New Releases by Nancy Means Wright

The voices of two Vermont siblings alternate in The Shady Sisters. We see the sisters in myriad places-Ireland, Scotland, England, Vermont- and at different stages of their lives. The poems illustrate the sisters' differences, their commonalities, loves, losses, angers, disappointments, and moments of joy.

When puppeteer Marion collapses during a performance, her friend Fay Hubbard promises to carry on. But Fay, a neighbor of Ruth Willmarth, already has her hands full with three demanding foster children. When an autopsy reveals that Marion had swallowed a dose of deadly crushed yew—and a friend finds her sister dangling from a rod like a marionette, a shocked Fay races after the villains. Mystery by Nancy Means Wright; originally published by Enigma/GMTA Publishing

After you’ve restored a hump-roofed, rump-sprung wreck of a Broken House, withstood the eccentricities of in-laws, willful kids, offbeat neighbors, obstinant hired hands, live-in ghost and established a craft shop, featuring Timothy, a wooden rocking horse with personality but who can’t seem to hold onto his eyes and tail—what do you do for an encore? Wright decided to write a book about her crazy experiences. Memoir by Nancy Means Wright; originally published by Down East Books

To get into her brother’s Northern Spy Club, Zoe Elwood must walk a narrow beam over rusted farm machinery, and then solve a crime. Her chance comes when Alice’s grandmother expires after eating a bowl of pea soup. Kelby gives Zoe just five days to solve the crime. Can she do it? (ages 9-12) Winner of an Agatha award for Best Children’s/Young Adult Novel. Children’s/Young Adult Mystery by Nancy Means Wright; originally published by Hilliard and Harris

Feminist Mary Wollstonecraft meets Henry Fuseli at her publisher’s circle of intellectuals, philosophers, and artists, and becomes obsessed with him and his erotic painting The Nightmare. When it is stolen, Fuseli accuses young painter Roger Peale, who is clapped into Newgate Prison. Escaping with the aid of a French émigré from the Revolution, Peale is ambushed by a highwayman and taken to a madhouse. Meanwhile Fuseli’s footman, a witness to the theft, is killed in a carriage “accident.” And bluestocking Isobel Frothingham is strangled after a soiree and posed to resemble Fuseli’s perverse masterpiece. Wollstonecraft’s impetuous nature leads her to propose a ménage à trois with Fuseli and his wife, and when rebuffed-always on the side of the underdog-to investigate the case to clear the young artist and rescue Isobel’s illegitimate daughter. Wright’s first mystery with Mary Wollstonecraft, Midnight Fires, was called “captivating” by Publishers Weekly. And mystery author Patricia Wynn says, “The Nightmare does what good historical fiction should do-makes me wonder where the truth ends and fiction begins.”

Drusie Valentini doesn’t fit in with her arty family: her extravagant puppeteer father, his gypsy-like assistant Fey, who moved in when her mother left—or her pesky younger brother Punch. A party that a boyfriend talked her into ends in disaster, and getting her sent to a strict boarding school. In a year when it seems that everyone is pulling her strings, Drusie is forced to come to terms with her life. Young adult fiction by Nancy Means Wright; originally published by Dutton

Ruth Willmarth leaps into the fray when her ornery cow Zelda unearths a human finger; a rented greyhound digs up a skeleton wearing a Scots bonnet; and a lovely woman dies a mysterious death at a local Healing House. “Demanding and engaging,” (Booklist). “Vividly offbeat characters,” (Kirkus Reviews), “A strong sense of place…with human, and humorous problems.” (Publishers Weekly) 2nd Ruth Willmarth mystery by Nancy Means Wright; originally published by St. Martin’s

Vermont dairy farmer Ruth Willmarth encounters beekeepers, Abenaki Indians, a dead male student, a strangled female professor, and devastating secrets from the past in this hair-raising tale. Romantic Times calls STOLEN HONEY “intricate and fascinating,” while Kirkus Reviews find the mystery “penetrating, economical, and generously plotted.” Mystery by Nancy Means Wright; originally published by St. Martin’s Minotaur

Dairy farmer Ruth Willmarth struggles with a mad cow plague, a squatter family of volatile Irish Travellers, a beautiful runaway woman--and Murder. According to Kirkus Reviews: “The masterfully evoked terror of Mad Cow makes Ruth's fifth her most sharply focused yet.” Mystery by Nancy Means Wright; originally published by St. Martin’s Minotaur

Single mother-farmer Ruth Willmarth discovers her neighbor, Lucien, and his part-Indian wife Belle, bloody, beaten, and robbed of their life savings. When Belle dies, Ruth faces barn burnings and the disappearance of her son—as she and would-be lover Colm Hanna, who serves as Realtor, town mortician, and part-time cop, track the killer's muddy trail to put an end to this mad season. Mystery by Nancy Means Wright; originally published by St. Martin’s Press

Catastrophe hits a Vermont apple orchard: a plague of maggots, a spray of RoundUp, hate calls from a local cult, poisoned fruit that kills a Jamaican picker, and a young girl in a risky relationship. Dairy farmer Ruth Willmarth rushes to help—only to watch the troubles pile up on her own doorstep! Wright doesn't put a foot wrong in this well-wrought mystery." (The Boston Globe) Mystery by Nancy Means Wright; originally published by St. Martins Minotaur

Mitchelstown Castle in County Cork, seat of the notorious Anglo-Irish Kingsborough family, fairly hums with intrigue. In 1786 the new young governess, Mary Wollstonecraft, witnesses a stabbing when she attends a pagan bonfire at which an illegitimate son of the nobility is killed. When the young Irishman Liam Donovan, who hated the aristocratic rogue for seducing his niece, becomes the prime suspect for his murder, Mary-ever a champion of the oppressed, and susceptible to Liam's charm-determines to prove him innocent. Mary Wollstonecraft (mother of Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley, who wrote Frankenstein) was celebrated, even a cause celebre in her day, as a notorious and free-thinking rebel. Her short life was highly unconventional, with the kidnap of her sister from an abusive husband, love affairs, an illegitimate child, religious dissent, a suicide attempt, participation in the French Revolution, and other eyebrow-raising episodes. Nancy Means Wright hopes that Midnight Fires, set during Mary's term as a governess in Ireland, will "present her to the world as the brilliant, yet wholly human, passionate, and conflicted woman that she was."Riiviting. . . . As Mary snoops around in search of the culprit, she is bound not to lose herself to the mystery, her job, or the charms of any man. Wright deftly illuminates 18th-century class tensions." Publishers Weekly (2/15/10)

Top mystery writers Nancy Means Wright and Jonathan Harrington team up with romance writers Maggie Price and B.J. Daniels to deliver four gripping stories of love, betrayal, and crime during the Valentine's season.