Books
Bed and Breakfast Fiction (by the Author’s last name)
Mystery at the Inn by Carolyne Aarsen
The month of October brings thrills, chills and excitement to the good people of Acorn Hill, Pennsylvania. The Howard sisters are holding their first ever “murder mystery weekend” at the inn to benefit a worthwhile charity. Meanwhile…has the Pastor fallen in love with the charity coordinator?
The three sisters who run Grace Chapel Inn have different concerns. Jane hosts a reunion of three of her college roommates. Alice tries to learn theidentity of a traffic accident victim suffering from amnesia, her only clue the dog that watched over her. Louise tries to counsel a young guest who marriage is in distress.
The Burglar in the Library by Lawrence Block
For Bernie Rhodenbarr, bookseller and compulsive burglar, a weekend at a country bed & breakfast inn takes an unexpected twist when a valuable book is stolen and a dead body turns up in the library.
The Cat Who Went Up the Creek by Lilian Jackson Braun
Qwill and his cats are spending a few weeks at the Nutcracker Inn, a restored Victorian mansion.The manager believes it may be haunted and wants Qwill to investigate. On their first day, Qwill and the cats find the dead body of a guest floating in the nearby creek.
Back Home Again by Melody Carlson
After the death of their father, the three Howard sisters each inherit a share in his Victorian homeand decide to turn it into a bed-and-breakfast, but first they have to overcome their conflicts from the past and learn to accept help from their friends.
The Christmas Bus by Melody Carlson
When her family cannot make it home for Christmas, Edith opens her home–which doubles as an inn the rest of the year–to a few strangers in need of a place to stay, who are an unusual bunch of characters.
Christmas Memories at Grace Chapel Inn
As the three Howard sisters gather around the fire on Christmas Eve, they reminisce about their favorite Christmas memories.
Hidden History by Melody Carlson
Bed and breakfast owners of the Grace Chapel Inn find the journal of their father from the early 1900′s.
Ready to Wed by Melody Carlson
Jane owns Acorn Hill, a bed and breakfast inn, and was sprucing up the garden, when she noticed a pink Cadillac pulling up in front of the inn. Out jumps Belle from Georgia who is looking for a room and proclaims the reason for her trip is God gave her a dream that she would meet the man she is meant to marry at Acorn Hill. Belle sets off to meet all of the eligible bachelors, but to whom will she marry? In the meantime, Jane receives a letter from her ex-husband and wonders what he wants after all this time. Jane is forced to face the mistakes of her past as Belle prepares for her wedding.
The Aloha Quilt by Jennifer Chiaverini
Bonnie faces a bleak winter alone, with her divorce looming. A welcome escape comes when Claire invites her to Maui to help launch an exciting new business: a quilter’s retreat set at a bed and breakfast amid the vibrant colors and balmy breezes of the Hawaiian Islands.
The Wurst Is Yet To Come by Mary Daheim
When she volunteers at the State B&B booth during Oktoberfest, trying to win some allies to save her inn, Judith McMonigle Flynn stumbles on a dead body and, agreeing to not get involved, convinces her cousin Renie to pose as the sleuth while she does the dirty work to solve this crime.
The Letters by Suzanne Woods Fisher
At Eagle Hill, an Amish bed and breakfast created in the converted basement of Rose Schrock’s farmhouse, guests arrive with their worries and leave with their problems solved in surprising ways.
The Extinguished Guest by Jeanne Glidewell
When a guest is murdered in his suite on opening night of the Alexandria Inn, Lexie Starr and Stone Van Patten investigate.
A Holiday Yarn by Sally Goldenbaum
While Mary Pisano’s family is staying at her new bed-and-breakfast to discuss her grandfather’s will, her cousin is found murdered, and soon the Seaside Knitters are on the case.
Arsenic and Old Puzzles by Parnell Hall
“When an elderly boarder at a Bakerhaven bed-and-breakfast drops dead during afternoon tea, there’s nothing particularly suspicious about it–except for the Sudoku in his jacket pocket. When a second body turns up in the window seat and an autopsy shows both men were poisoned with elderberry wine, the Puzzle Lady suspects she’s dealing with a cold-blooded killer who for some reason is copying the Cary Grant movie “Arsenic and Old Lace”, (in which two old ladies who run a boarding house poison elderly widowers and bury them in the basement). More murders, more puzzles, and a grave dug in the cellar seem to cement the theory. Ordinarily, Cora would eat a case like this for breakfast, but for once she can’t figure it out. She is not sure if the clues do not add up or if the much-married Puzzle Lady is just distracted by being involved in her first romantic entanglement in years.
While vacationing at the Blue Frog Ponds Inn in New England with his wife, private investigator Stanley Hastings must catch a killer who is murdering the guests at the Inn, with only his wits, his wife, and a cat to assist him.
Driftwood Lane by Denise Hunter
After her estranged father dies and leaves her in custody of three siblings she has never met, Meridith travels to Nantucket to care for them and becomes attracted to the handyman of her father’s bed-and-breakfast. Can she trust God with the details and relish the adventure?
Murder Under the Mistletoe by Jennifer Jordan
Mystery writer Dee Vaughan and her husband Barry travel to a quaint English country inn to celebrate a quiet holiday, but everyone staying there becomes a murder suspect when a fellow guest, beautiful model Miranda Travers, is found dead on Christmas Eve.
Seaside Harmony by Evangeline Kelley
After three sisters buy a bed and breakfast on Nantucket Island, they investigate the fate of the widow of a previous owner, a young woman who disappeared in the 1880′s, and in the process of the investigation, they become closer.
Murder at Longbourn by Tracy Kiely
Invited to join her Aunt Winnie for a How to Host a Murder Party on New Year’s Eve at Winnie’s new Cape Cod B and B, Elizabeth Parker must unearth old secrets and new motives in order to clear her beloved aunt of suspicion when the local wealthy miser ends up the unscripted victim.
Killer Librarian by Mary Lou Kirwin
While on a literary tour in London that pays homage to mysteries, librarian Karen Nash is faced with a real-life mystery when another guest at the B&B where she is staying is murdered and her ex and his new girlfriend turn up.
311 Pelican Court by Debbie Macomber
When Rosie and her husband, Zach, get a divorce, Judge Olivia Lockhart decrees an unusual custody arrangement. It will not be the kids moving between her place and Zach’s, they are the ones who will be going back and forth. Olivia has to decide whether to stay with Jack, the guy who runs the local paper, or get back with her ex, while Roy McAfee investigates the man who died at a local bed-and-breakfast to find out why he showed up there in the middle of the night.
50 Harbor Street by Debbie Macomber
Corrie McAfee and her husband, a private investigator, solve a mystery from their past, while their daughter Linette moves back home and opens a new medical clinic and finds unexpected romance.
6 Rainier Drive by Debbie Macomber
When Justine and Seth lose their restaurant, The Lighthouse, to arson, they must rebuild their lives and their marriage, while the residents of Cedar Cove go about their daily business, dealing with marriages, births, reunions, and scandals.
1105 Yakima Street by Debbie Macomber
When his wife Rachel, who is pregnant, leaves him, Bruce Peyton, who is also trying to cope with his spoiled thirteen-year-old daughter Jolene, is determined to get her back with a little help from his Cedar Cove friends.
The Inn at Rose Harbor by Debbie Macomber
Jo Marie Rose opens the Rose Harbor Inn bed and breakfast in Cedar Cove in order to start a new life, but the inn and its first guests bring surprises into Jo’s life.
Rose Harbor in Bloom by Debbie Macomber
Jo Marie Rose welcomes a new set of guests, including a cancer survivor who regrets ending a relationship with the one man she truly loved and a woman who remembers her own broken engagement while planning an anniversary celebration for her grandparents.
Springwater Wedding by Linda Lael Miller
Maggie McCaffrey left her fast-paced corporate job to take a chance on a more rewarding, but riskier, business venture: turning the dilapidated Springwater Station into a bed-and-breakfast. However, Maggie did not count on running straight into J.T. Wainwright, the hometown boy who stole her heart many years before.
Secrets of the Lost Summer by Carla Neggers
Olivia Frost is back in her small New England hometown to transform a historic home into an idyllic getaway, if only the absentee owner will fix up the eyesore next door. Dylan McCaffrey’s ramshackle house is an inheritance he never counted on. It also holds the key to a generations-old lost treasure he cannot resist, any more than he can resist his new neighbor.
The Second Chance by Jaclyn Reding
Starting a new life in Massachusetts as the proprietor of a quaint bed-and-breakfast, Flora MacCallum, a young widow with three children, finds unexpected love with a composer who is grieving for his lost marriage and son, and together they discover the healing power of hope and music.
The Perfect Hope by Nora Roberts
Innkeeper Hope Beaumont’s past makes an unwelcome appearance as she adjusts to life in small-town Boonsboro and her attraction to tough and surly Ryder Montgomery.
Murder Under Blue Skies by Willard Scott
(First book in the series) Retired weatherman Stanley Waters opens a bed-and-breakfast in Virginia called Blue Skies, but when a guest dies during the grand opening, Waters and his three cats find that a murder investigation is more exciting–and dangerous–than television.
Killer Crab Cakes: a Fresh-Baked Mystery by L.J. Washburn
While looking after her cousin’s bed and breakfast, and entering the annual Rockport, Texas Just Desserts competition, Phyllis and her boyfriend Sam discover a dead body, and forced to investigate when the suspect list gets too close for comfort.
Hatteras Girl by Alice J. Wisler
When Jackie Donovan meets Davis Erickson, the owner of the Bailey Place–an Outer Banks home Jackie wishes to turn into a bed-and-breakfast–Jackie is sure God has answered her prayers, until she learns some disturbing details about Davis’s past.
Amazing Gracie by Sherryl Woods
Meet Gracie MacDougal, a workaholic who has never learned to enjoy life. She has no family and no close friends, just her work. Until she leaves her high-paying job as a luxury hotel executive, deserting it in favor of the one spot she remembers from her childhood, a sleepy, gossipy Virginia beach town, that is. There she discovers that she can fit right in, and she finds the perfect project: a Victorian house that would make a fabulous bed and breakfast. The only problem is that the owner, who seems to be bone-lazy attorney Kevin Patrick Daniels, will not sell. In fact, it is not really his house, but that is just one of many secrets that flit in and out of this gentle, and often humorous, story of family, dependents, commitment, and love. For readers who enjoy Susan Elizabeth Phillips’ quirky characters and the gentle feel of Debbie Macomber’s love stories.
Bed and Breakfast Nonfiction (organized by title)
Behind the Door Marked Private: Confessions of a Small Town Bed & Breakfast Owner by Nancy Huisenga
In the year 2000, the author and her husband left professional careers and a metropolitan area of over 2.5 million people for the small town of Lanesboro, population 754, in rural, southeastern Minnesota. For the next chapter in their lives, they would own, rehabilitate and operate the 14 room, 19th century Habberstad House Bed and Breakfast. They share their inside story and a taste of a retirement that is anything but that, as two city slickers learn what goes into trying to find balance in their lives as they build a very successful business. Together they use old-fashioned elbow grease to clean, garden and make beds, while conquering modern technology to advertise and take reservations on the internet, do the book-keeping, and cut payroll for the cleaning ladies, all while trying to carve out a little time for themselves. Enjoy the recipes that have been served over the years, each one with its own special story, as well as some actual reviews posted by guests over the years. Peek at what it’s like-the good days and bad days, learning the ropes, cooking breakfast for twelve people who are on every imaginable diet possible, completing house renovations and constant repairs, wondering about the ghostly bumps in the night, sharing a home with thousands of guests over twelve years, dealing with the ups and downs that go with learning how to fit into a small town culture-all the things that go on behind the door marked Private.
Confessions of a Bed and Breakfast Diva, Hospitality Lessons from the Other Side of the Desk by Frania Shelley-Greilen
A first-hand account of what owning a small town Bed and Breakfast is really like. Told with a fresh, lyrical voice, this wry and witty account of big city girl turned small town diva also includes some of the most delicious breakfast recipes you will ever try.