The Cat in the Stacks is an armchair/amateur sleuth/Cozy Mystery series by Dean James writing as Miranda James. The series features librarian Charlie Harris, a widowed father of two adult children, and his pet Maine Coon cat Diesel. Having moved back to his old hometown of Athena, Mississippi three years before the start of the series and met Diesel one year later, Charlie works as an archivist in the library of Athena College and, with Diesel, has a tendency to stumble across mysteries.
The fourth book of the series introduced elderly sisters Miss An'gel and Miss Dickce Ducote, who also live in Athena and would later get their own Spinoff series, Southern Ladies Mysteries, in which the two follow in Charlie's footsteps in having to solve murders, both in Athena and in other locations they visit. The spinoff went on hiatus after its fourth installment, but the sisters, their pets Endora and Peanut, and their new ward Benjy Stephens (the latter three of whom were introduced in the first spinoff book) continue to appear in the main books afterward.
The two series (by publication order) consist of:
- Cat #1: Murder Past Due (August 2010) Summary
- Cat #2: Classified as Murder (May 2011) Summary
- Cat #3: File M for Murder (January 2012) Summary
- Cat #4: Out of Circulation (January 2013) Summary
- Cat #5: The Silence of the Library (January 2014) Summary
- Ladies #1: Bless Her Dead Little Heart (October 2014) Summary
- Cat #6: Arsenic and Old Books (January 2015) Summary
- When Charlie Met Diesel Summary
- Ladies #2: Dead with the Wind (September 2015) Summary
- Cat #7: No Cats Allowed (January 2016) Summary
- Ladies #3: Digging Up the Dirt (September 2016) Summary
- Cat #8: Twelve Angry Librarians (February 2017) Summary
- Ladies #4: Fixing to Die (October 2017) Summary
- Cat #9: Claws for Concern (February 2018) Summary
- Cat #10: Six Cats a Slayin' (October 2018) Summary
- Cat #11: The Pawful Truth (July 2019) Summary
- Cat #12: Careless Whiskers (January 2020) Summary
- Cat #13: Cat Me If You Can (August 2020) Summary
- Cat #14: What the Cat Dragged In (August 2021) Summary
- Cat #15: Hiss Me Deadly (June 2023) Summary
- Cat #16: Requiem for a Mouse (announced for June 2024)Summary
These series provide examples of:
- Accidental Murder:
- In book 6, while reading the diaries of Rachel Long (who lived in Athena during the 1800s, including the Civil War), Charlie learns how she received a bolt of cloth, green tarlatan, and gave it to a neighboring family to make clothes for their children, who all died soon afterward, as did their mother. In the final chapter, Charlie's daughter Laura and son-in-law Frank inform him that green tarlatan was made with arsenic, to fix the dye in the cloth. In giving that cloth to the neighbors, Rachel had unwittingly poisoned them.
- In book 8, Gavin Fong attempts to murder one of his blackmail victims via poisoned water. The would-be victim is suspicious and switches the tainted bottle with Gavin's clean one, thinking it'll just make him sick, and is horrified when Gavin dies of cyanide poisoning as a result.
- Amateur Sleuth: Charlie Harris in the main series, sisters Miss An'gel and Miss Dickce Ducote in the spinoff series.
- Amoral Attorney: The main villain of Ladies #2 is Mirielle Champlain's lawyer Richard Thurston, who's trying to manipulate things so he can get all her money.
- Asshole Victim: A number of the victims (though not all of them) in the series turn out to be jerks of some shade or another.
- Godfrey Priest, a notorious ladies' man who was also regularly cheating his business partner, the man who wrote most of the books published under Priest's name, out of his fair share of the money they brought in, in book 1.
- Vera Cassity, the town busybody who wants to be known as Someone in their town, in book 4. She's made plenty of enemies with her offensive and manipulative ways, and when she's killed, most people are more surprised it didn't happen sooner.
- Oscar Reilly, the interim library director, in book 7. A wife-beater who robbed his own wife of her heirloom jewelry and notorious flirt, who tries to fire anyone who disagrees with him; he also tried to cut valued library services just to reduce the budget and let the villains, who'd been embezzling from the library, continue their scheme while also taking a cut of their profits for himself; this effort at blackmail is what got him killed. His brother-in-law, likewise, is a huge jerk who tries to pick up where Reilly left off with his blackmail scheme and is also murdered.
- Gavin Fong in book 8, a visiting librarian who's a world-class jerk and egotist who's been slugged a few times for his inability to not hit on women who are either married or already involved with someone. He's also blackmailed people in an effort to keep them from getting a better job than his, and it's one of his blackmail victims who accidentally kills him when Gavin attempts to kill that person to cover up his misdeeds.
- Hiram Barber, who was murdered years before the events of book 9, is revealed to have been killed in retaliation for a crime of his own — the murder of his wife and her sons with her lover.
- Artistic License – Animal Care: Subverted — Charlie is noted as being very careful not to let Diesel eat anything that isn't good for cats, such as onions. In book 4, he lets Azalea's sister Lily know exactly what Diesel can't have, including milk, cheese, chocolate, raisins, grapes, green tomatoes, raw potatoes and the aforementioned onions. It's also noted that while Diesel loves to play with ribbon, Charlie's always careful to make sure he doesn't eat any. There's also the fact that when he found Diesel in the library parking lot, he made the vet's office his first stop to have the cat checked out rather than just taking them straight home. Miss Dickce did the same thing when she and Benjy met Peanut and Endora, and Charlie later did it for the five kittens from book 10 (whom he found on his doorstep).
- Attack of the Political Ad: Discussed in book 6. Charlie notes on the tendency of most election ads being thinly disguised attacks on the other candidate, and how in the current election for state senate, with Andrew Beckford Long competing for his now-retiring father's seat against Jasper Singletary, the candidates are running a cleaner campaign than most. That doesn't stop Long's mother from having a diary forged that would make Jasper look bad by claiming one of his ancestors was a freed slave and thus could never have been legally married to the Civil War-era Jasper Singletary (who shares his name with his descendent); it never actually gets used in the campaign before it's found out as fake.
- Attending Your Own Funeral: In Ladies #2, the Ducote sisters' cousin Mireille Champlain fakes her death by heart attack; later, after the sisters find out about this, they attend her fake funeral where she sits up in the coffin, points to her lawyer, and yells "Thief! Murderer!" at him, freaking him out and helping expose his crimes.
- The Beard: In book 4, Vera Cassity's husband Morty is having an affair with Hank Beauchamp. While Hank is openly gay, Morty isn't, so Hank's sister Sissy — whom Stewart Delacorte is pretty sure is also gay — pretends to be the one that Morty's with. She eventually kills Vera so Hank and Morty can be together openly, since the Beauchamps are broke and Morty can't divorce his wife like he wants without being taken to the cleaners by her.
- Big, Screwed-Up Family: The Delacortes in book 2. James cares only for his books (and secretly pines for his butler), his sister Daphne's always pretending to be ill, her son Hubert can't hold down a job because he thinks he's entitled to anything because of his lineage (something he got from his mother), Hubert's wife Eloise is mentally ill, and James' grandniece Cynthia (granddaughter of James' late brother Thomas) is cold to most everyone. The closest to normal is James' flamboyantly gay grandnephew Stewart (grandson of James' other late brother, Arthur), who can't stand most of his blood relatives (except for James, to some extent) and can't wait to get out of that house, just to get away from them all (save for Eloise, the only non-blood relative among them and the one he liked most) — he mainly stayed in order to save money on housing.
- Big "SHUT UP!":
- In book 2, when they catch Hubert Morris yelling at his cowering wife Eloise, both Sean and Deputy Bates roar "Quiet!" at him.
- Also in book 2, Q.C. Pendergrast lets out a big "Quiet. Immediately." at Hubert Morris and Stewart Delacorte when they start protesting James Delcorte's will, which left the house and the majority of his money to his butler rather than a family member (one of the few times the pair agree), informing them that if they turn it into a legal fight, they will lose. At the end of the book, it's left up in the air as to whether said butler actually will get his inheritance after it turns out he killed James, since Mississippi law prohibits murderers from profiting from their crimes.
- Blackmail Backfire:
- Twice in book 7. Oscar Reilly's attempt at blackmailing the villains of the book gets him killed by them. When his former brother-in-law tries to pick up where he left off, the killers eliminate him too.
- Again in book 8. Gavin Fong blackmailed another man to keep him from getting a better job. This, coupled with his attempt to murder said victim later, led to his own death.
- Black Widow:
- Discussed in book 9; when looking into Jack Pemberton's true crime novels, Charlie finds that one, Hell Has No Fury, describes a woman of this type who married older and wealthier men and then killed them in order to inherit their money. Fortunately, her fifth husband proved harder to kill than the first four, and ultimately saw her in prison.
- Also discussed in book 10; it's rumored that Deirdre Thompson, the neighborhood "grande dame", killed at least two of her husbands via causing them to get pneumonia so she could inherit their money, but it's never been proven.
- The Butler Did It: Literally in book 2, where James Delacorte's butler Truesdale became his boss's primary heir and then killed him to speed up the process after finding out by means of a gossipy paralegal and her aunt, the latter of whom was having an affair with one of the other heirs and shared this information with Truesdale after learning of his status. Both Sean and Kanesha Berry are rather incredulous when Charlie figures out this must have been the case, especially since two other major suspects have just been arrested with evidence that they're involved in a different crime, but that doesn't stop it from being true. After Charlie explains why he thinks this though, Sean starts to believe him, and it's confirmed soon afterward.
- Calling the Old Man Out:
- Late in book 2, Charlie's son Sean lets him have it for basically ignoring his children since his wife died. Charlie acknowledges his own mistakes in judgement and promises to do better.
- Newton Pittman Junior does it to his grandmother for her behavior in Ladies #1, treating her children harshly and then throwing a fit when they dare to object. She doesn't take too kindly to this.
- Camp Gay: Stewart Delacorte, introduced in book 2, is out and not shy about it.
- Car Fu:
- The Victim of the Week in book 6 is killed in a hit-and-run. The one responsible insists it was an accident. The fact that she borrowed her neighbor's car without their knowing and committed the crime with it, however, means the police have their doubts.
- In Ladies #3, Arliss McGonigal is run off the road and left in a coma; she eventually awakens, but is still injured. Later, the same person tries to run Miss An'gel off the road, but she avoids injury.
- The Casanova: Godfrey Priest, the Victim of the Week in book 1, is a notorious ladies' man with four ex-wives and multiple lovers over the years. His father is noted as having been one too.
- Cats Hate Water: Diesel is specifically noted more than once as hating getting his paws wet, making Charlie carry him rather than walk across wet ground on his own.
- Chronic Evidence Retention Syndrome:
- The killer in book 2 turns out to have saved the receipt for the peanut cookies that were used to poison the victims, as revealed in the last chapter.
- The killer in Ladies #2 is revealed to be guilty of this in the final chapter, having failed to dispose of the murder weapon. Unusually for the trope, this fact is only revealed to the audience (and the characters in-story) after they gave themselves away with their other actions in the penultimate chapter, and the Ducote sisters lampshade it when they remark on how they already knew Sondra's killer was stupid, but then he really blew it when the police find he still has the murder weapon.
Dickce: "How many killers are actually dumb enough to drive around with the murder weapon in the trunk of their cars?" - Clear My Name: Charlie, in book 8 — he'd been seen having an altercation with the victim a day or so before and is briefly considered a chief suspect.
- Clear Their Name: More than a few of the books have Charlie working to clear the name of a friend or relative of his.
- Clingy Jealous Girl: As discussed in book 10, Milton Harville's wife Tammy is very possessive of her husband, thinking every woman who so much as looks at her husband is trying to lure him away from her, even though he's clearly devoted to Tammy. It's gotten so bad that during Gerry Albritton's party, when Tammy threatens Gerry if she doesn't stay away from Milton, Milton's finally had enough and tells her that if she doesn't stop it, he'll have her committed. It's later revealed that she's mentally unstable in part due to an addiction to painkillers, though it's never explained by the end of the book if she got proper treatment for her issues.
- Cloudcuckoolander: James Delacorte's niece-in-law Eloise Morris, in book 2, who makes strange comments at random times and tends to dress up like Scarlet O'Hara. It's implied that she's genuinely mentally ill, and it's not helped by everyone except James and Stewart yelling at her whenever she says anything.
- Cool Old Guy: Charlie Harris himself, who's almost fifty in the first book and is a supportive friend and father figure to his boarders.
- Cool Old Lady: Miss An'gel and Miss Richelle "Dickce" Ducote, who debuted in the fourth book of the original series and wind up as amateur sleuths themselves. Charlie also thinks of his late aunt Dottie as one.
- The Corpse Stops Here: In book 4, Azalea Berry becomes the main suspect after being found over the dead woman's body. Her daughter Kanesha notes that it's also politically motivated, because the sitting sheriff is up for reelection in the coming year. He thinks Kanesha, as the chief deputy sheriff, might be wanting to run against him then and thinks having a mother as a murder suspect will make her look bad and thus weaken her chances of winning.
- Creepy Housekeeper: Estelle in Ladies #2, a very superstitious woman who keeps saying the chosen date is bad luck for the wedding being planned, since there's another woman who was set to get married then and instead died the night before; she also falsely claims to have a psychic connection to Mireille Champlain and knew the instant she died. Estelle herself is already dead by the time Mirielle turns up alive and well. Sondra, the bride-to-be, can't stand her and keeps demanding that Mirielle make her leave.
- Crossover: The collection Year Round Trouble (part of the Familiar Legacy series starring a black cat named Trouble, who travels around solving mysteries) has one story where Trouble meets Diesel and works on a case with him.
- Cruel and Unusual Death: Oscar Reilly is found crushed to death in the compact, automated shelves in the library basement in book 7.
- Daddy's Girl:
- Charlie's daughter Laura, a 23-year-old actress at the time of the first book, who is noted as having always been closer to her father than her mother.
- Elizabeth Barber was this for her father in book 9 — a notorious skinflint, she was the only member of the family he was willing to spend money on. Until she killed him after he murdered his wife and Elizabeth's younger brothers.
- A Deadly Affair: It's revealed in the conclusion of book 9 that Hiram Barber's wife had slept with her old flame, Bill Delaney, and he was the real father of their twin sons. Hiram responded by murdering the boys and his wife after learning this, and in the following confrontation with Bill, was shot in the back by his only biological child, his daughter Elizabeth.
- Dead Man Writing: In book 4, after Vera Cassity's death, Charlie receives a letter from her that, while it doesn't lead to her killer, does reveal important information about her family.
- Demoted to Extra: After being an important character in the first book, Charlie's boarder Justin Wardlaw is demoted to being offscreen for most of the rest of the series (and is outright noted as having moved out early in book 11). While it's usually explained, he's not even mentioned in books 5 and 10 (and is mentioned only once in book 6).
- Disguised in Drag: In book 5, Mrs. Cartwright's grandson Eugene disguises himself as his grandmother for public appearances. He also used his disguise to throw off any potential witnesses when he entered (as a man) and left (as a woman) the house of the woman he murdered.
- Disney Villain Death: In Ladies #2, a story is told of how a woman, the night before she was to get married, was caught by the wind and thrown from her balcony to her death. Later, when Sondra Delevan is found dead on the lawn, it's believed she was also caught by the wind and fell to her death. Subverted when it turns out she was killed by a blow to the head and thrown off the balcony by her killer.
- Disproportionate Retribution:
- In book 7, Charlie corrects Oscar Reilly's pronunciation of the Ducote sisters' surname, and Reilly responds by doing everything he can to harass Charlie into quitting (including by trying to ban him from bringing Diesel to work with him), finally deciding to close the archives outright and sell off the rare book collection, ostensibly to make up a deficit in the library budget (though it's pretty obvious that his real motivation is to cut Charlie's job). Before Reilly can actually go through with this, he's killed by the real villains of the book, and Charlie is requested to take over Reilly's job as interim head of the department by the college president.
- Also in book 7, Cassandra Brownley, head of the library's collection development and acquisitions department, is identified as having done this to two different people. One tactfully corrected her in front of several people; Cassandra's retaliation (filling her office with plastic bugs, since she was scared of them) caused her to suffer a panic attack and break two limbs when she tripped over a chair while trying to flee them. The other went over her head to get some materials for the library that he felt were needed and she didn't; she tricked him into eating a large quantity of laxatives, which resulted in a hospital visit. In both cases, the victims left the college soon after.
- Domestic Abuse: In book 2, it's revealed that Hubert Morris treats his wife Eloise horribly, always yelling at her if she says anything, and is seen hitting her after she returned the inventory book he'd swiped from his uncle's library, which is stopped by Sean Harris and Deputy Bates (Hubert claims she was having hysterics and he was trying to slap her into sense again, but nobody's buying it). Her cousin-by-marriage Stewart does his best to stand up for her when he sees Hubert being abusive, and has always felt she deserved better than him.
- Doorstop Baby: Variant in book 10, near the end of the very first chapter, when the doorbell rings and Charlie subsequently finds a box of five kittens waiting outside, with a note asking him to keep them safe, which he does.
- Dreadful Musician: Downplayed with Charlie; his singing isn't painful, but late in book 10, he describes his musical ability as "my inability to carry a tune in a bucket". He figures it comes from one of his parents, both of whom were the same way, as he recalls. Subverted with Sean and Laura though, as they both have pleasant singing voices.
- Driven to Suicide:
- In book 6, Charlie reads the diaries of Rachel Long, and learns of someone whom this happened to: Rachel's husband, Andrew Long III, became horrified by what he saw during The American Civil War. He deserted during Gettysburg, returned home and, soon after being scorned by his father for what the latter viewed as a cowardly act, went and hung himself from the rails of the staircase in the family's home.
- In book 10, Gerry Albritton's killer ends up committing suicide by cyanide to escape arrest.
- Drives Like Crazy: Miss Dickce, who tends to drive at least fifteen miles over the speed limit most of the time.
- Embarrassing First Name: In Ladies #3, it's noted that the late Calpurnia "Callie" Partridge had always hated her first name.
- Evil-Detecting Dog:
- Or cat, rather — Diesel has a knack for telling nice people from nasty ones. People he dislikes include one crook in book 2 and two Asshole Victims in book 3, and in book 7, he backs away from Oscar Reilly when they first meet, even before the man proves to be a total jerkwad, showing that Diesel's instincts are spot on. It's also inverted, as when Diesel shows trust and friendliness towards someone, it indicates that they're a good person.
- In Ladies #4, the Ducote sisters' dog Peanut reacts with hostility to the greedy and thoroughly unpleasant Nathan Gamble.
- Faking the Dead:
- In Ladies #2, the Ducote sisters' cousin Mireille Champlain fakes her death by heart attack in order to trick the man who's been trying to steal from her.
- In Ladies #3, it's revealed that nearly forty years before, Hadley Partridge and Coriander Simpson went overseas and married, then the two sent a telegraph to her family claiming she was dead.
- False Widow: In Ladies #1, Rosabelle Sultan claims her husbands have all died. It turns out the last one had just gone overseas, and he returns for her partway through the book.
- Family of Choice:
- Charlie comes to see Stewart Delacorte as a younger brother, as he admits to himself in book 4.
- In book 6, he notes that his coworker Melba Gilley is like the sister he never had.
- Family Relationship Switcheroo:
- Justin Wardlaw, supporting character throughout the series, learns early in book 1 that his biological father is supposedly famous writer Godfrey Priest. Godfrey ends up the book's Victim of the Week when he figures out he was lied to and who Justin's actual birth father was — it's Godfrey's older half-brother Rick Tackett, making Godfrey into Justin's uncle instead. Justin's mother, who was the one lying about Justin's parentage so that he'd inherit Godfrey's millions, is the killer.
- In the final chapter of book 3, Charlie receives a letter from the book's now arrested murderer, in which Sarabeth Conley (née Norris) confesses that the book's other arrested murderer, her supposed younger brother Levi, is actually her son. His father is not identified.
- In book 4, while researching the Ducote family, Charlie discovers the diary of Katherine Cecelia Ducote in the archives and from it learns that she was left unable to safely have children after a miscarriage, so her husband turned to Cecelia's cousin Esther (AKA "Essie Mae"). Essie Mae thus became the mother of Miss An'gel and Miss Dickce, but they were raised by Cecelia as her own. Charlie turns the diary over to the sisters by the end of the book, allowing them to learn the truth as well, while swearing never to reveal it without their say-so.
- Friend on the Force:
- Initially averted with Kanesha Berry, who's annoyed that Charlie keeps getting involved in cases around Athena (and also doesn't like that her mother insists on continuing to work for him instead of retiring). Finally played straight in book 4 when she asks him to investigate on her behalf and clear her mother's name, and comes to accept his aid afterward. She's also much more reasonable when the Ducote sisters offer help in their spinoff series.
- Haskell Bates, a fellow deputy, also becomes friendly with Charlie and becomes one of his boarders at the end of book 7, sharing a room with another of Charlie's boarders — Bates' boyfriend Stewart Delacorte.
- Friend to All Living Things: Benjy Stephens, introduced in Ladies #1, who is in training to be a vet. He befriends Diesel easily, and is the one to see Peanut by the side of the road when he and Dickce went out to get groceries.
- From Stray to Pet:
- Diesel himself, found shivering in the rain as an eight-to-ten-weeks-old kitten. Charlie rescues him, takes him to a vet to be checked out, and adopts him.
- In Ladies #1, while Dickce and Benjy Stephens are on their way to town to get groceries, they find a labradoodle by the side of the road, and an Abyssinian that comes running to join him. Later in the afternoon, after taking the animals to the vet's office to be checked out, Dickce meets the owner — a local farmer, who explains the two (named Peanut and Endora, respectively) were his mother's, but he was taking them to a shelter after she died (since he couldn't give them the attention they needed) and they escaped from his truck en route. Having already come to care for the two, Dickce immediately makes arrangements with Claud to adopt them.
- Full-Name Ultimatum:
- Sean Robert Harris is on the receiving end from his father in book 2, after he loses his temper over a phone call from someone he never wants to hear from ever again. It leads to a Calling the Old Man Out moment, in which he lets Charlie know just how upset he is that Charlie's basically ignored him since Sean's mother died.
- In Ladies #1, Newton Aloysius Pittman Jr. finally calls out his grandmother, Rosabelle Sultan, on her bad behavior — he tells her she's been acting like a spoiled brat. She promptly uses this trope on him.
- Funetik Aksent: In Ladies #2, little four-year-old Tippy speaks with a lisp, portrayed as changing all "L"s in her dialogue into "W"s.
- Fur and Loathing: Vera Cassity, the thoroughly unpleasant victim in book 4, wears a mink coat when she comes to see Charlie, who reacts with disgust.
- Gentle Giant: Diesel, who's thirty-six pounds at full growth and large even for his breed, is nevertheless a kind and loving fellow. Charlie actually uses the term "gentle giant" to describe him to a severe ailurophobe in book 5 in an effort to calm her.
- Ghostwriter: In book 1, Charlie finds evidence that a ghostwriter has been writing novels for Godfrey Priest (starting with his sixth book), and is pretty angry at him for not getting their fair share of the money said books are bringing in. He eventually figures out the ghostwriter's identity, and during the climax, Charlie's coworker Willie Clark confirms what Charlie suspected — that he was the ghostwriter.
- Gossipy Hens: Offscreen version in book 2. One of the paralegals at Q.C. Pendergrast's firm is always gossiping over the phone with her aunt, and some of the information given prompted said aunt to inform another man that he was the primary heir to his employer's fortune. An Inheritance Murder ensued.
- Happily Adopted: Benjy Stephens is introduced in Ladies #1, and becomes the legal ward of the Ducote sisters by the end of the book, living with them after his mother dies and his stepfather wants nothing to do with him. By Ladies #3, they're privately discussing asking him to let them formally adopt him in nine months' time (when he's been living with them for a year); in Ladies #4, Benjy's own thoughts reveal that he's come to think of Miss Dickce as a grandmother and Miss An'gel as an aunt.
- Harassing Phone Call: In book 2, Charlie receives a late-night phone call from someone who warns him to "Mind your own business, Harris. Stay away from the Delacortes if you want to stay healthy." Charlie laughs it off, but is more rattled when they deliver another threat: "You'd better take this seriously, or your family will regret it." before hanging up. Charlie responds by calling the sheriff's department to report it, including the phone number they called from... which really gets Kanesha's attention, because it turns out to be from the private line in James Delacorte's bedroom, which was supposed to have been sealed off. It turns out to be Hubert Morris, who didn't want Charlie to catch on that he'd been stealing from James' rare book collection, and was able to make the call because he had a duplicate set of his uncle's keys.
- He Knows Too Much: A couple of the victims are killed for this.
- In book 3, it comes out that the main murder victim had witnessed a murder when they were a child, and while the memories were repressed, they eventually recovered them and began to work on a way to expose the truth. The killer figured it out, and killed him to keep him quiet.
- In book 4, there's some in-universe speculation that Vera Cassity was murdered to keep her quiet for trying to dig into the Ducote sisters' past, and not wanting it exposed. It's subverted though, since she hadn't been able to find out anything before she was killed for completely different reasons.
- In book 7, the main murder victim was killed partly because of this and partly out of sheer greed. He'd uncovered the killers' own embezzlement scheme and tried to blackmail them into sharing the money, and they killed him to keep him quiet and keep their funds to themselves. And their next victim, who witnessed this murder, was killed for the same reason.
- In book 8, the second murder victim knew too much about the killer's previous activities, including blackmail, resulting in the killer arranging their death to cover it up.
- He-Man Woman Hater: Willie Clark in book 1, who's pretty grouchy towards everyone but especially disdainful towards women. It also comes through in the books he wrote for Godfrey Priest, where women are often the victims of brutal violence.
- Hoist by His Own Petard: Namedropped and discussed in book 8, where Gavin Fong's attempt to murder one of his blackmail victims via poisoned water backfires horribly. The would-be victim is suspicious and switches the tainted water with Fong's clean bottle, resulting in Fong's death.
- If I Had a Nickel...:
- In book 1, the late Godfrey Priest's agent has to listen to a man complaining about the quality of literature nowadays and lamenting the commercialism of it all, how people have come to write for money over "literary merit". After chasing him off, she remarks that "If I had a dollar for every one of his kind I've met, I could retire."
- In Charlie's narration in book 2, when talking about how most people aren't familiar with the Maine Coon breed of cat and are confused when they see Diesel, he thinks to himself that "If I had the proverbial dime for every time someone asked me, "What is that?" I could donate a hefty sum to the library and solve some of its ongoing budget woes."
- I'm Taking Her Home with Me!:
- It's mentioned in book 3 that during her visit in the Christmas between books 1 and 2, Laura Harris had threatened to catnap Diesel and take him back to California with her because she liked him so much (and the feeling was mutual).
- In Ladies #1, Benjy Stephens similarly remarks that he wishes he could take Diesel back to California with him, since Diesel's been so friendly towards him.
- Inadequate Inheritor: In book 2, James Delacorte clearly considers all his blood relatives to be this, since his will specifies that he's kicking them out of the house and they're only being left money so they can afford new places to live.
- Incompatible Orientation:
- In book 2, Stewart Delacorte flirts with Sean Harris, but Sean is straight as an arrow (fortunately, he's not bothered by the attention, being more amused than anything). Sean later mentions to his father that a coworker of his, Arthur, had also hit on him but stopped when Sean made it clear he wasn't interested.
- In the same book, James Delacorte has been in love with his butler Nigel Truesdale for years, but Nigel is very straight.
- Inheritance Murder:
- Discussed more than once, as the first two books (and Ladies #4) make mention of the fact that in Mississippi, murderers aren't allowed to profit from their crimes, so killing someone they were supposed to inherit from automatically makes them ineligible to inherit.
- A variant happens in book 1, when Godfrey Priest has added his supposed son Justin Wardlaw to his will, but soon figures out that Justin is actually his nephew. It's not Justin himself, but rather Justin's mother who kills Godfrey to ensure that he can't change his will again in light of this discovery. It's never confirmed in later books if Justin got his inheritance after this, due to the above law.
- In book 2, when James Delacorte turns up dead, it's suspected that the killer did so to speed up their inheritance. Turns out that's exactly the case. It's not a family member, as initially suspected, though — it's his butler and primary heir, Nigel Truesdale.
- In Ladies #1, the victims are all killed to clear the way for the murderer to inherit, the first two because their portions revert to the estate that way and the last a straight-out inheritance murder.
- In Ladies #4, the victim is again killed so the killer can get their hands on his money.
- Mentioned in book 9, where such a murder is the subject of two of Jack Pemberton's true crime novels — one where a Black Widow kills her husbands to inherit their wealth, and another where a preacher killed some people who'd left their money to his church in order to speed up the inheritance so he could use it to pay off his gambling debts.
- Interspecies Friendship:
- In book 2, Sean Harris comes to Athena from Houston, bringing his poodle Dante. Dante and Diesel quickly become fast friends, and this remains even after Stewart Delacorte becomes Charlie's new boarder and subsequently Dante's new owner (since Sean admits that Stewart really likes him and Sean himself can't give the dog the attention he needs).
- In Ladies #1, Dickce Ducote meets (and ultimately adopts) the labradoodle Peanut and his Abyssinian friend Endora, who are practically attached at the hip.
- It Runs in the Family: Book 9 has two examples.
- Delbert Collins, Charlie's long dead uncle, turned out to have been an alcoholic, though his wife Dottie managed to get him to drop it. He passed it on to his son Bill, whom he never met.
- In a darker example, it turns out Hiram Barber inherited mental instability from his mother, who spent part of her life in a mental hospital and died there; it's part of what led to his crossing the line and murdering his wife and the sons she had with her lover. It also turns up in his daughter, who murdered her father after these killings and later tried to kill Bill Delaney, the only witness to the crime, because she thought he was going to finally expose her.
- I Want Grandkids:
- Despite the fact that they tend to butt heads on several matters, Azalea Berry is fiercely proud of her daughter Kanesha and her accomplishments, with one exception — Azalea is disappointed that Kanesha hasn't married and given her grandchildren, which is a touchy subject between the pair.
- Charlie is mentioned as looking forward to being a grandfather as well. He gets his wish when, at the end of book 6, his daughter Laura informs him that she's pregnant; in book 7, his son Sean informs him that Sean's fiancee Alexandra is also expecting, so they're moving their wedding up to immediately. Laura gives birth between books 8 and 9, and Alexandra between books 9 and 10.
- Kick the Dog:
- Almost literally in book 2. Sean Harris was in a relationship with his boss, even buying her a dog as a present, but she refused to take the animal (a poodle named Dante) when she found out he came from a shelter. It's only after this that Sean finds out she was just using him.
- In Ladies #4, the murder victim is Nathan Gamble, cousin of Mary Turner. He turns out to be a Jerkass who'd bought out her mortgage (after she'd had to borrow money to pay for some expensive repairs to her family's ancestral home, which she runs a Bed and Breakfast out of) and planned to foreclose on her as soon as he could, throwing her out of her own house and then selling off the contents and bulldozing the place. After his death, his sister Serenity declares her intention to do the same thing as soon as the lawyers are done sorting everything out, since she figures she'll inherit his business and ownership of the mortgage. Mary, whose home and business are her life, is devastated by this news. Thankfully, the plan is thwarted by Serenity's arrest for murder, and even before that, Miss An'gel assures her that the state historical commission would have to agree to let Cliffwood be demolished, and it's highly unlikely that they would.
- The Killer Becomes the Killed:
- Bernice Cameron, Rosabelle's second daughter in Ladies #1, is suffocated to death by her own daughter after Juanita realizes Bernice had murdered Rosabelle, her daughter-in-law Marla, and Bernice's older sister Maudine. Juanita justifies it as a case of Killing in Self-Defense, since Bernice had attacked her when confronted, and says she couldn't stand to see her mother go to jail or a mental institution for her crimes.
- A preemptive version in Gavin Fong in book 8, who attempts to murder one of his blackmail victims, and a woman who was working with him and could expose his crimes. His weapon of choice is poisoned water; while the woman dies of it, his first intended victim is suspicious and switches the tainted bottle with Gavin's clean one, resulting in Gavin's death.
- Killing in Self-Defense: The murderer in Ladies #1 dies after attacking their own daughter. When she stumbled and fell mid-attack, the daughter acted quickly and smothered her with a pillow.
- Kind Hearted Cat Lover:
- Charlie, who found the young Diesel as a cold, wet stray and quickly took him in. He also temporarily takes in five kittens in book 10, including an orange tabby named Ramses who is permanently gifted back to the family afterward, and is noted as having owned cats before.
- Charlie's daughter Laura is also very adoring of Diesel — it's mentioned that during her visit in the Christmas between books 1 and 2, she threatened to catnap Diesel and take him back to California with her because she liked him so much (and the feeling was mutual).
- Kindly Housekeeper: Azalea Berry, who was a part-time housekeeper for Charlie Harris' Aunt Dottie for years and continues in the role for Charlie after Dottie dies and Charlie inherits the house, in part since she's not ready to stop working (she also works part-time for other families); she's a bit brusquer than most examples, but still cares for him. Her friend Clementine, who works for the Ducote sisters, is also one.
- Laxative Prank: Not played for laughs when it's discussed in book 7. Cassandra Brownley, head of the library's collection development and acquisitions department, is identified as having done this to one of her fellow employees who went over her head to get some materials for the library that he felt were needed and she didn't; in retaliation, she tricked him into eating a large quantity of laxatives, which resulted in his needing to go to the hospital. He left the college soon after as a result.
- Long-Lost Relative: Book 9 revolves around Charlie meeting one in the form of Bill Delaney, son of Charlie's long dead uncle Delbert Collins (husband of Charlie's aunt Dottie). Delbert was married before, but left his wife after about six months and never knew she was expecting; Delaney himself didn't find out his father's true identity until after his mother died.
- Make It Look Like an Accident: In book 3, Charlie, Laura and Sean put together what they know and figure out that the 1984 death of retired mayor Hubert Norris, who drowned in his bathtub while drinking, was a case of this — the killer had purposely pulled his legs up until his head was underwater. The final consensus at the time was "accidental death", but Charlie eventually confirms that it was murder.
- Maligned Mixed Marriage: Discussed in Ladies #3, where Coriander Simpson mentions having had to deal with problems because her mother was black and her father was mixed-race. Part of the reason for her not wanting to come back to Athena is because she'd have to deal with further prejudice over her own marriage to a white man.
- Mama Bear: In book 3, it comes out that Sarabeth Conley, née Norris, had murdered her own father when he refused to bail out her son, who was in jail for a hit-and-run.
- Marriage of Convenience: In Ladies #2, Sondra Delevan is set to marry Lance Perigold, a gay man who's not too bright, but has aspirations of being a model, in order to meet the conditions in her father's will (she inherits when she marries or turns 25, whichever comes sooner). She herself just wants to marry so she can claim her money, get out of the house and go to New York to become an actress. And then she agrees to marry her grandmother's lawyer when he claimed he wanted to take her the next day to elope, despite his age. She's killed before it happens, and it turns out he was just manipulating her so he could get his hands on her money.
- Maybe Magic, Maybe Mundane: In Ladies #4, while at least some of the "hauntings" of Cliffwood (the old mansion where the story takes place) were man-made, there's some indication that there really was a ghost there, though it's never absolutely confirmed.
- Mega Neko: Diesel, the titular "cat in the stacks", is a massive and very intelligent 36-pound Maine Coon (a species that's naturally very large) who is said to be about half the size of a full-grown Labrador and accompanies his owner Charlie Harris everywhere on a leash and harness. The small Mississippi town they live in are still adjusting to the sight of him (and some don't even realize he's a cat at first). It's explained in-story that Charlie had found him as a stray eight-to-ten-weeks-old kitten and, due to his size, had mistaken him for an adult cat until the vet corrected him.
- Minor Crime Reveals Major Plot: In book 2, Charlie is invited to James Delacorte's house to inventory his rare book collection, since Delacorte thinks a family member has stolen from him. This puts Charlie in place to investigate Delacorte's subsequent murder, which is actually committed for unrelated reasons.
- The Mistress: In book 2, Hubert Morris is blatantly cheating on his mentally ill wife with his long-time lover, Anita Milhaus. He even stole from his uncle James' rare book collection to finance the presents he bought for Anita, which is what draws Charlie into the situation when James hires him to inventory the collection and figure out what's missing.
- Momma's Boy: Positive version in 27-year-old (as of book 1) lawyer Sean Harris, who is noted as having been closer to his mother before she died. He gets to bond more with his father in books 2 and beyond.
- Murder-Suicide: Book 10 ends with Charlie learning that Gerry Albritton's murderer was found dead by self-inflicted cyanide poisoning.
- Murder the Hypotenuse:
- This is the motive behind the deaths in Ladies #3. Reba Dalrymple was obsessed with the idea of marrying Hadley Partridge and, knowing how close he was to his sister-in-law Callie, accused Callie of sleeping with him. Callie's husband Hamish, who was present at the time, lashed out and injured Callie, and Reba then hit her again when he left, making sure Callie was dead. Years later, when Hamish returns, Reba starts killing (or trying to kill) any woman who might be interested in him, and when she finds out he's been married for years, comes roaring up to his home and tries to murder his wife. Thankfully, she's stopped in time.
- Also in Ladies #3, Lottie MacLeod tries to kill Reba (and actually shoots her in the shoulder, non-fatally), for the same reason — she wants Hadley for herself. She's stopped and arrested for her attempted murder.
- Mystery Magnet: Charlie Harris, naturally, as he keeps finding dead bodies, or at least knows the person who turned up dead. He, his children and Chief Deputy Kanesha Berry are all none too thrilled by this, and Sean Harris in particular is noted several times as being concerned about his father's safety due to his tendency to attract murders and murderers.
- Narrative Profanity Filter: Used multiple times throughout the series. In book 4 in particular, Helen Louise is subject to this when Charlie informs her of what Vera Cassity had tried earlier.Helen Louise used a word I had never heard her speak, disconcerting me.
- Never One Murder: Zig-zagged. Books 2, 3, 6, 7, 8 and 9, and Ladies #1, 2 and 3, all feature multiple murders in the past and/or present, but books 1, 4 and 5, and Ladies #4, feature just one each.
- No Animals Allowed: Discussed more than once, and almost always sympathetically.
- While Charlie typically brings Diesel with him everywhere he goes (with the exceptions of places that would be very crowded and make the cat nervous as a result, like his church or large parties), there's one place in town that specifically bans animals due to health regulations — the local hospital. Charlie fully understands this, and obeys the rules.
- Most restaurants also ban animals due to health regulations, but Helen Louise's bistro lets Diesel (and, on one occasion, the poodle Dante) in anyway, and in book 9, an out-of-town restaurant permits him in so long as he, Charlie and Jack Pemberton use the back office instead of the main dining room (which they can understand).
- Book 4 mentions that Charlie leaves Diesel home when he has to go to the town records office, because the clerk there is highly allergic to cats — she still likes them though, and apologizes for her problems.
- In book 7, Oscar Reilly — Charlie's new Jerkass of a boss — tries to impose a "no animals allowed" rule on the college library, claiming allergies. He's lying, and is soon killed by the book's villains; the college president, however, sees no problem with Diesel being on campus and revokes the ruling when he calls Charlie soon after Oscar's death.
- Not Blood Siblings: In Ladies #2, Sondra Delevan and her stepbrother Horace Mims the Third, or Trey, get as far as having a child together. Sondra refuses to marry him though, even though he's head-over-heels for her.
- Not So Stoic: Cynthia Delacorte, James Delacorte's great-niece in book 2. When Charlie first meets her, he sees her as an ice queen, cold and reserved; her cousin Stewart describes her as one later on as well, since she's rather cold to essentially everyone. However, a key scene late in the book shows that her behavior is more because she's tired from working night shifts at the hospital; the stoicism completely fades when she's horrified to learn Elaine is dead and furious upon realizing who must have been responsible, leading to her providing a key piece of evidence that reveals the real killer.
- Old Maid: The Ducote sisters, who are in their eighties when the series takes place, freely refer to themselves as old spinsters, having never married — as noted in Ladies #3, they've both declined repeated proposals from their own doctor, who keeps asking both of them, for several years. Unlike most examples, they don't treat the term as an insult.
- Old Retainer: Azalea Berry, who served as a part-time housekeeper for Charlie Harris' Aunt Dottie for years and continues in the role for Charlie after Dottie dies and Charlie inherits the house, in part since she's not ready to stop working (unusually for the trope, she also works part-time for other families). Azalea's daughter Kanesha, a deputy for the local police, is not happy about this and just wants her mother to retire, blaming Charlie for Azalea's refusal to do so.
- Once per Episode: In each book Charlie is in, the narration (or Charlie himself) mentions that Sheriff Kanesha is related to Charlie's housekeeper Azalea.
- Only Known by Their Nickname:
- Miss Dickce Ducote's real first name is Richelle, but nobody's called her that in years.
- In book 4, Judianne Beuchamp and Henry Ainsworth Beuchamp IV are only referred to by their real names once each, in narration. They go by Sissy and Hank, respectively. Likewise, Morton "Morty" Cassity is almost never referred to by his full first name.
- On One Condition:
- In book 2, James Delacorte's will leaves a sum to his sister Daphne on the condition that she use it to move into an assisted-living facility. Otherwise she gets nothing.
- In Ladies #2, it's explained that Sondra Delevan will receive an inheritance from her late father either when she marries or when she turns 25, whichever comes first, but that if she marries before she turns 20, she gets nothing. This is part of why she refused to marry her stepbrother when she was seventeen, despite him getting her pregnant.
- Origins Episode: When Charlie Met Diesel, a short story included as a bonus feature in book 6. It's exactly what it sounds like, showing how Charlie found Diesel, wet and shivering in the parking lot of the library where he volunteers, and promptly took him to the vet to get checked out before adopting him.
- Out of Focus: Kanesha Berry in book 9. While a series regular who'd been involved in pretty much every murder investigation in the series (save in Ladies #2 and 4, which take place in other states), in this book, she's only mentioned a few times and has a blink-and-you'll-miss-it appearance with no dialogue in the penultimate chapter.
- Outliving One's Offspring:
- In book 1, it's mentioned that Rick Tackett lost one of his daughters to cancer when she was about nine or ten.
- In book 5, it's mentioned that Charlie's Aunt Dottie's only child, a daughter named Victoria, died when she was six months old.
- In book 6, it's found that this happened during the Civil War era to two different families. Andrew Long III deserted the Confederate army, returned home and then hung himself out of despair after his father scorned him for his act; his father, who found the body, suffered a stroke as a result and died three days later. Also during this time, the Longs' neighbor Jasper Singletary lost his second wife and their three children when they were accidentally poisoned by Andrew Long III's wife, who'd given them a bolt of cloth that, unbeknownst to her, had been dosed with arsenic to fix the dye into the cloth.
- In book 9, this is key to the murder being investigated — Bill Delaney arrived too late to save his lover and their sons from being murdered by his lover's abusive husband.
- Over The Top Christmas Decorations: Book 10 has Athena's new resident Gerry Albritton filling her yard with an absurd amount of inflatable decorations a short time before Christmas. At least one person doesn't approve, since they sneak in and deflate all of them. It's later revealed it was Gerry's brother Billy Albritton, who was trying to frighten her, though it didn't work.
- Papa Wolf: Charlie is very protective of his family, especially his daughter Laura, and won't hesitate to step in and protect her, as seen in book 3.
- Passed-Over Inheritance: In book 2, James Delacorte leaves his mansion and the majority of his money (excluding certain other bequests) to his butler, Nigel Truesdale, rather than to a direct relative. His nephew Hubert Morris (son of James' sister Daphne) is most upset, having expected to inherit the bulk of it. When it turns out Truesdale is the killer, it's suggested that the trope will be subverted and Daphne, as the next of kin, will inherit Truesdale's share.
- Personal Effects Reveal: In book 2, James Delacorte's library and personal papers reveals his most recent rare book purchase — and also that someone had stolen it.
- Persona Non Grata:
- Anyone who complains about Diesel being at Helen Louise's restaurant gets banned from there for good, as seen in book 2.
- In Ladies #4, after some of her behavior, Mary Turner coldly tells Serenity Foster that cousin or no, she is no longer welcome at Cliffwood. And that's even before it turns out Serenity had murdered her own brother and is thus headed to jail for a very long time.
- Pet Heir:
- Discussed but subverted in book 2, when the lawyer of the by-then deceased James Delacorte calls Charlie to meet with him about the will, and Sean Harris jokingly suggests that Delacorte might have changed his will to include Diesel as an heir. It's not the case though.
Sean: "Or maybe he took a shine to Diesel. You could have a very wealthy cat on your hands."- Referenced again in book 5, when Sean jokingly says he doesn't want his father to die until he's made out his will. Charlie just as jokingly says he already has, and that he's left everything to Diesel, to which Sean rolls his eyes.
- Playing Sick: In book 2, Daphne Morris is always playing like she's deathly ill. She does have some heart troubles, but most of her illnesses are just faking for attention.
- Posthumous Character: Charlie's wife Jackie and aunt Dottie, who'd both died of cancer within a few weeks of one another three years before the series began.
- Pronouncing My Name for You: Ladies #1 includes a pronunciation guide for the Ducote sisters' first names (pronounced ahn-JELL and Dixie, respectively) and family name (the latter is pronounced "Du/Dew-COH-tee"); in the main series, book 7 had the pronunciation being given In-Universe. It's also noted that the sisters themselves don't much like it when people mispronounce their name, and their friends tend to also make sure other people pronounce it correctly.
- Rage Breaking Point: In book 10, Milton Harville's had to deal with his wife Tammy's possessiveness of him for a long time. But when she actually calls Gerry Albritton a whore and essentially threatens to kill her if she doesn't stay away from Milton, Milton's finally had enough and threatens his wife with sending her to the state mental hospital if she doesn't stop acting like that.
- Raised by Grandparents:
- In book 2, Stewart Delacorte came to live with his grandparents at Delacorte House after his parents died when he was younger.
- In Ladies #2, the final chapter states that with her mother Sondra's death, little Tippy Delevan will be raised by her grandmother and great-grandmother.
- Recurring Character: Justin Wardlaw, one of Charlie's boarders, who has a major role in book 1 and then spends most of the rest of the series off-screen, either being described as away in books 2, 7, 8 and 9, and entirely offscreen in books 5, 6 and 10. In book 11, he's mentioned as having moved out of Charlie's house entirely and in with family near campus for his last year of college.
- Required Spinoff Crossover: Southern Ladies Mysteries plays with this in that the characters are still living in the town where the action from the main series takes place, making the appearances by existing characters feel natural rather than shoehorned in. Ladies #1 has Diesel staying with the Ducote sisters in their mansion while Charlie and his family are out of town, and since they're still in Athena, a crime being committed results in series regular Kanesha Berry coming over in her role as the town's Chief Deputy Sheriff (along with her deputy Haskall Bates). Ladies #3 also takes place in Athena, so Kanesha appears again, and the sisters get to visit Charlie, Diesel and Melba Gilley at the college archives.
- Revealing Cover-Up: The first observed murder in book 7 is a cover-up for a longer-running scheme. Investigating the man's death leads to the discovery of an embezzlement scheme that lasted over a decade, plus an earlier murder that was also an attempt to cover it up.
- Revisiting the Cold Case: Book 9 is focused on this, as Charlie and true crime writer Jack Pemberton work together to solve the murders of a man, his wife and their two sons from twenty years ago.
- "Scooby-Doo" Hoax: In Ladies #4, Henry Howard Caitlin pretends to be a ghost in the Bed and Breakfast he and his wife run, moving objects around in a room that's seemingly locked. He explains that his wife is unwilling to leave the place for so much as a day, lest something go wrong while she's away, but he's sick and tired of being tied to the house all the time and wants to at least be able to take her on a vacation. He ultimately confesses the truth, and while she's initially furious, she eventually lets him explain himself and is understanding.
- Screw the Rules, I Have Connections!: Book 2 features Hubert Morris as a character, who feels entitled due to his bloodlines (his mother Daphne is from the very wealthy Delacorte family, and encouraged him to feel he deserved anything because of it). Reality ensues when his attitude doesn't endear him to anyone, and he's never been able to hold down a job for more than a year at a time because of it, but he still thinks he deserves anything he wants, including the bulk of his uncle James' estate, simply because he's the oldest male in the family after James dies.
- Screw the Rules, I Have Money!: Attempted in book 4, Vera Cassity tries to use her status and wealth as a library donor to get access to the Ducote family papers in the college library's archives. Charlie, however, won't back down, since the papers aren't available to the public without written permission from a member or a legal representative of the Ducote family.
- The Scrooge:
- Nathan Gamble in Ladies #4, who's very stingy about money, wearing worn-out clothes and driving a twenty-year-old car. He's especially stingy when it comes to lending money to his family, as he refuses to let his sister have any money from her trust fund, which he manages, to pay her legal bills and try to keep her ex-husband from getting sole custody of their children. She finally murders Nathan to get the money, but once she's found out, the law prevents her from profiting from it, so it was All for Nothing.
- Hiram Barber, who died twenty years before the events of book 9, was a notorious skinflint who didn't like paying for much of anything, even to heat his house.
- Sesquipedalian Loquaciousness: Less of the former and more of the latter, but in book 5, Winston Eagleton tends to be rather... wordy. Charlie, when explaining him to his son Sean, points out that Eagleton is the type to use seven words when one would do, especially when he's excited. Sean, after meeting Eagleton himself, tells Charlie that if anything, Charlie had downplayed it.Sean: "You weren't kidding about the seven words when one would do, except I'd say it was more like seventeen."
- Shotgun Wedding: No shotguns or threats are involved, but in book 7, Sean Harris and his fiancee Alexandra Pendergast move their wedding up to immediately as soon as they find out Alexandra is pregnant.
- Shout-Out Theme Naming:
- In Ladies #1, Benjy Stephens named his pet tarantulas Bert and Ernie.
- The five kittens that appear in book 10 are all given names that are shout-outs to literature. Charlie names one of them Marlowe after the Elizabethan playwright Christopher Marlowe (also after a female cat he'd once owned by the same name). Her sister is named Bastet, after a character from Elizabeth Peters' Amelia Peabody books, and one of her brothers is Ramses, after a character from the same series. The last two males are named Fred and George, after the Weasley twins.
- Show Within a Show: Book 5 contains much of the text of The Mystery at Spellwood Mansion, the first in the fictional Veronica Thane series by Electra Barnes Cartwright.
- Sinister Minister: Mentioned in book 9, where Jack Pemberton briefly mentions one of his true crime novels is about a preacher who killed a couple of people who'd left money to his church, money he desperately needed to cover his gambling debts.
- Slashed Throat: In book 3, the morning after his house is targeted by an arsonist, Charlie is visited by Kanesha Berry and informed that Damitra Vane, one of his suspects in the murder of Connor Lawton, had been found earlier with her throat cut.
- Sleeping with the Boss: In book 2, Charlie's son Sean unexpectedly turns up at his house, and reveals he quit his job at the law firm he worked at in Houston. He eventually confesses that his boss had manipulated him, sleeping with him while getting him to do most of the work on a project, and then moving on to the next guy. He quit to get away from her after he figured out her con.
- Someone to Remember Him By: A downplayed version in book 5. While researching author Electra Barnes Cartwright (who is almost 100 by this point), Charlie finds that her daughter Marcella, an adult with a grown son of her own by this time, was born two months after Mr. Cartwright's death by heart attack.
- Sore Loser: Vera Cassity in book 4, who threatens Charlie's job and cat when he refuses to break the rules and let her see the Ducote family papers without written permission. The Ducote sisters hear about this and have their lawyer deliver a warning. Vera then tries to hassle Charlie's girlfriend, but again, the Ducote sisters find out and step in.
- Spiteful Will: When James Delacorte dies in book 2, he shows just how poorly he thought of his surviving relatives.
- He leaves some money to his brother's grandson Stewart and his other brother's granddaughter Cynthia, but also gives them just three months from the date of his death to move out of his house, and specifically informs Stewart that when he leaves, he may not take any furnishings he himself didn't bring into the house (something that Stewart is particularly disappointed about, as he mentions later).
- To his nephew Hubert (son of James' sister Daphne), he leaves a trust fund, to be managed by James' lawyer, but anything left of it when Hubert himself dies will go to Athena College to fund a scholarship in James' name. He also orders Hubert and his wife to move out of Delacorte House, leaving them a sum that can only be used on a house (including taxes).
- To his sister Daphne, he basically tells her to move out, and that if she chooses to go to an assisted living facility, his lawyers will help her with finding one and the estate will pay her expenses. If she moves anywhere else (such as choosing to go with her son to whatever new house he moves into), she gets nothing.
- Finally, he leaves everything else (save for his rare book collection, which goes to Athena College, and a sum that goes to Charlie Harris for his work in cataloguing it), including the house, to his butler (with a stipulation that when Truesdale dies, the house and estate go to the Athena County Historical Society).
- Stealing from the Till: The villains in book 7 were embezzling from the library budget for over a decade using a phony e-book company, which they themselves had set up and then got a subscription to it for the library, allowing the college access to the e-books it provided. Except all the items were permanently checked out, and the money supposedly going to the company went straight into the villains' pocket. When the library director tried to cancel the subscription in order to reduce the library's spending, the villains killed him and faked his resignation; when his successor figured out what was going on and tried to blackmail the villains, he was killed; and a witness who tried to continue the blackmail was also killed.
- Straight Gay:
- James Delacorte in book 2 — a closeted, elderly gay man (not that he's good at hiding it; his entire family knows how he feels about his butler) who doesn't act like it in the slightest.
- Haskell Bates, a local deputy, is also mostly closeted and doesn't act like he's gay; the only stereotypical trait he displays is a large shoe collection.
- Straw Feminist: Marie Steverton in book 6, a history professor at Athena College who tries to throw her (metaphorical) weight around to get what she wants and, if a man refuses to comply with her wishes, she accuses him of sexism and not wanting her to "achieve anything significant" just because she's a woman. It's noted, by both men and women, that her rudeness and prejudice are the issue, and why she's so unpopular, rather than her gender.
- Strong Family Resemblance: Azalea and her sister Lily are almost identical, as Charlie discovers when he sees them together for the first time in book 4 — when he comes in the room and sees them standing side by side (and with their backs to him), he initially thinks he's seeing double until he gets a better look.
- Sudden Sequel Death Syndrome: Peter Vanderkeller, Athena College's library director (and Charlie's boss) in the first six books, abruptly sent in a resignation letter in book 7; he is later discovered to have been murdered, and the letter was sent by his killers to delay the discovery of their crime.
- The Summation: Happens in the last chapter of pretty much every book, clarifying whatever wasn't already confirmed or explained in the earlier chapters.
- Sweet Tooth: Cynthia Delacorte, introduced in book 2, pretends she doesn't have one, but it's proven that she does — it prompted her to snag one of the peanut cookies that killed two other members of her family via triggering their allergic reactions. Luckily, she didn't actually eat it, and thus it becomes key evidence in proving the identity of the real killer.
- Tall, Dark, and Handsome: Stewart Delacorte describes Sean Harris as "Tall, dark and gorgeous" shortly after they first meet in book 2.
- Tampering with Food and Drink:
- Ladies #2 has one victim die this way, when an allergen was put into their whiskey.
- In book 8, the killer gives two people water bottles that have secretly had cyanide added. One, being suspicious, switches his bottle for one that the killer was going to drink from, resulting in an Accidental Murder.
- Til Murder Do Us Part: Discussed in book 2, when Eloise Morris turns up dead and Charlie considers that her husband might have killed her to clear the way for him to marry the woman he's been having an affair with. It's not him though.
- Two Dun It:
- In book 2, it turns out that the two major crimes (the murders of James Delacorte and Eloise Morris, and the theft of some of Delacorte's rare book collection) were committed by different people. The killer, Nigel Truesdale, did so to speed up his inheritance. The thief, Delacorte's nephew Hubert, stole part of his uncle's rare book collection to pay for pretty things for his mistress.
- In book 3, after the initial murder of Conner Lawton, there are further crimes committed: Charlie's daughter Laura is hit from behind in her office at work, someone tries to burn down the house, Damitra Vane is found dead with her throat cut, and a letter bomb is sent addressed to Laura. It turns out that Sarabeth Conley (née Norris) had killed Conner via suffocation because his play was going to expose her earlier murder by drowning of her father, more than thirty years ago, but the other attacks were carried out by her son Levi. Sarabeth, who was unaware of any of these attacks until Charlie and Laura mentioned them, was horrified when she realized what he'd done.
- In book 9, the cold case Charlie is working on — the murders of four people, twenty years ago — turns out to have been this. Hiram Barber murdered his wife and her sons by her lover after discovering their true parentage, and then his daughter Elizabeth shot him in the back when she realized what he'd done.
- In book 10, the two main crimes — the murder of Gerry Albritton, and the embezzling of funds from her business partner — were committed by two people, as revealed in the last chapter. Gerry was killed by her own sister, Betty Camden, while the embezzling was done by her assistant, Jincy Bruce. A third crime, the sabotage of Gerry's Christmas decorations, turns out to be the doing of yet another person: Gerry's brother Billy Albritton, who was trying to scare her out of the neighborhood.
- Unexpected Inheritance:
- In book 2, James Delacorte's butler Nigel Truesdale faints when he finds out Delacorte left him almost all his money and the house. He's faking, having learned about the contents of the will in advance and murdered Delacorte to speed up the process.
- A variant with Charlie Harris, who is shocked to find he was named co-executor of the will. He's also surprised to find that Delacorte had specifically named him in the will, leaving Charlie the job of cataloguing Delacorte's library (a job he'd only hired Charlie for just a short while ago), including the associated salary. He also left his rare book collection to Athena College, where Charlie works.
- Unsettling Gender-Reveal: In book 10, Charlie learns that murder victim Gerry Albritton — who'd been flirting with him more than once, though he'd never returned her interest — was transgender, having been born male but undergone surgery at least twenty years before, transitioning from Jerry Albritton to Geraldine Albritton. He mentally admits that he doesn't know a time when he's been more shocked. Later, when Melba finds out, she's just as stunned.
- Vacation Episode:
- Ladies #2 sees the Ducote sisters, their ward and their pets all traveling away from Athena to visit family in Louisiana. Ladies #4 sees the same group visiting friends in Mississippi.
- Book 13 involves Charlie, Diesel, Helen Louise and the Ducote sisters all visiting North Carolina.
- Vehicular Sabotage: In Ladies #2, Sondra Delevan's brand new car has its brake line cut, and she crashes into a tree. It's suspected the real target was her grandmother, who was supposed to be with her but backed out at the last minute.
- Weaponized Allergy:
- In book 2, both James Delacorte and his niece-in-law Eloise are deathly allergic to peanuts, and James doesn't allow them in the house because of it. This allergy is used to kill them.
- Similarly, in Ladies #2, Estelle is murdered when someone puts ground-up peanuts, which she's allergic to, in her whiskey.
- What Happened to the Mouse?:
- In book 1, Charlie is mentioned as having a second boarder named Matt, who's spending his fall semester in Madrid in order to do research for his dissertation. He's mentioned all of once and then never comes up again; by book 2, set the following spring, the second room is available for Stewart Delacorte to move into, with no mention of its previous occupant.
- A number of characters are featured in one book and simply never mentioned again, such as Charlie's coworker Willie Clark in book 1 (he isn't mentioned as still working in Athena College's library afterward, and it's never confirmed if he got the rights to the books he wrote for Godfrey Priest) or the rest of the Delacorte family in book 2 (Stewart was on the outs with most of them, but he never even so much as mentions his cousin Cynthia, who played a key role in solving their great-uncle's murder, after the book's end).
- Who Names Their Kid "Dude"?: Miss An'gel mentally expresses this opinion of the name "Lance" in Ladies #2, thinking to herself that "It sounded like a name out of a particularly torrid romance novel."
- Why Did It Have to Be Snakes?:
- The Ducote sisters' mother was deathly afraid of storms, and the sisters themselves don't like them either (though it's noted that they actually worked to try and get over their fear).
- In book 5, Della Duffy is deathly afraid of cats — the mere sight of one, even one as gentle as Diesel, sends her into a panic attack.
- In Ladies #1, Maudine Pittman is deathly afraid of spiders, and suffers a fatal heart attack at the sight of rubber spiders in her bath towel, placed there by the killer. Her mother is the same, and her niece isn't too fond of them either.
- Witch with a Capital "B":
- In book 3, Laura quotes another character, but censors herself because she doesn't want the language to upset her father.
"All he said was 'That fat witch' — except he didn't say witch — 'may think she can shut me in like she used to, but I'm too big now.'"- Ladies #1 does it too, when Rosabelle Sultan talks about her daughter-in-law Marla.
"If I weren't in polite company, I could tell you what I think of her in a single word, and I'm sure you can imagine the word I mean — it rhymes with witch." - Written-In Absence:
- Justin Wardlaw, introduced as one of Charlie's boarders in book 1 and a Recurring Character for much of the series, is absent from books 2, 7, 8 and 9, and is given an explanation each time — he's away with his family for spring break in book 2, in England for the semester in 7 and 8, and away with his family on vacation in 9.
- The spinoff series starts with one, as Charlie, his girlfriend Helen Louise, his children, their love partners and his boarder Stewart Delacorte are all off in Europe for a few weeks. This allows the action to focus on the Ducote sisters, who are cat-sitting for Charlie in his absence (since he can't take Diesel on the trip with him).
- You Got Murder: Charlie receives a letter bomb in book 3. Luckily, Diesel detects that something's off about it, warning Charlie away before he can set it off, and he calls the sheriff's department right away so it can be safely disposed of.
