by Sandra Murphy & Peggy Ehrhart

This week we have a review of another fun Halloween mystery, along with a fun Halloween craft from the author Peggy Ehrhart. Details at the end of this post on how to enter to win a copy of the book and a link to purchase it from Amazon at the end of this post.

A Dark and Stormy Knit by Peggy Ehrhart
Review by Sandra Murphy

A storm might add the perfect atmosphere for Halloween night, but it also cuts short the annual parade and bonfire. Pamela and her neighbors, Wilford and Bettina, have decided it’s best to stay inside and enjoy spiced cider and oatmeal raisin cookies. Their dog Woofus is usually a timid boy, but a sound alerts him that something is wrong. The scream that follows proves him right.

A lot of homes include scarecrows or fake bodies as part of the décor on the front porch. The next door neighbor’s house has one too—except this body is real—and really dead. Discovered by the late night trick or treaters whose screams brought Pamela, Wilford, and Bettina to the scene, the teens say they didn’t see anyone else around. Sounds of a struggle would have been muffled by the storm.

Since the victim lived in New York City and was visiting her sister in Arborville, New Jersey—maybe to avoid NYC—there is suspicion the killer made a fatal error and killed the wrong sister. After all, there are those rumors…

Bettina is a reporter for the weekly newspaper, its only reporter actually. She’s hot on the case and is certain the police detective is looking in all the wrong places. It couldn’t hurt for her, with the help of Pamela, to ask a few questions.

This is book 11 in the series. On knitting nights, Nell still has her rule about no negative topics, the snacks are luscious, the coffee and tea piping hot, and served at precisely eight o’clock because Roland never fails to remind them when it’s time. Pamela’s almost, wanna-be love life has taken a few turns over the last few books but now there’s a faint glimmer of hope. You won’t have to wait long to find out more about a potential man for her because book 12, Last Wool and Testament, releases on April 29, 2025 and is available for pre-order now.

Pamela shares a pattern for a cozy scarf hood with optional ears and a recipe for Apple Galette which she says looks harder than it really is. The crust uses 1/3 cup of buckwheat flour for a nutty taste. It sounds delicious.

Sandra Murphy lives in the shadow of the Arch in St. Louis Missouri. She’s the editor for the upcoming Yeet Me in St Louis, an anthology with stories from twelve St. Louis writers. Her own short stories have appeared in Ellery Queen Mystery Magazine, Mystery Magazine, and anthologies such as The Perp Wore Pumpkin and I (Almost) Died in Your Arms. ‘Lucy’s Tree’, published in The Eyes of Texas, won a Derringer Award from the Short Mystery Fiction Society. She lives in St. Louis with Ozzie the Westie Impersonator and his sidekick in crime, Louie the Cat.

Spooky Halloween Door Wreath with Spiders
by Peggy Ehrhart

The residents of Arborville, New Jersey, do such a convincingly scary job of decorating their houses for Halloween, that in A Dark and Stormy Knit, a real corpse is mistaken for just another decoration. Here’s a simpler way to give your porch a spooky vibe—no corpses included. It’s a grapevine wreath featuring black flowers and creepy-crawlies.

You will need:

A small piece of black felt
10 black pipe cleaners 12” long
A grapevine wreath
An assortment of ribbons in somber colors
Black artificial flowers, plastic or cloth

First make your spiders.

Draw a spider-body pattern on paper, about 2 ½” long, and cut it out. Pin it to a corner of the felt and carefully cut around it. Repeat the process to make 10 spider bodies.

Cut the pipe cleaners in half to make two equal lengths. As shown in the photos below, lay a pipe-cleaner half across a spider body and anchor it in place using an overcast stitch. Add three more pipe-cleaner halves using the same process.

Lay another spider body on top of the body with the pipe cleaners to make a kind of sandwich. Stitch all the way around the edge using an overcast stitch. Bend the pipe-cleaner legs for a realistic spidery effect. (Editor’s note—a glue gun works too for those who can’t stitch)

Repeat the procedure to make four more spiders.

Now assemble your wreath.

I bought the grapevine wreath at Michael’s, or you might already have a similar wreath that you can repurpose. You might also already have plastic or cloth flowers that you can spray black, or you can buy black artificial flowers this time of year at stores like Michael’s. I had flowers left that I had sprayed black for a Kings River Life Halloween craft project I did in 2020, when Knit of the Living Dead, which also had a Halloween theme, came out. You can see them in the process of being sprayed, laid on a newspaper outside.

Use your ribbons to tie an attractive bow at the bottom of the wreath.

Arrange the flowers and your spiders around the wreath. Anchor the flowers by weaving the stems into the wreath and use fine wire, if necessary, to hold them in place. Use the spiders’ legs to anchor them in place and add a bit of fine wire, if necessary.

Here’s the spooky Halloween wreath all finished.

You can click here to purchase this book from Amazon.

To enter to win a copy of A Dark and Stormy Knit, simply email KRL at krlcontests@gmail[dot]com by replacing the [dot] with a period, and with the subject line “stormy knit” or comment on this article. A winner will be chosen October 19, 2024. U.S. residents only, and you must be 18 or older to enter. If entering via email please include your mailing address in case you win. You can read our privacy statement here if you like.

Check out other mystery articles, reviews, book giveaways & mystery short stories in our mystery section. And join our mystery Facebook group to keep up with everything mystery we post, and have a chance at some extra giveaways. Also listen to our new mystery podcast where mystery short stories and first chapters are read by actors! They are also available on Apple Podcasts, Google Play, and Spotify.

Peggy Ehrhart is a former English professor with a doctorate in Medieval Literature. She writes the Knit & Nibble cozy mysteries for Kensington. A Dark and Stormy Knit is #11 in the series, and Peggy’s Knit & Nibble novella, Murder Most Irish, was included in Kensington’s Irish Milkshake Murder, which appeared in January 2024. Peggy is an avid crafter, dating from her childhood as a member of the 4-H Club in rural Southern California. She currently lives in northern New Jersey, in a charming suburban town rather like the Arborville of her series.

Disclosure: This post contains links to an affiliate program, for which we receive a few cents if you make purchases. KRL also receives free copies of most of the books that it reviews, that are provided in exchange for an honest review of the book.