Hobby-Themed Mysteries: Home Renovations

Death and the Decorator by Simon Brett

Jude's decision to redecorate her cottage leads to a meeting with a local decorator and a surprising discovery behind a wall panel in a Victorian building: a woman's handbag! The discovery becomes serious when the police identify the handbag's owner as Anita Garner, a young woman who vanished in suspicious circumstances twenty years earlier.

Zapped by Carol Higgins Clark

Returning home from their honeymoon to discover that their neighbor has put his Manhattan apartment up for sale, Regan Reilly and her husband Jack decide to buy it to enlarge their own loft, but the renovation process spawns its own set of problems and an unexpected case.

Knockdown by Sarah Graves

Jacobia “Jake” Tiptree is deep in her latest home improvement project—repainting the porch of her lovingly restored house in Eastport, Maine—when she notices the man repeatedly biking past her house. His face is unsettlingly familiar, but his chilling message seems Blood shows up again. Murder will out. Then there’s the anonymous email warning her to beware the Fourth of July—just two days away. Jake remembers some shady characters from her days as a hotshot financial manager, but she’s baffled as to the identity of her nemesis—until she receives a photo of a murdered man. From home invasion to kidnapping, this twisted killer is slowly but surely plotting a knockdown, not just for Jake but for the entire town of Eastport.

Deader Homes and Gardens by Joan Hess

Finding what she hopes will be an ideal house to share with her new husband and teenage daughter, Claire Malloy learns that the property's previous owner died under suspicious circumstances and that a real estate agent has gone missing.

Under Lock and Skeleton Key by Gigi Pandian

After a disastrous accident derails stage magician Tempest Raj's career, she heads back to her childhood home in California to comfort herself with her grandfather's Indian home-cooked meals. She resists working for her father's company. Secret Staircase Construction, which specializes in transforming clients' homes with sliding bookcases, intricate locks, and hidden reading nooks. When Tempest visits her dad's latest renovation project, her former stage double is discovered dead inside a wall that's supposedly been sealed for more than a century. Fearing she was the intended victim, Tempest begins to wonder if the Raj family curse that's plagued her family for generations has finally come for her.

Renovated to Death by Frank Anthony Polito

Real-life domestic partners and stars and producers of the new hit reality home renovation show Domestic Partners, bestselling mystery author Peter "PJ" Penwell and actor JP Broadway are enjoying work and life in their sleepy Detroit suburb of Pleasant Woods -- until a suspicious death makes an unscripted appearance. After a successful first season of Domestic Partners chronicling the renovation of their historic Craftsman Colonial, Peter and JP are taking on a renovation of a local Tudor Revival inherited by identical twin brothers Terry and Tom Cash. But linoleum floors and a pink-tiled bathroom aren't the only unwelcome surprises awaiting inside the house!