When Rachel Murdock and her sister Jennifer receive a call for help from their favorite niece, Lilly, in Breakers Beach, CA, they quickly hop a train from Los Angeles to see her—but not before collecting their prized cat Samantha in a picnic basket and bringing her along for the ride. Samatha, it turns out, is an heiress, the inheritor of a fortune left by a wealthy relative, and so the attempt at the cat’s life, made right after they arrive, comes as a shock. The cat survives, but unfortunately, Lilly, murdered soon thereafter, is not so lucky. By the time the police arrive, the clues are already falling into place. The source of Lilly’s trouble is revealed to be a gambling debt incurred during an attempt to cheat at bridge, and the suspects in her slaying quickly pile up. But then another corpse is discovered, buried in the nearby sand, and it becomes clear that the killing spree concerns more than just the young lady’s personal money trouble. With the authorities distracted by lurid details, it’s up to Rachel and her furry friend to uncover the subtleties containing the solution to the puzzle. A prototypical early “cat mystery,” written before the subgenre became a staple of cozy mystery fiction, The Cat Saw Murder is an entertaining and endlessly surprising whodunit with a focus on felines. Reissued for the first time in over half a decade, the book, written pseudonymously by the author better known for her hardboiled and suspense novels, is the first in the long-running Rachel Murdock series. Includes discussion guide questions for use in book clubs.

A spry seventy-year-old sleuth and her feline companion sniff out clues to a "The observant Rachel is an appealing Jessica Fletcher antecedent." —Publishers Weekly A letter has arrived at the home shared by the elderly Murdock sisters and their black cat, Samantha. It stirs Rachel's curiosity, and Jennifer's alarm, as she fears her sibling will once again head off on a dangerous adventure in detection. The letter-writer is an old friend's granddaughter who explains that a bizarre drawing of a hand has been slipped under her door, making her very uneasy, and she'd appreciate Rachel's sleuthing skills. Leaving a furious Jennifer behind and toting Samantha in her travel basket, Rachel departs Los Angeles to visit Prudence Mills and assess any possible threat to her. There'd been conflict over her late father's business dealings, and Prudence's little sister encountered a prowler in her bedroom. Even more troubling, Prudence's face has been scarred by an unseen attacker—and for some reason, she fears telling the police. Now, in the snowy mountains, Rachel will be entangled in a chilling mystery—and, as a child of pro-temperance activists, visit a bar for the first time in her seventy years . . . "Dolores Hitchens has been writing novels of mystery and suspense, under a variety of names and in a variety of styles, but always entertainingly and often achieving something more than casual entertainment." —The New York Times Catspaw for Murder was previously published under the pseudonymD. B. Olsen

A drunken man is shot dead on his doorstep in this classic mystery starring the “observant \[and\] appealing” seventy-year-old sleuth (Publishers Weekly). Walking home wearily from an evening spent poring over the books of the Parchly Heights Methodist Ladies’ Aid searching for a fifty-eight-cent error, Miss Jennifer Murdock becomes witness to a terrible A man, stumbling drunk, arrives home—and just as he fumbles with his keys, gunfire erupts and kills him on the spot. Jennifer is determined not to tell her sister, Rachel, anything about it. After all, Rachel considers herself a sleuth, or as Jennifer views it, a busybody who pokes her nose in places it doesn’t belong. What she doesn’t know is Rachel has just had a visit from a member of that same household, a meek eighteen-year-old taken in after she was orphaned and treated like a servant. Young Shirley has been alarmed by a series of nasty pranks—and now she’s heartbroken, and even more frightened, after finding her pet bird dead. There’s something awful going on in the house on Chestnut Street, and neither her prim and proper sister nor Det. Lt. Stephen Mayhew can stop Rachel from finding out what it is . . . “Rachel has never yet failed to solve a murder mystery. Never before have her methods been quite so devious and unorthodox as they are in this story.” —The New York Times The Cat Wears a Noose was previously published under the pseudonymD.B. Olsen

Native American lore infuses a southwestern mystery featuring the indomitable Rachel Murdock and her cat, Samantha. The notes—short and sharp—seem to strike at the heart of each recipient’s insecurities and darkest secrets. Signed “Kachina,” they’ve been sent to a group of friends who met in college, including Rachel Murdock’s goddaughter, Gail. When Gail wants to unmask the letter writer by inviting the group to her house in Arizona, she asks Rachel for help. Unable to resist, Rachel scoops up her cat, leaving her sister behind on a tour through the Southwest. As the seven friends reconnect, familiar grievances and new resentments emerge. And when one woman—as prickly as the cacti dotting the desert landscape—is killed by a rattlesnake bite, the party takes an even darker turn. A thunderous storm soon washes out the roads, and the group is left on their own with a dead body and a murderer in their midst. Now Rachel must use her knowledge of human nature to unmask a killer before another life is snuffed out.

The senior super-sleuth is the odds-on favorite to discover if a killer stalks the Hollywood Hills in the final Rachel Murdock mystery. Though not a professional private eye, Miss Rachel Murdock has gained notoriety in certain Los Angeles circles for her crime-solving skills. They come in handy after she witnesses an extraordinary a woman being thrown into the window of a pet store. Said woman is Ruth Rand, an actress desperate to find her missing niece, Lila. She is convinced that Lila's husband, a former jockey, killed her. It doesn't help that he's the one responsible for Ruth ending up on the pet store floor. When Rachel agrees to help her, she's drawn into the sordid world of horse racing and gambling. But the more she learns about the lives of those involved, the more she's willing to bet that the truth lies in the haunting figure of Lila's one-eyed cat. Praise for Dolores Hitchens and her mysteries "You will never regret having made the acquaintance of Miss Rachel Murdock." —The New York Times "High-grade suspense." —San Francisco Chronicle "For those who enjoy Little-Old-Lady detectives, this should be a pleasing mystery, particularly if active LOLs are preferred . . . Both interesting and unusual is the motive for murder." —Mystery File