Lilly Jayne typically spends the harvest season baking festive pies and crafting colorful wreaths to enter in the library's annual fundraising contest. But this year, autumn opens on a somber note when beloved local theater owner Leon Tompkin dies unexpectedly. His memorial sets the scene for a mini reunion of The Goosebush Players' best and brightest alumni, including Hollywood star Jeremy Nolan... until someone plucks Jeremy from the spotlight-permanently. As dedicated theater volunteer Scooter McGee falls under suspicion, Lilly and her Garden Squad must spring into action. They quickly discover a cornucopia of potential suspects in Jeremy's murder: Was it an embittered ex... or a jilted lover? A rival thespian... or an overly ambitious artist? Lilly rakes through the piles of clues, but if she doesn't uncover the real killer soon, more than autumn leaves will be dropping in Goosebush...
Lilly Jayne typically spends the harvest season baking festive pies and crafting colorful wreaths to enter in the library's annual fundraising contest. But this year, autumn opens on a somber note when beloved local theater owner Leon Tompkin dies unexpectedly. His memorial sets the scene for a mini reunion of The Goosebush Players' best and brightest alumni, including Hollywood star Jeremy Nolan... until someone plucks Jeremy from the spotlight-permanently. As dedicated theater volunteer Scooter McGee falls under suspicion, Lilly and her Garden Squad must spring into action. They quickly discover a cornucopia of potential suspects in Jeremy's murder: Was it an embittered ex... or a jilted lover? A rival thespian... or an overly ambitious artist? Lilly rakes through the piles of clues, but if she doesn't uncover the real killer soon, more than autumn leaves will be dropping in Goosebush...
Between hosting a haunted house on her lawn, serving on the town's 400th Anniversary Planning Committee, and prepping for the Fall Festival's 10k fundraiser, Lilly has her hands full. She doesn't have time for prickly newspaper reporter Tyler Crane, who's been creeping around town, looking for dirt on Goosebush's most notable families...until he's found dead on the race route moments before the start.An unfortunate accident? Or did Tyler unearth a secret that someone in Goosebush is willing to kill to keep? By planting nasty rumors and cultivating fear, Tyler sowed a fair share of ill will during his brief time in town. Weeding through the suspects will be thorny, but Lilly and her Garden Squad are determined to root out the autumnal assassin before the Fall Festival flops.
While Lilly digs into a town beautification project, her friend Tamara O'Connor has greater concerns than well-pruned geraniums. The real-estate-firm owner hasn't been shy about blaming perennial grouch Gladys Preston for thwarting her many attempts to sell off a beautiful beachside property. But accusations fly when Gladys is suddenly found dead-and Tamara is caught standing over the body with a bloody weapon in her hand. As Tamara becomes the prime murder suspect, Lilly and the Garden Squad ladies set out to prove that someone planted the evidence. With a potpourri of alarming clues scattered around Goosebush, cracking this case means confronting a calculating culprit with a penchant for cutting down anyone who gets in the way.
With hundreds flocking to her inaugural garden party, meticulous Lilly Jayne hasnÄôt left a single petal out of place. But the picture-perfect gathering turns unruly upon the arrival of Merilee Frank, LilyÄôs ex-husbandÄôs catty third wife. Merilee lives for trouble, so no one is surprised after she drinks too much, shoves a guest into the koi pond, and gets escorted off the property. The real surprise comes days laterÄîwhen Merilee is found dead in a pile of mulch. Lilly wishes she could stick to pruning roses and forget about MerileeÄôs murderÄîuntil her best friend and ex become suspects in the overgrown homicide case. Now, aided by the Garden Squad, an unlikely group of amateur crime solvers with a knack for planting, Lilly knows she has limited time to identify the true culprit and restore order to GoosebushÄîbecause if the murdererÄôs plot isnÄôt nipped in the bud, another victim could be pushing up daisies!
