Usually, Jinx and I would do a video chat to talk about January’s releases from Berkley Prime Crime. But, I only have three books from them for January, hardly worth getting the camera and cat out. Instead, I’ll give you a brief summary.

Jennifer Ashley’s Death Below Stairs launches a new historical mystery series. “The brazen heroine of Ashley’s popular novella, A Soupçon of Poison, returns as the protagonist of the Below Stairs series. Beloved young cook Mrs. Kat Holloway is as shrewd and calculating as ever, charming readers with her fierce sincerity as she takes on a new position in the Victorian housefly of a British Lord.” Mrs. Holloway discovers a slew of odd characters in the Rankin household. And, there’s trouble brewing in the home, which boils over when the cook’s young assistant is found dead.

Dial M for Mousse is Laura Bradford’s third Emergency Dessert Squad mystery. Owner and baker Winnie Johnson is supposed to proved a plate of motivational desserts for an artists’ retreat. Instead, she discovers the body of the retreat owner just inches away from some very eccentric suspects.

Miranda James’ Twelve Angry Librarians will be out in paperback in January. After a public argument with the guest speaker at a librarians’ conference at Athena College, interim library director Charlie Harris is the primary suspect when the man ends up dead. Charlie and his Maine Coon cat, Diesel, must check out every clue to find the real killer. (For more about Miranda James, and the author behind the Cat in the Stacks books, check out Poisoned Pen’s blog today, at https://poisonedpen.com/category/fiction-review/.)