Anastasia Pollack Crafting Mysteries Books In Order

Publication Order of Anastasia Pollack Crafting Mysteries Books

The “Anastasia Pollack Crafting Mystery” is a series of mystery novels by women’s fiction, romantic suspense, mystery, and romance novelist Lois Winston. Winston is a critically acclaimed and award-winning author that has been writing under the pseudonym, Emma Carlyle. However, she is best known for the “Anastasia Pollack Crafting Mystery” series which has been referred to as the more mature version of Stephanie Plum. In addition to being a bestselling author, Lois is a craft designer and also doubles as a literary agent. All of these experiences help her create the characters and settings in the novels that she writes. Until her retirement, she spent several years as a designer and editor of consumer crafts magazines. Much of what she did was with magazine and craft book publishers though she for a time worked with magazine and craft book publishers that required someone with experience as an editor and designer. When she is not working as an editor and designer, she carries around a terrible glue gun and has hurt herself from time to time. However, she believes that the pain has all been worth it as she gets a lot of inspiration from it.

Lois Winston started writing when she published “Talk Gertie to Me,” a romance novel that she published in 2006. The novel was a humorous story and less of a romance though it was the motivation she needed to launch her writing career. “Love, Lies and a Double Shot of Deception” the romantic suspense novel was published in 2007, further cementing her name as an author to watch. It was with the publishing of “Assault with a Deadly Glue Gun” that her career took off as it became the first of her very popular “Anastasia Pollack Crafting Mystery” series.

Anastasia the lead character of the “Anastasia Pollack Crafting Mystery” series features the spunkier, feistier, and more mature version of Stephanie Plum. She is an ordinary and very real woman who has to deal with all manner of adversity though she is not a superhero. For the most part, she uses willpower and courage to overcome whatever is thrown at her. She is a middle-aged woman that works a day job as a women’s magazine crafts editor and often finds herself in trouble. In the first novel of the series, her husband dies and leaves her in a bind. He had been gambling all their money away and this event will color the rest of the series as Anastasia battles to survive with very little money. On top of all of her troubles, she also lives with a narcissistic communist mother in law who makes outrageous demands. Her mother is no better as she is a childlike and obnoxious woman that is always getting into trouble in which Anastasia has to get her out of. The only bright side to her life seems to be her knack for solving some tough befuddling mysteries. She often finds herself or her loved ones facing charges of serious crimes such as murder and has to turn into amateur sleuthing to get out of such circumstances. Despite none of her mothers ever helping her out, she takes care of everyone around her even though she does a bad job taking care of herself. In everything, she uses her wit and caustic asides as a coping mechanism when her marriage and life circumstances seem not to be going that great.

“Assault with a Deadly Glue Gun” the first novel of the “Anastasia Pollack Crafting Mysteries” is the novel that introduces the woman that has been called the more grown-up version of Stephanie Plum. The ordinary-looking Anastasia is not a superwoman as for the most part she just uses what any other woman has, to deal with some very serious challenges in her life. At the opening of the debut novel of the series, she is working for a women’s magazine as a crafts editor and her life could not have been any better until her husband suddenly dies. She soon learns that he had been emptying their bank account as he had a serious gambling habit. She now has to deal with the mob that has been sending some nasty fellow around asking for money her husband had borrowed. Anastasia did not take it so seriously until she finds one of her friends and colleague killed and glued to her desk. Things only get more complicated when the police finger her as the lead suspect in the murder. Three times, gangsters break into her house and the fact that she has to contend with a demanding communist mother-in-law only makes her life more complicated. Her narcissistic and selfish mother-in-law Lucile has recently been demanding more space in the house at a time when she is struggling with the house bills and two teenage boys.

Anastasia gets a reprieve in “Death by Killer Mop Doll” as the mobster who had been coming around is finally dealt with. Her money problems have also been lessened though she still has to live with Lucile her obnoxious mother in law while having to edit tens of articles. She now works editing the crafts and design section of a women’s magazine and hardly has any time to rest, only for things to get worse. Some higher-ups have decided that some of the middle-grade editors now have to come up with a 15-minute segment that will be aired on the company run radio station. Such a segment would need at least a full day to prepare and Anastasia just does not have the time. It is a terrible deal given that they will not be paid overtime for the segments. Moreover, things often tend to go wrong with these things, and on the very first day, they do. The set and craft they had prepared for the segment are vandalized and on the second day, the program director who is also Anastasia’s mother fiancé is found dead. Given that the body had been in the crafts closet, she loses all her work even though she had bigger fish to fry since her mother is fingered as the main suspect in the murder. Anastasia now needs to help clear her mother of the charges.

“Revenge of the Crafty Corpse,” the third novel of the “Anastasia Pollack Crafting Mysteries” by Lois Winston opens with Anastasia in another tough place. She has recently been presented with the opportunity to earn more money as an arts and crafts instructor for a local nursing home. Working two jobs, she is now doing better and the situation improves even further since her mother in law is living in a rehab nursing home having undergone surgery a few weeks before. Lucile has been put in a room alongside a 96-year-old woman that entertains the gentlemen of the home at night when she is not doing her crafts. Lucile’s roommate’s activities during the night often cause raucous situations with the residents and staff but things get very interesting when one of the residents is found dead. Lucille is the lead suspect in the case and Anastasia has to try to get her off once again.