The Scapegoat by Daphne du Maurier

By chance, John and Jean — one English, the other French — meet in a provincial railway station. Their resemblance to each other is uncanny, and they spend the next few hours talking and drinking – until at last John falls into a drunken stupor. It’s to be his last carefree moment, for when he wakes, Jean has stolen his identity and disappeared. So the Englishman steps into the Frenchman’s shoes, and faces a variety of perplexing roles – as owner of a chateau, director of a failing business, head of a fractious family, and master of nothing.

Gripping and complex, The Scapegoat is a masterful exploration of doubling and identity, and of the dark side of the self.

Stuck in Manistique by Dennis Cuesta

Near the midpoint of the Upper Peninsula, along a Lake Michigan bend of shore, is the town of Manistique, Michigan. Mark had never heard of Manistique before the death of his estranged aunt, but as sole beneficiary of Vivian’s estate, he travels there to settle her affairs. As Mark tours his aunt’s house for the first time, the doorbell rings.

Days after graduating medical school, Dr. Emily Davis drives north, struggling with her illicit rendezvous on Mackinac Island. She never makes it—on the highway near Manistique, her car collides with a deer, shattering the car’s windshield. Stranded for the night, Emily is directed to a nearby bed and breakfast.

Maybe it’s a heady reaction, the revelation that his aunt, an international aid doctor, ran a bed and breakfast in retirement. Or perhaps he plainly feels pity for the young, helpless doctor. Regardless, Mark decides to play host for one night, telling Emily that he’s merely stepping in temporarily while his aunt is away.

As a one-night stay turns into another and more guests arrive, the ersatz innkeeper steadily loses control of his story. And though Emily opens up to Mark, she has trouble explaining the middle-aged man who unexpectedly arrives at the doorstep looking for her.

Will these two strangers, holding on to unraveling secrets, remain in town long enough to discover the connection between them?

Wanna Get Lucky?by Deborah Coonts

It’s your lucky day because this book is “funny, fast-paced, exuberant, and brilliantly realized” (Susan Wiggs). Lucky O’Toole is determined to uncover the real story behind a woman’s death at a Las Vegas pirate show — but can anyone find justice in America’s most infamous city? A hilarious mystery that “hits the proverbial jackpot” (Booklist).

Unmasking Sinby Mary Lancaster

A more intriguing option…

Rebecca, Lady Cornish, is lonely. She comes to Maida Pleasure Gardens, masked and alone, just to feel part of a world that still dances and laughs. But she repels all company – until the mysterious Ludovic Dunne refuses to be dismissed. Intrigued and unwillingly attracted, Rebecca begins to wonder if he might become a friend.

And she is badly in need of friends.

Twice widowed by the age of two-and-twenty, Rebecca is shunned by the ton and reviled as “The Black Widow”, convicted by rumor of murdering her husbands. She endures her isolation but refuses to give up her son to hostile family. Surely Ludovic, a solicitor who specializes in solving people’s knotty problems, is the man to help her fight?

Ludovic, however, is already on a mission to find evidence against her. Haunted by the past, he will never let his heart interfere with justice. By the time he proves the sin is not Rebecca’s, he has lost her trust. But that will not stop him from helping her, even if she never knows.

Mystery and danger culminate inevitably at Maida Gardens, but when Ludovic’s past catches up with him, will love be enough to save him and the woman he loves beyond reason?

Careless Love by Steve Zettler

The answer seemed simple for Grace Rolston when she dropped the .38 revolver into her travel bag and retreated to Hawaii. It was time to escape Californian demons, abandon her philandering husband, and say goodbye to the life of a canary trapped in a cage.

Demons have also invaded the life of Lee Corbet, and he too has retreated to Hawaii, hoping to jettison the past memories that eat away at his soul.

Grace and Lee collide, but love is careless; it will take these two innocents, toss them into a typhoon of passion and emotion, and then rip them apart, all for entertainment’s sake.

When a bird flies westward, Hawaii is the end of the line.