Mattie Winston mysteries

A model who had recently had a very public argument with her estranged husband is found dead, and the estranged husband is the top suspect.

When a paraplegic who recently won a huge casino jackpot dies in a house fire, all bets are off as deputy coroner Mattie Winston and detective Scott Hurley, convinced that he was murdered for his money, take a gamble on the wrong suspect.

"Deputy coroner Mattie Winston knows a thing or two about dead bodies. That's why she's on the case of Derrick Ames, a high school math teacher stabbed to death with a barbecue fork straight to the heart. Sure, she's turned up some motives and a few suspects, but nothing adds up. Especially when the evidence points to Ames's teenage son. Newly pregnant Mattie can't believe it, even as her own long-estranged father may be following her. But one thing's...

As the single mom of an energetic toddler and an investigator working for the medical examiner's office in small-town Sorenson, Wisconsin, Mattie is used to her life being a juggling act. But now that she{u2019}s moved in with Detective Steve Hurley and his teenaged daughter Emily, and has started planning their wedding, her home life is looking more like a three-ring circus. And with her boss and friend, Izzy, suddenly having a health crisis, she...

"At the local ER, a battered and bruised teenage girl has been brought in by a mysterious man who claimed she'd fallen out of a car. The staff is suspicious, but while they attend to the teenager, the unidentified man slips out. Then the girl dies, but not before informing social worker Hildy Schneider that the man had her little sister as well. Mattie's exam reveals forensic evidence of long-term IV drug use and physical abuse, findings consistent...

In her previous career as a nurse, Mattie Winston's job was to keep death at bay. Now, as a medicolegal investigator, she's required to study death intimately--to figure out causes and timing, and help deduce whether it was natural or suspicious. In the case of Montgomery "Monty" Dixon, a well-to-do realtor, there can be little doubt: broken pool cues do not embed themselves. Monty's body is found in the game room of his lavish house, the walls adorned...