy, I’m a Luddite; he’s street-smart and I’m book-smart. Our strengths and weaknesses balance each other out, and we make a great team.

After lunch, I might do a few errands or simply visit my friends who run several of the shops in town. Occasionally I’ll need to drive down the coast to Tillamook to check in with my lawyer, accountant, or property manager.

Then it’s home to tea, which is my favorite part of the day. Every day at four o’clock, Katie serves a full English tea in the library, complete with homemade scones, cakes, and finger sandwiches. When I’m the only one there, it seems a bit ridiculous to have so much food to choose from, but I often invite a guest or two. After tea I might help Katie out by playing with her baby daughter, Lizzie, so Katie can concentrate on cooking up yet another amazing dinner. It’s no sacrifice—Lizzie is the sweetest baby ever, and she’s especially precious to me since I never had any of my own.

Luke often joins me for dinner and the evening. Sometimes we’ll adjourn to his house to watch British mysteries on his big-screen TV, since there is no TV at Windy Corner; sometimes we just sit in the library and talk. Then I cap off the evening with a leisurely bath in my big clawfoot tub and head to bed.

But this idyllic lifestyle I’m describing never lasts uninterrupted for long. Solving Aunt Beatrice’s murder seems to have been my equivalent of opening Pandora’s box. Murder now dogs my steps wherever I go. My literary knowledge and scholarly training have proven quite helpful so far in puzzling out the personalities and motivations of the various people involved, and although I hate being immersed in evil for the duration of a case, finding the truth does bring a certain satisfaction. At least I know my newly luxurious life will never be boring!

You can read more about Emily in Cyanide with Christie, the third book in the “Crime With The Classics” cozy mystery series, released March 1, 2019.

A game of charades ends in coldblooded murder in this entertaining cozy mystery, third in the Crime with the Classics series.

Having finished transforming Windy Corner, the grand Victorian mansion she inherited from her great aunt, into a writers’ retreat, widowed literature professor Emily Cavanaugh is ready to receive her first set of guests. But her careful planning is thrown into disarray by the unexpected arrival of outrageous true-crime writer, Cruella Crime, whose unpardonably rude behaviour is causing great offence. As a ferocious ice storm rages outside, the guests entertain one another with a game of charades. But their revelries are brought to a sudden halt by the discovery of a body in one of the guest bedrooms. When it transpires the victim was poisoned, Emily decides to take a leaf out of the book of her favourite detective writer, Agatha Christie, and investigate. But as she pursues her enquiries, it becomes chillingly clear that she herself may have been the intended victim. . .

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Meet the author
Katherine Bolger Hyde is the author of the traditional mystery series Crime with the Classics. She lives in the mountains above Santa Cruz, CA, with her family. When not reading, writing, or editing for her day job, she can generally be found knitting while watching British mystery series or singing in the choir at St. Lawrence Orthodox Church.

Visit Katherine’s website at kbhyde.com.

All comments are welcomed.