In December, Nantucket would be desolate and bleak, except for the Christmas Stroll event--the first since Covid began--which lends the town a festive air in Mathews's knotty seventh Merry Folger mystery (after 2020's Death on Tuckernuck). Two disparate groups arrive on the island: the Secretary of State and her family, and a cast and crew filming a murder mystery TV show. Merry, recently promoted to police chief, is tasked with assisting the security detail for Madam Secretary and keeping the Stroll running smoothly. When two dead bodies are found, Merry and Howie Seitz, recently promoted to Merry's old detective job, must uncover the web of connections among the murder victims, the many visitors, and island denizens, including a National Geographic photographer-naturalist. The solve depends on a fairly simple, conventional clue, but many of the character motivations are both complex and coherent. The Secretary's seemingly feckless stepson befriends the TV star's daughter, and their tender, genuine relationship steals the emotional show. Fresh, well-wrought prose brings the setting of Nantucket to life. Mathews consistently entertains. Agent: Raphael Sagalyn, Sagalyn Literary. (Nov.)

After the isolation and losses of the pandemic, Police Chief Merry Folger is eager for Nantucket Island to celebrate Winter Stroll again, to enjoy a weekend beginning with Santa's arrival by boat. However, other arrivals on the island will kick off homicide investigations. The Secretary of State and her family are there, while a tech billionaire welcomes a TV production team of 80 to the island. The Secretary of State's stepson, Ansel, and an action star's daughter, Winter, manage to escape their security to head to town. When Ansel and Winter find the first body that weekend, Merry and her detective, Howie Seitz, must carefully balance a murder investigation with the political and media clout of the suspects. When a second body is found, it's also connected to the Hollywood group. As she grieves for her own grandfather, felled by COVID, Merry commiserates with the two young people trying to cope with losses in their lives. But she and Howie must still find a killer, despite the links to the two sympathetic visitors. VERDICT Fans of Katherine Hall Page's Faith Fairchild mysteries will appreciate the careful way this investigation unfolds in the atmospheric Nantucket-set story.--Lesa Holstine

Mathews wrote four novels about Nantucket detective Merry Folger between 1994 and 1998; the character returned in Death on Nantucket (2017), and this is the third in the series' second coming. It's set in the aftermath of the COVID-19 pandemic. Folger, now the police chief, is contending with a cantankerous TV crew filming the island's Christmas Stroll event when a tricky situation involving a high-ranking politician escalates into murder. She and Howie Seitz, whose journey from patrolman to detective has played out in the new books, have a surfeit of suspects, and it'll take a lot of determined sleuthing, not to mention a little luck, to narrow down the list. Superficially, the Folger novels feel like a blend of procedurals and cozies: long on character and atmosphere, short on blood and violence. But there's darkness under the surface, a sense of chaos threatening to erupt. The return of Merry Folger was most welcome back in 2017, and it's even better that the series continues to thrive today. Encourage fans to catch up on the full seven-installment run.

Christmas and death come to Nantucket. U.S. Secretary of State Janet Brimhold McKay; her husband, Ron; and his unsatisfactory, artistic son, Ansel, are in Nantucket for Christmas Stroll, a beloved island tradition. Also on the island is a film crew that's staying at the compound of wealthy tech genius Mike Struna, an old friend of ambitious director Carly Simpson-Sonnenfeld and her much older husband, Vic, a womanizer who runs a powerful talent agency. The two disparate groups are linked by a talented nature photographer squatting in a falling-down house. Ansel McKay and Winter Candler, daughter of movie star Chris Candler, strike up a friendship after a chance meeting in town. Both have serious problems, and both are often shadowed by their parents' security teams. Ansel, who had long believed his father's story that his cocaine-addicted mother left him and later died, has now identified her as Mary Alice Fillmore, a celebrated photographer who's squatting in her family home, which Ron McKay vengefully left to rot. When Mary Alice is murdered, Police Chief Merry Folger and her staff have their hands full since many of the suspects are powerful people who don't take kindly to her questions. Then Vic Sonnenfeld goes missing. Once his shotgunned body is found in a nature reserve, Merry has no dearth of suspects in a challenging case of powerful people and tangled love/hate relationships. Plenty of fascinating characters and myriad motives make for an exciting read. Copyright (c) Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.