Fresh Baked Mysteries Books In Order

Publication Order of Fresh-Baked Mysteries Books

The Fresh Baked Mysteries is a series of thriller and cozy mystery novels written by the famous American author Livia J. Washburn. The novels in the series feature the main character in the form of Phyllis Newsom, who has been depicted by the author as a retired teacher based in a small town in Texas. The plots of all the novels of the Fresh Baked Mysteries series show that Phyllis Newsom gets involved in various murder cases as the prime suspect. However, she shows great determination to solve the criminal cases on her own and clear her name. This determination and dedication have allowed her to become an amateur sleuth. The author Livia J. Washburn began writing the series in the year 2006 when the first novel of the series was published. Since then, she has successfully completed a total of ten novels till 2015. The author still continues to contribute to the series and makes sure that she publishes at least one novel in the series each year. The series is one of her favorites among other successful mystery series written by her, but she hardly gets enough time to work on it because of her busy schedule. The first novel of the Fresh Baked Mysteries was published in the year 2006 under the title ‘A Peach of a Murder’. The novel was published by the Signet publishing house and features the central character Phyllis Newsom. The plot of the novel opens up with Phyllis Newsom, who is introduced as a retired teacher in one of the small towns of Texas. The people of the town have always known Phyllis as a humble and down-to-earth school teacher, who is spending her days after retirement quite satisfactorily. She is considered to be sweet as peach pie all the year round. However, at the time of the annual Peach Festival in the town, she becomes nervous and a little bit restless as the blue ribbon the festival has slipped through her hands on previous occasions. But this time, she seems to be determined to make her attempt count at every cost.

Soon, the people of the town become shocked when a dead body is found in the town. It is learned that the dead body is of a notorious local citizen, which is found lying under one of the cars in the local garage. Although, Phyllis Newsom seems to be very busy in her preparation to win the Peach Festival contest, she decides to do some amateur sleuthing in order to collect some important clues related to the murder. However, she does not let herself away from the contest and makes sure that she prepares well for the contest in order to out-bake her rivals and win the Peach Festival competition. All the contestants in the competition guard their secrets about their recipes and make sure that the others do not come to know about their recipes. They do all sorts of rubbish talking in order to prevent others from knowing their recipes. Phyllis Newson also follows the strategy of her rival contestants and keeps her recipe preserved from others. She prepares an unusual peach dish with the name Spicy Peach Cobbler and hopes that she will win the contest with this special recipe. However, her dreams get shattered as the judge of the competition dies after eating her cobbler peach. She becomes the prime suspect of the murder, which is witnessed by all the people at the festival. Phyllis decides to use her sleuthing tactics to bring the truth about the death of the judge and clear her name of the crime that she has not committed. She also decides to bring the actual killer to justice and punish him for the murder as well as for poisoning her recipe which caused her to lose the Peach Festival contest.

One of the other novels of the series was titled ‘The Christmas Cookie Killer’. This novel was published by the NAL publishing house in the year 2008. The novel continues to show the troubled life of the retired school teacher named Phyllis Newsom, who lives in the town of Weatherford in Texas. The ups and downs in her retired life have forced Phyllis to become an amateur sleuth. In the opening plot of the novel, she is depicted as trying to finish up the unlucky year on good terms after clearing her name from a murder case. However, she has not lost hope in baking new recipes because of the bitter experience of her previous attempts. Phyllis is determined not to hang up her apron and looks forward to the coming year’s Christmas baking contest. She knows that she has to try even harder as the contest is going to be a tough one. At first, she thinks that entering into the Christmas cookie competition would be a fun experience for her, but soon she realizes that she is going to get a tough challenge from her rivals in the contest. Phyllis thinks that the lime sugar cookies, which are in the shape of snowflakes are the best cookies in the contest.

But, the pecan shortbread prepared by her friend Carolyn and ginger doodles made by her neighbor Mrs. Simmons seems to be giving her a tough competition. After exchanging the cookies in the annual Christmas celebration, Phyllis decides to visit Mrs. Simmons, who is an elderly woman and lives alone in her home. When Phyllis arrives in Mrs. Simmons’s home, she finds out that Mrs. Simmons has been strangled to death with the belt of her bathrobe and lying in the pile of the sugar lime cookies. Phyllis decides to look for the long list of suspects in the murder and seems to be determined to solve the case. She thinks of it as a cookie, which needs to be crumbled at any cost in order to catch the killer and bring him to justice. Just like the other novels of the series, this novel too went on to become a huge hit among the readers all over the world. Author Livia J. Washburn was praised for her efforts by the critics as well as her fellow authors. She received a lot of motivation from the success of the novels of the series, which helped her to continue writing such mysteries. The novels of the series have helped author Livia j. Washburn to establish herself as a well known author of the mystery genre and this has allowed her to write a number of other mystery series’ as well. She keeps trying to manage her busy schedule and use some her time in writing the next novel of the Fresh Baked Mysteries series.

3 Responses to “Fresh Baked Mysteries”

1. Julie: 1 month ago

   Love “Fresh Baked Mysteries”, I can’t believe that she is not going to write anymore of them.Has she changed her mind? I know her fans are very upset. I know I am.

   Reply
2. Linda Lee: 2 months ago

   Love this series. Would love to see another one published. Does Mrs. Washburn plan any more books in this series.

   Reply
3. Judy. vanRyn: 1 year ago

   Found the first book of this series in a “take one – leave one “. Box at our neighborhood park. Didn’t know an 80+ old gal could become an addict. Love the series

   Reply