Guest Sleuth Spotlight: Greta Sinclair
Series: A Hattie andMoose cozy mystery
The Book: Murder at the Steeplechase
Hattie Leiper went to the Hillshire Farms Steeplechase for the fancy hats, the cross-country jumps, and a double date with Detective Bo Beckett. She did not go expecting a body. But when jockey Austin Grimes turns up dead in the stables alongside his prized horse, the authorities call it a tragic accident—and Hattie, looking at the man's open mouth, is not buying their story.
The setting is bluegrass country at the height of steeplechase season—silk hats, polished boots, and a fortune in horseflesh moving across cross-country fences. Beneath the surface runs a tangle of debts, bitter rivalries, and jockeys with secrets they would rather keep buried. Detective Beckett handles the official inquiry; Hattie, working from the edges with characteristic quiet persistence, starts her own.
What follows is a steeplechase grounds full of people who had reasons to want Austin Grimes gone—rival jockeys with bruised pride, owners with money on the line, and stable hands who saw more than they ever intended to admit. Hattie's investigation is helped, complicated, and very loudly accompanied by her menagerie: grumpy Chow Chow Moose, whose nose for trouble is matched only by his disinterest in subtlety; feisty Yorkie Mini Pearl, who keeps everyone honest; and crime-magnet British Shorthair Cecil, who absolutely refuses to be left out of the sleuthing. The further Hattie pulls at the threads of bluegrass society, the clearer it becomes that the killer is not finished—and that she'd best find them before another body turns up in the stables.
“Greta is a 2025 Global Book Awards Silver Medal winner whose Hattie & Moose books are built to stand on their own, so if you love equestrian settings, Southern small-town whodunits, and pet-driven sleuthing in the tradition of Ellery Adams or Maggie Sefton, this is the one to pick up.”
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