The day I’m writing this is also the day I’m getting ready to drive to Columbus, Ohio for four days, so at some point, I may just have to list the rest of the titles. And, I won’t be online much today, probably just at the end of the day. That doesn’t mean you can’t enjoy the list of June Treasures in My Closet, the forthcoming book releases. And, if you have some titles you’re anticipating, please share them with the rest of us. So, check out my annotations, and the list below.

Let’s kick off the list with a cozy mystery, Valerie Burns’ Murder is a Piece of Cake. It’s a feisty culinary mystery in which social media influencer Maddy Montgomery is adjusting to her new life after moving to small-town Michigan to run a bakery and take care of a gigantic English mastiff – all while solving the murder of a rival bakery owner. (Release date is June 27.)

I have to admit Elizabeth Castellano’s debut novel, Save What’s Left, jumped out at me when I saw it referred to as an “un-beach” novel. An outrageously funny debut novel about a woman who moves to a small beach town looking for peace, only to find herself in an all-out war with her neighbors. When Kathleen Deane’s husband, Tom, tells her he’s no longer happy with his life and their marriage, Kathleen is confused. They live in Kansas. They’ve been married thirty years. Who said anything about being happy? But with Tom off finding himself, Kathleen starts to think about what she wants. And her thoughts lead her to a small beach community on the east coast, a town called Whitbey that has always looked lovely in the Christmas letters her childhood friend Josie sends every year. It turns out, though, that life in Whitbey is nothing like Josie’s letters. Kathleen’s new neighbor, Rosemary, is cantankerous, and the town’s supervisor won’t return Kathleen’s emails, but worst of all is the Sugar Cube, the monstrosity masquerading as a holiday home that Kathleen’s absentee neighbors are building next door to her quaint (read: tiny) cottage. As Kathleen gets more and more involved in the fight against the Sugar Cube and town politics overall, she realizes that Whitbey may not be a fairytale, but it just might be exactly what she needed. (Release date is June 27.)

A short annotation will not do justice to S.A. Cosby’s new book. All the Sinners Bleed will be on my list of Favorite Books of 2023. After years of working as an FBI agent, Titus Crown returns home to Charon County, land of moonshine and cornbread, fist fights and honeysuckle. Seeing his hometown struggling with a bigoted police force inspires him to run for sheriff. He wins, and becomes the first Black sheriff in the history of the county. Then a year to the day after his election, a young Black man is fatally shot by Titus’s deputies. Titus pledges to follow the truth wherever it leads. But no one expected he would unearth a serial killer who has been hiding in plain sight, haunting the dirt lanes and woodland clearings of Charon.

I’ve already read and written two reviews for All the Sinners Bleed. The reviews are much better than the annotation. If you’ve liked Cosby’s other books, you’ll like this one as well. (Release date is June 6.)

Here’s another debut, Claire Daverley’s Talking at Night. Secret walks and late-night phone calls. An undeniable chemistry. A tragedy that haunts them both. A powerful yet tender love story between two people who can’t help but be pulled back to each other. This is the story of Will and Rosie. The two are opposites in every way and yet they fall for each other as teenagers; nineties music, sideways glances, sunsets and bonfires and talking late into the night. It’s palpable, inevitable: they’re on the precipice of starting something wonderful. Until one day, tragedy strikes, and any possibility of being together seems to shatter. But time and again, Rosie and Will find their way back to each other. Though the years pass, they cannot quite let go of what might have been. (Release date is June 20.)

When I read and reviewed Mary Anna Evans’ The Traitor Beside Her, I didn’t realize Justine Byrne was also the protagonist in her novel The Physicists’ Daughter. Evans just won the Oklahoma Book Award for Fiction for The Physicists’ Daughter. You don’t need to have read the previous book, since I didn’t even know there was an earlier book in the series. The Traitor Beside Her is an intricately plotted WWII espionage novel weaving together mystery, action, friendship, and a hint of romance. Justine Byrne can’t trust the people working beside her. Arlington Hall, a former women’s college in Virginia has been taken over by the United States Army where hundreds of men and women work to decode countless pieces of communication coming from the Axis powers. Justine works among them, handling the most sensitive secrets of World War II—but she isn’t there to decipher German codes—she’s there to find a traitor. (Release date is June 6.)

A Newlywed’s Guide to Fortune and Murder is Dianne Freeman’s sixth Countess of Harleigh mystery. With her new husband George busy on a special mission for the British Museum, Frances has taken on an assignment of her own. The dowager Viscountess Wingate needs someone to sponsor her niece, Kate, for presentation to Queen Victoria. Frances—who understands society’s quirks and constraints as only an outsider can—is the perfect candidate. Kate is charming and intelligent, though perhaps not quite as sheltered as she might first appear. More worrying to Frances is the viscountess’s sudden deterioration. The usually formidable dowager has become shockingly frail, and Frances suspects someone may be drugging her. The spotlight falls on Kate, who stands to inherit if her aunt passes, yet there are plenty of other likely candidates within the dowager’s household, both above and belowstairs. (Release date is June 27.)

The tenth Lighthouse Library mystery is Death Knells and Wedding Bells by Eva Gates. Lucy and Connor planned for the perfect Outer Banks wedding—and that’s exactly what they got. Aside from typical rumblings of familial tensions, the late spring weather allowed for a beautiful day, the food was delicious, and everyone had a good time, until one of the guests goes missing. Before Lucy can look forward to the rest of her life in Nags Head and the work she does at the Bodie Island Lighthouse Library, she gets a phone call from her boss, Bertie James. Eddie, Bertie’s friend, never made it back home after the reception. Initially, Lucy doesn’t think anything of it—sometimes wedding guests simply have a little too much fun. But this quickly turns to something darker when she discovers the body of a wedding guest strangled in a locked closet, and the police immediately start asking questions about Eddie. Lucy must figure out if the two are connected before it’s too late—both for Bertie’s friend and the rest of her wedding guests. (Release date is June 6.)

From Kristin Harmel, the bestselling author of the “heart-stopping tale of survival and heroism” (People) The Book of Lost Names, comes a gripping historical novel about two mothers who must make unthinkable choices in the face of the Nazi occupation, The Paris Daughter. Paris, 1939: Young mothers Elise and Juliette become fast friends the day they meet in the beautiful Bois de Boulogne. Though there is a shadow of war creeping across Europe, neither woman suspects that their lives are about to irrevocably change. When Elise becomes a target of the German occupation, she entrusts Juliette with the most precious thing in her life—her young daughter, playmate to Juliette’s own little girl. But nowhere is safe in war, not even a quiet little bookshop like Juliette’s Librairie des Rêves, and, when a bomb falls on their neighborhood, Juliette’s world is destroyed along with it. More than a year later, with the war finally ending, Elise returns to reunite with her daughter, only to find her friend’s bookstore reduced to rubble—and Juliette nowhere to be found. What happened to her daughter in those last, terrible moments? Juliette has seemingly vanished without a trace, taking all the answers with her. Elise’s desperate search leads her to New York—and to Juliette—one final, fateful time. (Release date is June 6.)

Count me as one of the fans of Miranda James’ Cat in the Stacks mysteries. Hiss Me Deadly is the fifteenth featuring librarian Charlie Harris and his Maine Coon cat, Diesel. Charlie Harris remembers Wilfred “Wil” Threadgill as one of the outsiders during high school in Athena. Although Wil was a couple of years ahead of him and his friend Melba Gilley, Melba had a big crush on Wil, who dropped out after his junior year. An aspiring musician, Wil hit the road for California and never looked back. Wil eventually became a star, fronting a band and writing award-winning songs. Coming back to Athena to work for two weeks with students in the college music department, Wil is now the big man on campus. Not everyone is happy to have him back, however. His entourage have been the target of several acts of petty harassment. At first they are easy for Wil to shrug off, but the incidents escalate and become more troubling. When one of the band members is killed Charlie worries that Melba, now deeply involved with the man at the center of the attacks, could be in deadly danger. (Release date is June 27.)

I don’t know that I’m going to read Jimmy Juliano’s debut novel, Dead Eleven, but the summary was enticing enough that I wanted to share. On a creepy island where everyone has a strange obsession with the year 1994, a newcomer arrives, hoping to learn the truth about her son’s death—but finds herself pulled deeper and deeper into the bizarrely insular community and their complicated rules… Clifford Island. When Willow Stone finds these words written on the floor of her deceased son’s bedroom, she’s perplexed. She’s never heard of it before, but soon learns it’s a tiny island off Wisconsin’s Door County peninsula, 200 miles from Willow’s home. Why would her son write this on his floor? Determined to find answers, Willow sets out for the island.After a few days on Clifford, Willow realizes: This place is not normal. Everyone seems to be stuck in a particular day in 1994: They wear outdated clothing, avoid modern technology, and, perhaps most mystifyingly, watch the OJ Simpson car chase every evening. When she asks questions, people are evasive, but she learns one thing: Close your curtains at night. Five weeks after Willow arrives on the island, she disappears. Willow’s brother, Harper, comes to Clifford searching for his sister, and when he learns the truth—that this island is far more sinister than anyone could have imagined—he is determined to blow the whole thing open. (Release date is June 27.)

Final Cut by Marjoire McCown is a Hollywood mystery. When Hollywood costumer Joey Jessop stumbles across a dead body near the set of a big budget movie, she must find ways to protect her career—and herself—before it’s too late. Joey Jessop enjoys working behind the scenes. As key costumer for the next epic superhero movie, her role is to make others look good while staying out of the spotlight. That means making sure to be professional around Eli Logan, her ex and the First Assistant Director, and Courtney Lisle, Eli’s newest love interest and the Second Assistant Director. But this isn’t a problem for Joey—especially when the movie is shooting at a gorgeous Malibu location. All of that changes when Joey finds Courtney’s dead body on the first day of principal photography and she soon becomes the primary suspect. When the press takes hold of the story and social media begins to run with it, Joey watches her well-ordered life behind the scenes become front and center for all to see. (Release date is June 6.)

Because I’m talking about June releases, of course there’s a beach read or an un-beach read or two. Same Time Next Summer is Annable Monghan’s beach romance. The ultimate summer nostalgia read, about an engaged woman who comes face to face with her first love who she hasn’t seen in fourteen years, but who she spent every summer with from age five to seventeen when he broke her heart, calling into question everything she thought she knew about their love story, and herself.
Beach Rules:
Do take long walks on the sand.
Do put an umbrella in every cocktail.
Do NOT run into your first love.

Sam’s life is on track. She has the perfect doctor fiancé, Jack (his strict routines are a good thing, really), a great job in Manhattan (unless they fire her), and is about to tour a wedding venue near her family’s Long Island beach house. Everything should go to plan, yet the minute she arrives, Sam senses something is off. Wyatt is here. Her Wyatt. But there’s no reason for a thirty-year-old engaged woman to feel panicked around the guy who broke her heart when she was seventeen. Right?  (Release date is June 6.)

Code of the Hills is Chris Offutt’s third Mick Hardin novel. Mick Hardin is back in the hills of Kentucky. He’d planned to touch down briefly before heading to France, marking the end to his twenty-year Army career. In Rocksalt, his sister Linda the sheriff is investigating the murder of Pete Lowe, a sought-after mechanic at the local racetrack. After another body is found, Linda and her deputy Johnny Boy Tolliver wonder if the two murders are related. Linda steps into harm’s way just as a third body turns up and Mick ends up being deputized again, uncovering evidence of illegal cockfighting, and trying to connect all the crimes. (Release date is June 13.)

Ashley Poston’s The Dead Romantics was one of my favorite books of the year, so I’m going to put my faith in her. The Seven Year Slip is another novel with an unlikely premise, but I know Poston can make it work. An overworked book publicist with a perfectly planned future hits a snag when she falls in love with her temporary roommate…only to discover he lives seven years in the past. Sometimes, the worst day of your life happens, and you have to figure out how to live after it. So Clementine forms a plan to keep her heart safe: work hard, find someone decent to love, and try to remember to chase the moon. The last one is silly and obviously metaphorical, but her aunt always told her that you needed at least one big dream to keep going. And for the last year, that plan has gone off without a hitch. Mostly. The love part is hard because she doesn’t want to get too close to anyone—she isn’t sure her heart can take it. And then she finds a strange man standing in the kitchen of her late aunt’s apartment. A man with kind eyes and a Southern drawl and a taste for lemon pies. The kind of man that, before it all, she would’ve fallen head-over-heels for. And she might again. Except, he exists in the past. Seven years ago, to be exact. And she, quite literally, lives seven years in his future. (Release date is June 27.)

I found everything about Nilima Rao’s debut historical mystery to be fascinating, including the author’s background as a Fijian Australian Indian. A Disappearance in Fiji is a charming and atmospheric debut mystery featuring a 25-year-old Indian police sergeant investigating a missing persons case in colonial Fiji. 1914, Fiji: Akal Singh, 25, would rather be anywhere but this tropical paradise—or, as he calls it, “this godforsaken island.” After a promising start to his police career in Hong Kong, Akal has been sent to Fiji as punishment for a humiliating professional mistake. Lonely and grumpy, Akal plods through his work and dreams of getting back to Hong Kong or his native India. When an indentured Indian woman goes missing from a sugarcane plantation and Fiji’s newspapers scream “kidnapping,” the inspector-general reluctantly assigns Akal the case. Akal, eager to achieve redemption, agrees—but soon finds himself far more invested than he could have expected. (Release date is June 6.)

I don’t read many thrillers, but that doesn’t mean I won’t share the annotation for Kate Robards’ debut, The Three Deaths of Willa Stannard. A missing child, a small town’s secrets, and a desperate killer set the stage for a darkly wrought debut novel that will haunt readers long after the last page. It’s not that they’ve been all that close in the past few years, but sisters Willa and Sawyer Stannard are bonded by the ups and downs of the life they’ve lived with their mercurial single mother. When Willa is found dead in her apartment from an apparent suicide, Sawyer just knows it’s not possible. A cryptic note from the acclaimed broadcast journalist leads police to rule out foul play. Shattered by grief—and obsessed by the idea that her sister’s death was not a suicide—Sawyer plunges into a search for the truth. When Sawyer learns that Willa was writing an explosive true crime book about the decades-old disappearance of a toddler that rocked a small town hundreds of miles away, she’s even more convinced that Willa’s death is suspicious. Believing it is somehow connected to the research Willa was doing for the book, Sawyer begins to trace her sister’s steps, deep into a community she can’t begin to understand and to a truth that could destroy her as easily as it did Willa. (Release date is June 20.)

I don’t know who does the covers for Katharine Schellman’s Nightingale mysteries, but the cover art is gorgeous. The second book in the series set in New York City during Prohibition is The Last Drop of Hemlock. Life as a working-class girl in Prohibition-era New York isn’t safe or easy. But Vivian Kelly has a new job at the Nightingale, an underground speakeasy where the jazz is hot and the employees look out for each other in a world that doesn’t care about them. Things are finally looking up for her and her sister Florence… until the night Vivian learns that her friend Bea’s uncle, a bouncer at the Nightingale, has died. His death is ruled a suicide, but Bea isn’t so convinced. She knew her uncle was keeping a secret: a payoff from a mob boss that was going to take him out of the tenements and into a better life. Now, the money is missing. Though her better judgment tells her to stay out of it, Vivian agrees to help Bea find the truth about her uncle’s death. But they uncover more than they expected when rumors surface of a mysterious letter writer, blackmailing Vivian’s poorest neighbors for their most valuable possessions, threatening poison if they don’t comply. (Release date is June 6.)

Julia Seales and I don’t share the same sense of humor, but I know readers will enjoy Seales’ debut, A Most Agreeable Murder. When a wealthy bachelor drops dead at a ball, a young lady takes on the decidedly improper role of detective in this action-packed debut comedy of manners and murder. Feisty, passionate Beatrice Steele has never fit the definition of a true lady, according to the strict code of conduct that reigns in Swampshire, her small English township—she is terrible at needlework, has absolutely no musical ability, and her artwork is so bad it frightens people. Nevertheless, she lives a perfectly agreeable life with her marriage-scheming mother, prankster father, and two younger sisters— beautiful Louisa and forgettable Mary. But she harbors a dark secret: She is obsessed with the true crime cases she reads about in the newspaper. If anyone in her etiquette-obsessed community found out, she’d be deemed a morbid creep and banished from respectable society forever. For her family’s sake, she’s vowed to put her obsession behind her. Because eligible bachelor Edmund Croaksworth is set to attend the approaching autumnal ball, and the Steele family hopes that Louisa will steal his heart. If not, Martin Grub, their disgusting cousin, will inherit the family’s estate, and they will be ruined or, even worse, forced to move to France. So Beatrice must be on her best behavior . . . which is made difficult when a disgraced yet alluring detective inexplicably shows up to the ball. Beatrice is just holding things together when Croaksworth drops dead in the middle of a minuet. (Release date is June 27.)

For her fans, I probably only have to say, “Lisa See”. Her latest novel is Lady Tan’s Circle of Women. The latest historical novel from New York Times bestselling author Lisa See, inspired by the true story of a woman physician from 15th-century China—perfect for fans of See’s classic Snowflower and the Secret Fan and The Island of Sea Women. According to Confucius, “an educated woman is a worthless woman,” but Tan Yunxian—born into an elite family, yet haunted by death, separations, and loneliness—is being raised by her grandparents to be of use. Her grandmother is one of only a handful of female doctors in China, and she teaches Yunxian the pillars of Chinese medicine, the Four Examinations—looking, listening, touching, and asking—something a man can never do with a female patient. From a young age, Yunxian learns about women’s illnesses, many of which relate to childbearing, alongside a young midwife-in-training, Meiling. The two girls find fast friendship and a mutual purpose—despite the prohibition that a doctor should never touch blood while a midwife comes in frequent contact with it—and they vow to be forever friends, sharing in each other’s joys and struggles. No mud, no lotus, they tell themselves: from adversity beauty can bloom. But when Yunxian is sent into an arranged marriage, her mother-in-law forbids her from seeing Meiling and from helping the women and girls in the household. Yunxian is to act like a proper wife—embroider bound-foot slippers, pluck instruments, recite poetry, give birth to sons, and stay forever within the walls of the family compound, the Garden of Fragrant Delights. (Release date is June 6.)

Sarah Stewart Taylor’s Maggie D’arcy series is one of my favorite current series. Of course, it doesn’t hurt that it’s set in Ireland. A Stolen Child, the fourth in the series, takes Maggie in a different direction. After months of training, former Long Island homicide detective Maggie D’arcy is now officially a Garda. She’s finally settling into life in Ireland and so is her teenage daughter, Lilly. Maggie may not be a detective yet, but she’s happy with her community policing assignment in Dublin’s Portobello neighborhood.When she and her partner find former model and reality tv star Jade Elliot murdered—days after responding to a possible domestic violence disturbance at her apartment—they also discover Jade’s toddler daughter missing. Shorthanded thanks to an investigation into a gangland murder in the neighborhood, Maggie’s friend, Detective Inspector Roly Byrne, brings her onto his team to help find the missing child. But when a key discovery is made, the case only becomes more confusing—and more dangerous. Amidst a nationwide manhunt, Maggie and her colleagues must look deep into Jade’s life—both personal and professional—to find a ruthless killer. (Release date is June 20.)

Don’t you love the cover of Julia Bryan Thomas’ The Radcliffe Ladies’ Reading Club? I haven’t read it yet, but I’m eager to read it after I saw a quote that said it’s “a love letter to books and friendship”. Massachusetts, 1954. With bags packed alongside her heavy heart, Alice Campbell escaped halfway across the country and found herself in front of a derelict building tucked among the cobblestone streets of Cambridge. She turns it into the enchanting bookshop of her dreams, knowing firsthand the power of books to comfort the brokenhearted. The Cambridge Bookshop soon becomes a haven for Tess, Caroline, Evie, and Merritt, who are all navigating the struggles of being newly independent college women in a world that seems to want to keep them in the kitchen. But when a member of the group finds herself shattered, everything they know about themselves will be called into question. (Release date is June 6.)

The Isolated Seance is Jeri Westerson’s first Irregular Detectives mystery. Watch out, Sherlock! Introducing one-time Baker Street Irregular Timothy Badger and his partner-in-crime Benjamin Watson, two exciting and unconventional young consulting detectives, mentored by the great man himself, tackling intriguing and unusual cases in Victorian London with endearing verve and wit. Sherlock Holmes’s protégés Tim Badger and Benjamin Watson are catapulted into a tricky first case when a man is brutally murdered during a séance. London, 1895. Former Baker Street Irregular Tim Badger is determined to follow in the footsteps of his great mentor, Sherlock Holmes, by opening his own consulting detective agency with his partner, Benjamin Watson. The intrepid duo are ready to make a name for themselves . . . if only they had clients! Their luck changes when Sherlock recommends his protégés to Thomas Brent. Brent is eager to find out who killed his master, Horace Quinn, during a séance at Quinn’s house. What was Quinn desperately trying to find out from his deceased business partner, Stephen Latimer, before he was stabbed through the heart? (Release date is June 6.)

Enough? That’s it for June, other than that entire list below. Then, there are the ones you mention, books you’re waiting to read in June. Enjoy!

Check out these titles as well.

Adelman, Melissa – What the Neighbors Saw (6/20)
Audrain, Ashley – The Whispers (6/6)
Bartz, Andrea – The Spare Room (6/20)
Beutner, Katharine – Killingly (6/6)
Bush, Nancy – The Camp (6/27)
Chenault-Kilgore, Monica – Long Gone, Come Home (6/6)
Cravens, Claudia – Lucky Red (6/20)
Doiron, Paul – Dead Man’s Wake (6/27)
Ellis, Helen – Kiss Me in the Coral Lounge (6/13)
Flasar, Milena Michiko and Caroline Froh – Mr Kato Plays Family (6/20)
Gaynor, Hazel – The Last Life Boat (6/13)
Hall, Alexis – Mortal Follies (6/6)
Hallman, J.C. – Say Anarcha (6/6)
Hamrick, Melanie – First Position (6/20)
Hazelwood, Ali – Love, Theoretically (6/13)
Heard, Wendy – You Can Trust Me (6/13)
Hoffman, Michelle – The Second Ending (6/13)
Jakobson, Haley – Old Enough (6/20)
Jane, Emily – On Earth as it is on Television (6/13)
Khavari, Kate – A Botanist’s Guide to Flowers and Fatality (6/6/)
Leede, CJ – Maeve Fly (6/6)
Lillard, Amy – A Murder of Aspic Proportions (6/27)
Michallon, Clemence – The Quiet Tenant (6/20)
Moore, Lorrie – I am Homeless if This is Not My Home (6/20)
O’Donoghue, Caroline – The Rachel Incident (6/27)
Rabess, Cecilia – Everything’s Fine (6/6)
Schulman, Helen – Lucky Dogs (6/6)
Sennefelder, Debra – How the Murder Crumbles (6/20)
Siegel, Katie – Charlotte Illes is not a Detective (6/27)
Soule, Charles – The Endless Vessel (6/6)
Trussoni, Danielle – The Puzzle Master (6/13)
Wilder, Ava – Will They or Won’t They? (6/27)
Wilding, Rose – Speak of the Devil (6/13)
Williams, Katie – My Murder (6/6)
Xie, Jenny – Holding Pattern (6/20)