Does it seem as if it’s been forever since the last giveaway? Hopefully, we’ll be back on track with the giveaways, kicking them off on Fridays. If you’ve never entered one of the contests before, make sure you read the rules at the end of the post.

I’m kicking off the first one of 2023 with book-related mysteries. I really like the parallel stories in V.M. Burns’ Mystery Bookshop mysteries, the current time period with bookstore owner Samantha Washington, and the historical mystery that Sam is writing. In Bookclubbed to Death, the local library in North Harbor, Michigan, is flooded in a storm, and Sam offers her bookstore as a new venue for the Mystery Mavens Book Club. Unfortunately, she immediately runs afoul of the club leader, Delia Marshall, a book reviewer who can make or break careers—something Sam can ill afford with her debut historical mystery soon to be published. But the next morning, Sam opens her shop to find the unpleasant woman dead on the floor, bashed with a heavy—apparently lethal—tome: the Complete Works of Agatha Christie. While Sam is busy writing her latest British historical mystery in which the queen mother is suspected in the murder of a London Times correspondent, a pair of ambitious cops suspect Sam of the real-life crime. 

Victoria Gilbert’s Death in the Margins features a librarian. It’s early summer, and while Richard Muir and his dance partner, Karla, are preparing their new choreographic piece, Richard’s wife and library director Amy, is gathering the dance’s source materials. Based on folktales and the music of the Blue Ridge Mountains, the production is set to premiere at an old cinema that has been converted to a theater. But when dancer Meredith Fox—Richard’s former fiancé—is found dead backstage, Amy is once again propelled into a murder case that threatens the careers and lives of those she loves.

Which mystery would you like to win? You can enter to win both, but I need separate entries. Email me at Lesa.Holstine@gmail.com. Your subject line should read either “Win Bookclubbed to Death” or “Win Death in the Margins.” Please include your name and mailing address. The giveaway will end Thursday, Jan. 12 at 5 PM CT. Entries from the U.S. only, please.