Crime Never Takes A Holiday: A Mystery Anthology

by Paty Jager

A cornucopia of ten cozy mystery stories that are perpetrated during holidays from New Years to Christmas. This collection explores unexplained disturbances, college pranks gone wrong, and almost always one or more murders around a holiday. Solve these spooky crimes that lurk beneath celebratory parties and help search for the murderers. Kick off your shoes, grab a warm drink and snuggle into a blanket before you get lured onto the sparkling snow for the next crime spree.

A Body on the 13th Floor by Paty Jager
Dead Ladies Don't Dance by Robin Weaver
Took Nothing Left Nothing by Pamela Cowan
Busted for Bones by Dari LaRoche
Yuletide Firebug by Kathy Coatney
Starry Night Murder by Mary Vine
The Twelfth Night Murder by Ann Chaney
Blue Christmas by Melissa Yi
Two Turtle Doves by Maggie Lynch
Five Golden Rings by Kimila Kay

374 pages, Paperback

Published October 20, 2022

About the author

Paty Jager is an award-winning author of 55+ novels, novellas, and short stories of murder mystery, western romance, and action adventure.
All her work has Western or Native American elements in them along with hints of humor and engaging characters. Paty and her husband raise alfalfa hay in rural eastern Oregon. Riding horses and battling rattlesnakes, she not only writes the western lifestyle, she lives it.

Reviews

[Kim · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is a great collection of short mysteries. Paty Jager’s Body on the 13th Floor is what first drew me to the book. I really love Dela the main protagonist from Mrs. Jager’s Spotted Pony Casino Mystery Series. She is a wonderful complex and relatable character. The mystery was fast paced with plenty of suspects and red herrings even though this is a novella. The other novellas contained in this anthology are equally as well written.

I recommend this book to mystery fans.

All thoughts and opinions are mine and have not been influenced by anyone.

[Cheryl · Rating 5 out of 5]

An anthology which did NOT leave me wanting. Each story was very different from the others in a good way. The theme of the stories revolved around different holidays. The first story was by Paty Jager and Dela Alvaro solving a murder at the Spotted Pony Casino. Dela is familiar to me through Paty’s books and she is kind of my hero.

I am not familiar with the other authors but have found their stories interesting and learned a few things (like geocaching). Some murders occurred in a retirement village, in an early 1800s Twelfth Night celebration and while a young woman waits for her family and fiancé to arrive she solves a murder. A big twist in this last one. The final story really held my attention because the sheriff had a deputy who was autistic and really valuable at a crime scene. I actually bought a book by one of these authors. This anthology is well worth the time and money!

[Anna Brentwood · Rating 5 out of 5]

An Anthology with a little something creepy for everyone…


This precious little book contains ten cozy, suspense and mystery type stories that are each uniquely their own and pull you right in…Each story packs a punch of its own, different, interesting characters, both real or fictional places, and situations___best of all—-they are all centered around a variety of various holidays.

If you are an on-the-run reader who doesn’t have time for a long involved saga over three hundred plus pages but want to read something satisfying that holds your interest and you enjoy a good puzzle or two, this anthology is THE gift that keeps on giving.

I highly recommend. A great stocking stuffer too!

[Robin · Rating 4 out of 5]

This collection of 10 novellas was well-written and entertaining. There was quite a variety, most set in present time and one set in Regency England. Paty Jager wrote A Body on the 13th Floor, another installment in the series featuring Dela Alvaro at the Spotted Pony Casino. I enjoyed this story too, as it was fast-paced, clever and interesting. These 10 stories brought fun, suspense, intrigue, romance, mischief and mystery. It was a very satisfying collection and I recommend it to others.

[Elissa · Rating 5 out of 5]

More Is Better!
I must admit I got this book in the first place because Paty Jager was part of it. And her story was, of course, all and more than I expected and a wonderful addition to her latest series, Spotted Pony Casino. But then I started reading the rest of the tales, and each was as delightful as the next. A series of little nuggets, bite-sized for when you only have a few minutes to read and want a satisfying bonbon of a murder mystery. Thank you, wonderful authors!