Cozy Time: Two Series by Charlaine Harris

As the summer cozy-thon continues, I've been catching up on a favorite author: Charlaine Harris. Each of her  series has a  diffferent protagonist, setting, and plot premise that keeps them all separate, and prevents them  from running together. Last week, I reviewed her Lily Bard mystery "Shakespeare's Landlord" and have been looking forward to these two.  Harris has developed some excellent female characters, some interesting side characters in each, and plausible, intriguing plots.  I read both of these earlier last week and look forward to having more of both these series on my nightstand, or my MP3

Title: Grave Sight
Author:  Charlaine Harris
Publisher/Format: Recorded Books, audio 12 hours, 310 page equivalent
Narrator: Alyssa Bresnahan.
Year of publication: 2006
Subject: extra-normal abilities; murders
Setting:  Sarne Arkansas (fictional town)
Series: Harper Connelly mysteries
Genre: cozy mystery,  paranormal detecting
Source: public library


Harper Connelly was struck by lightening as a teen and lived to tell about it.  In fact, as a result of the electric bolt, she now can find others who have died and by being near the bodies, determine how they died, although she can't see the murderers when foul play is involved. With the help of her "brother" Tolliver Lang, they hire out across the country to assist in locating missing persons.  In many cases, they provide information to local law enforcement personnel often giving them a different take on how the victims died.  In Grave Sight, Harper not only finds the body of a murdered missing young lady, but also establishes that her dead boyfriend, originally ruled a suicide, did not in fact kill himself.  She and her brother are held in town until the local sheriff and police can solve the mystery, in spite of Harper's insistence that she can't "see" the identity of the perpetrator.

It's a pleasant read, and the reader has a fairly good inkling about 1/2 way through of who dunnit, but the story is so well written,  it's easy to continue to the end to see if the hunches are correct.  This the first book in the series and I can't wait for the rest.

Title: Three Bedrooms, One Corpse
Author: Charlaine Harris
Publisher/Format: Recorded Books audio, 6hr, 45 min;  310 pages equivalent
Narrator: Thérèse Plummer
Year of publication: 2010
Subject: amateur sleuthing-murder
Setting: Lawrenceton GA (fictional town)
Series: Aurora Teagarden mysteries
Genre: cozy mystery
Source: public library

I was immediately drawn to this series when I saw that the protagonist was a librarian!  Of course, Aurora (Roe) Teagarden is also an heiress, and decides she doesn't need to be a librarian anymore so she is now working on becoming a real estate agent, following her mother's footsteps.  While showing a client a three bedroom house, they discover the body of a fellow agent dead in the master bedroom. The story ramps up from there, another body is found, and Aurora discovers not only that she may be the object of a killer's search, but also the new love in her life (a real hunk who will certainly satisfy the romance readers who pick this up) may in fact be a suspect in the case. 

Great fun, tightly woven plot, interesting and engaging characters make this series one I'm going to continue.  This one is the third I've read, and I expect the next five to be just as much fun.

I can certainly recommend any of these series to those of you who are lovers of the cozy genre.  And if you are a vampire fan, don't forget her Sookie Stackhouse series.