Murder in the Green Room

The Comedian Cozy Mystery Series

Gwen Harper never planned on becoming a stand-up comedian at fifty-three. She planned on growing old with her husband, watching her kids find their way, and living quietly in their small Kansas town. But Tom is gone, and the one promise she made him—to finally chase the dream she'd always talked about—is the thing keeping her moving forward.

So Gwen drives two hours to open mic nights at questionable venues, clutches a notebook full of uncertain jokes, and tells herself the nerves mean she cares. It's a strange kind of life for a widow with a grown daughter living over her garage, a mortgage still on the books, and a complicated estrangement from her oldest child. But on stage, under the harsh lights, she is simply Gwen—and that feels like something worth holding onto.

When she arrives at The Rusty Nail for a Friday night open mic, she's surprised and delighted to find Tessa Ray there—a fellow comic and one of the few people who ever made Gwen believe she could do this. Their reunion is warm, easy, and full of the kind of laughter that makes a difficult evening feel like a gift. Then Tessa walks down the hall to the green room to meet someone, and never comes back.

When Gwen finds her friend's body, she's plunged into something far outside her quiet, carefully managed life. The police have questions. So does Gwen—and hers don't stop when the detective's do. Everyone in that bar that night had access to that hallway. One of them is a killer. And Gwen, who has spent the last few years learning to trust her instincts on stage, is starting to realize she might be able to trust them off it, too. Particularly as it applies to the undercover FBI agent!