Expat Zoe Barlow has settled well into her artist's life among the Lost Generation in 1920s Paris. When a too-tipsy guest at her weekly poker game breaks her favorite clock, she's off to a Montparnasse flea market to bargain with the vendor Laurette for a replacement. What Zoe didn't bargain for was the lost Chagall painting that's been used like a rag to wrap her purchases! Eager to learn if Laurette has more Chagalls lying about like trash, Zoe sets off to track her down at her storage shed. With no Laurette in sight, Zoe snoops around and indeed finds several additional Chagalls --- and then she finds Laurette herself, dead beneath a scrap heap. After returning the paintings to a grateful Marc Chagall, Zoe begins her own investigation. Did the stolen paintings play any part in the brutal killing? Or was it a crime of passion?

Paris, 1922: By the age of 18, Zoe Barlow had already lost her father to suicide, and her reputation to an ill-fated love affair --- not to mention other losses, too devastating for words. Exiled from her home and her beloved younger sister by their stepmother, she was unceremoniously dumped in Paris. Four years later, Zoe has forged a new life as a painter amidst fellow artists, expats and revolutionary thinkers struggling to make sense of the world in the aftermath of war. She's adopted this Lost Generation as her new family, so when her dear friend Hadley Hemingway loses a valise containing all of her husband Ernest's writings, Zoe happily volunteers to track it down. But her search for the bag keeps leading to murder victims, and Zoe must again face hard losses --- this time among her adopted tribe.

California zookeeper Theodora Bentley is now happily married to Sheriff Joe Rejas. The Gunn Zoo is celebrating the arrival of Poonya, an adorable red panda, who forms a strong bond with Teddy. All appears fairy tale blissful in the small Monterey Bay village of Gunn Landing until Teddy's mother-in-law, mystery writer Colleen Rejas, has discovered through DNA testing that Joe has sired a son he knew nothing about. Eighteen-year-old Dylan Coyle arrives to meet his biological family, and then is arrested for murder. By the end of the book, besides solving the crime, Teddy and Colleen have learned that the term "family" does not always mean blood kin. It often includes those who --- although no blood relationship --- are still held close in our hearts.

When Chelsea, the ex-wife of Harold Slow Horse, joins a "new thought" organization called Kanati, Scottsdale private eye Lena Jones begins to investigate. She soon learns that two communes have sprung up nearby in the Arizona desert. The participants at EarthWay follow a rigorous dietary regime that could threaten the health of its back-to-the-land inhabitants, while the more pleasure-loving folk at Kanati are dining on sumptuous French cuisine. After finding an emaciated woman's body in the desert, Lena's memory is jolted back to that horrible night when her father and younger brother were among those murdered by a cult leader named Abraham, who then vanished. Lena begins to wonder if either EarthWay or Kanati could be linked to that night, and to her own near-death.

While taking the yearly "otter count" at a marsh near Gunn Landing Harbor, California, zookeeper Theodora Bentley sees Maureen, her favorite otter, swimming around clutching someone's expensive smartphone. When Teddy rescues the device, she discovers a photograph of a murder-in-progress. A hasty search soon turns up the still-warm body of Stuart Booth, PhD, a local Marine Biology instructor. Booth was a notorious sexual harasser of young female students, so the list of suspects is long enough to make Teddy wonder if the crime will ever be solved. But when her friend, Lila, one of Booth's original accusers, is arrested and charged with his murder, Teddy begins to investigate.

When the man who raped Scottsdale PI Lena Jones as a nine-year-old foster child is released from prison, Lena is waiting for him in the parking lot --- with a big knife. "Papa" Brian Wycoff survives their meeting, but the next day, his wife is found dead in their home. Terrified he will be next, Wycoff takes shelter in an RV on his brother-in-law's small ranch. A couple of days later, he is found tortured to death. When Lena takes up the case, her conscience is torn. Does a serial child rapist really deserve justice? That choice might not be left up to Lena when members of a local group, Parents of Missing Children, start working to prevent her investigation from succeeding. How far will they go to make sure she fails?