Publication Date: July 23, 2026
Gilmore Girls meets Ghost Whisperer in this cozy metaphysical mystery
Fiona Miller runs a metaphysical gift shop in Pineridge Hollow. She reads tarot, sells crystals, mixes tea and generally minds her own business. Until she can’t.
When the son of her long-lost best friend Maggie turns up dead, Fiona has decided she’s getting to the bottom of it before she’s even aware of the decision. What stops her cold is the timing — moments before the call, she pulls The Hanged Man tarot card on the heels of a monster zoomie rampage by her cat and familiar Rosie.
Maggie’s son, found hanging in an eerie echo of the boy on the card. Accident? Suicide? Murder? The town has already decided. Fiona’s tarot deck isn’t so sure.
In her little corner of nowhere, with only her tarot to guide her through the stickier situations, Fiona is making her way blindly with little or no technology to guide her. The cat though…
Rosie brings some much-needed intuitive skills along with the Chief, who brings something else. With her Pineridge Hollow crew and Rosie at her side, Fiona follows the cards into buried grudges, old money, and secrets the town spent decades hiding.
On top of everything, The Hanged Man keeps making himself known. Flip it on its head, he whispers.
Look…really look, and then, be prepared to wait.
You just might be surprised…
Moments after pulling The Hanged Man tarot card, Fiona finds out that the son of her absent best friend Maggie has been found dead in The Hanged Man by Jane Brookwood.
Fiona, along with her familiar, a cat named Rosie, runs a metaphysical gift shop, sells crystals, reads tarot, and mostly keeps to herself. She loves the life she has built in Pineridge Hollow.
Fiona uses her tarot to determine how her friend’s son died, which is exceptionally challenging given that the townspeople have already determined his cause of death. Working with the Chief, the crew, and of course Rose, they dig through the past to uncover secrets, grievances, and other mysteries the town has been hiding for decades.
I liked the spooky elements of the story. With Halloween right around the corner, the paranormal elements added an extra layer to this cozy mystery and made it an even more fun read. I especially enjoyed the characters, and surprisingly, Rosie—the cat—was probably my favorite! That doesn’t, however, take away anything from Fiona and the other characters, who were also well-developed and enjoyable.
The mystery was well-plotted, and I loved the witchy elements.
Now is the perfect time of year for The Hanged Man and to indulge in a spooky paranormal cozy mystery.
Jane Brookwood writes cozy mysteries steeped in tarot symbolism, intuition, and the quiet magic that lingers in small towns. Though she lives just outside the fictional Pineridge Hollow, she knows its back roads and hidden corners by heart. Its shop windows, whispered rumors, and moonlit secrets inspire much of her work — and often feel as real to her as any place on a map.
Jane has always been drawn to the moment when an ordinary day tilts into something strange, meaningful, or unexpected. She writes to capture that shift — the sense that something powerful is moving just beneath the surface, waiting for the right person to notice.
When she’s not writing, she’s reading tarot, wandering through forests, visiting cafés that remind her of The Velvet Fig, or sharing quiet evenings with her cat, Rosie, who insists on chiming in whenever a mystery gets tense. Jane lives in British Columbia, where Pineridge Hollow grows a little more vivid with every sunrise.
