MOVING IS MURDER

An Air Force family’s relocation to Vernon, Wash., lands them in a nest of trouble.

Ellie and Mitch Avery are such practiced packers that they can move fairly smoothly even with a newborn. In fact, Ellie runs a business that helps people who lack her organizational skills. Choosing off-base housing to escape Air Force activities, the Averys find that most of their neighbors are members of Mitch’s squadron anyway. On the way home from a base barbecue, Ellie discovers the body of environmentally active Air Force wife Cass Vincent, dead of anaphylactic shock. Even sleep deprivation—her baby’s refusal to keep normal hours has Ellie popping Hershey Kisses—doesn’t prevent her from sticking her nose into the neighborhood mysteries. When Joe Vincent hires her to organize the removal of Cass’s things, she finds a cup of wasps wedged under the gas pedal of the woman’s car. Ellie will also have to deal with the murder of a squadron wife whose profligate spending condemned her to work two jobs secretly and a local land-development deal Cass had been trying to thwart. Although OSI and the local police are investigating, it’s Ellie’s snooping that eventually cracks the case—though only her rescue by Rex, the Vincents’ escape-artist puppy, saves her from becoming another victim.

A cozy debut that’ll help you get organized and provide entertainment in your newfound spare time.