Plainly Murder: A Penguin Special from Obsidian (10 page)

Isabella Alan
, an academic librarian for a small college in Ohio, grew up visiting the state’s Amish country with her family. Her 2010 debut, Maid of Murder, written under the name Amanda Flower, received an Agatha Award nomination for Best First Novel.

“Isabella Alan captures Holmes County and the Amish life in a mystery that is nothing close to plain and simple, all stitched together with heart.”

—Avery Aames, Agatha Award-winning author of the Cheese Shop Mysteries

“Who can best run a quilt shop in Holmes County’s Amish country—an English outsider, or only the Amish themselves? With its vast cast of English and Amish characters in fictional Rolling Brook, Ohio, Isabella Alan’s
Murder, Plain and Simple
will be a dead certain hit with devotees of cozy mysteries.”

—P. L. Gaus, author of the Amish-Country Mysteries