Nothing says “gratitude and grudges at the same table” quite like a Thanksgiving cozy mystery. Small-town parades, turkey farms, family feasts gone wrong — the holiday gives cozy authors plenty to work with.
We rounded up 12 Thanksgiving cozy mysteries to get you through the holiday, from long-running series favorites to a modern classic set in a Quebec village. Every book below can be read on its own, even if it is the twentieth book in a series.
Quick picks
- Best small-town Thanksgiving: Turkey Day Murder by Leslie Meier
- Best with a celebrity sleuth: A Fatal Feast by Jessica Fletcher & Donald Bain
- Best catering mystery: A Catered Thanksgiving by Isis Crawford
- Best turkey farm setting: The Trouble with Turkeys by Kathi Daley
- Best anthology: The Killer Wore Cranberry series
- Best literary pick: Still Life by Louise Penny
Small-town Thanksgiving mysteries
1. Turkey Day Murder
Leslie Meier · Lucy Stone Mystery #7
In Tinker’s Cove, a Metinnicut activist named Curt Nolan is found dead with an ancient war club beside him — right as the town gears up for its Thanksgiving celebration. Since Curt had a habit of disagreeing with just about everybody, Lucy has no shortage of suspects to work through between basting the turkey and wrangling her four kids.
Best for: readers who want to start the long-running Lucy Stone series with a classic small-town whodunit.
2. Turkey Trot Murder
Leslie Meier · Lucy Stone Mystery #24
Lucy discovers a body while out training for Tinker’s Cove’s annual Turkey Trot road race. What looks at first like a tragic accident on the ice turns into a case that pulls at old tensions running under the surface of her small town.
Best for: longtime Lucy Stone readers who want a later, more community-focused entry in the series.
3. A Fatal Feast
Jessica Fletcher & Donald Bain · Murder, She Wrote #32
Jessica Fletcher is juggling writer’s block, a looming manuscript deadline, and hosting a big Thanksgiving dinner in Cabot Cove — plus a visit from Scotland Yard Inspector George Sutherland. A peaceful post-dinner walk turns into a murder investigation when the two stumble on a body.
Best for: fans of the TV series and anyone who wants a classic “amateur sleuth in a cozy coastal town” read.
Feasts, farms and family drama
4. A Catered Thanksgiving
Isis Crawford · A Mystery with Recipes #7
Catering sisters Bernie and Libby are hired to run a Thanksgiving dinner for a spectacularly dysfunctional family — and things go from tense to deadly. As always in this series, expect a few recipes tucked between chapters.
Best for: readers who want recipes with their reading and don’t mind a family that bickers more than they give thanks.
5. The Trouble with Turkeys
Kathi Daley · Zoe Donovan Mystery #2
Zoe agrees to help her friend Jeremy with a temporary job at a local turkey farm two weeks before Thanksgiving — and ends up tangled in a case involving a dead miser and an eclectic cast of heirs, all with their own reasons to want him gone.
Best for: readers who want a lighter, small-town series to start fresh this season.
6. Roast Turkey and a Murder
Kathleen Suzette · Rainey Daye Mystery #7
The organizer of the community Thanksgiving dinner turns up dead, and Rainey and her crew of regulars have to figure out who among their small town wanted her gone before the holiday.
Best for: readers who like a cast of recurring small-town characters and a quick, cozy read.
7. Fanny Packs and Foul Play
Dorothy Howell · Haley Randolph Mystery #10
Event planner Haley Randolph organizes a Thanksgiving feast at a Calabasas mansion for the young owners of a candy company — until the hostess is pushed to her death from a second-floor balcony. Money-hungry relatives and an ex-lover all make the suspect list.
Best for: readers who like their cozies with a glossy, southern-California event-planning backdrop.
Parades, road trips and one Quebec village
8. The Thanksgiving Day Murder
Lee Harris · Christine Bennett Mystery #6
A woman vanished during the Thanksgiving Day Parade over a year ago, and with the official investigation stalled, her husband turns to ex-nun Christine Bennett for help. Christine works from little more than a box of the missing woman’s belongings — and finds a hidden past nobody suspected.
Best for: readers who like a slower-burn, puzzle-driven amateur-sleuth mystery.
9. Death in a Turkey Town
Melanie Jackson · Chloe Boston Mystery #3
Meter maid Chloe Boston is rounding up a flock of escaped turkeys before Thanksgiving when she stumbles into a murder investigation in her small town. A gentle, quick read for anyone who wants something short between longer series.
Best for: readers who want a shorter, breezier mystery to fit around holiday errands.
10. Murder Talks Turkey
Deb Baker · Gertie Johnson (Yooper) Mystery #3
Set in Michigan’s Upper Peninsula during the busy Thanksgiving season, Gertie Johnson and her group of amateur investigators get pulled into a bank robbery and shooting that shakes up their small town right before the holiday.
Best for: readers who want a cozy with more small-town color and a feistier, older amateur sleuth.
11. Still Life
Louise Penny · Chief Inspector Gamache #1
On the Sunday of Canadian Thanksgiving, beloved village resident Jane Neal is found dead in the woods outside Three Pines, a hamlet so small it isn’t on any map. Most people assume it was a hunting accident, but Chief Inspector Armand Gamache isn’t so sure. A little more literary than the rest of this list, and the start of one of the most acclaimed mystery series of the last twenty years.
Best for: readers who want a gentle mystery with real literary polish, and don’t mind starting a series that gets deeper as it goes.
An anthology to sample several authors at once
12. The Killer Wore Cranberry series
J. Alan Hartman (editor) · multiple volumes
Each volume in this series collects several short, Thanksgiving-themed mystery stories from different cozy authors. It is a low-commitment way to sample new voices over the holiday weekend, one short story at a time.
Best for: readers who want variety, or only have time for a story or two between holiday errands.
Do you need to read these in order?
No. Every book on this list wraps up its own mystery, so you can start with the Thanksgiving book even if it isn’t the first in the series. If you enjoy the characters, you can always go back and read the earlier books afterward.
Frequently asked questions
Are Thanksgiving cozy mysteries only about murder?
The mystery is always there, but most of the page time goes to the holiday itself: family dinners, parades, small-town festivals and a lot of turkey. The murder is the reason the characters come together to solve a puzzle, not the focus of the book.
Do these books include recipes?
Some do. Isis Crawford’s A Mystery with Recipes series (which includes A Catered Thanksgiving) is built around them, and several holiday anthologies include a recipe or two as well.
Which one should I read first?
If you want to start a series from book one, Turkey Day Murder, The Trouble with Turkeys and Still Life are all series openers. If you want something short, try Death in a Turkey Town or a volume of The Killer Wore Cranberry.
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Your turn
What is your favorite Thanksgiving cozy mystery? Tell us in the comments — we would love to add more to this list.