A Knit Before Dying is the second book in the Tangled Web Mystery series and takes place in the fictional town of Dorset Falls, Connecticut. After a few bumpy opening pages, author Sadie Hartwell’s style hits a solid groove and she delivers an amusing cozy aimed at people who love to knit. However, you don’t have to know your garter stitch from your seed stitch to enjoy this yarn. (Sorry, I couldn’t resist the pun.) Josie Blair has inherited her great aunt’s shop, Miss Marple’s Knits, and is trying her best to make a go of it. She’s ditched her fashion career in New York City for a rural farmhouse and crotchety roommate, her great uncle Eb. Gone are the big-city power clothes, traded in for more casual duds and a pair of trusty mud boots. Attracting new clients to the store, though, is a struggle.

When the storefront next to hers is rented to antique dealer Lyndon Bailey, Josie hopes the foot traffic will spill over to the yarn store. Instead, the only spillover is the puddle of blood oozing from Lyndon’s body, murdered before Nutmeg Antiques and Curiosities can even open. Discovered standing near the corpse is his business partner, Harry Oglethorpe. Did Harry stumble onto the crime scene or did he make a calculated move to take over the entire business? Throw into the plot a downright mean restaurant owner, a decades-old mysterious disappearance, and some eccentric sewing ladies, and watch what happens. Knitters will be thrilled with the patterns and yarn suggestions on the last few pages provided by Jane Haertel, writing here under the pen name of Sadie Hartwell.