Spotlight & Giveaway: Making Friends Can Be Murder by Kathleen West

Today, HJ is pleased to share with you Kathleen West’s new release: Making Friends Can Be Murder

Thirty-year-old Sarah Jones gets caught up solving a murder in her new neighborhood after unknowingly befriending a dangerous con artist (who’s nothing like what she seems) in this playful, twisty mystery from acclaimed author Kathleen West.

 
It feels like kismet when Sarah Jones, newly relocated to Minneapolis after abruptly calling off her engagement, gets invited to join a group of women who share her same (very common) name. For years Sarah has received all types of correspondence intended for different Sarah Joneses, but now it seems that this mistake has given her the opportunity for an instant community.

What starts as a low-stakes meet-up called “The Sarah Jones Project” soon turns sinister when another local Sarah Jones is found dead, under suspicious circumstances, at the base of the downtown Minneapolis bridge. After fielding numerous calls from concerned loved ones ruling out their Sarah as the victim, the surviving Sarahs decide to take matters into their own hands.

Aided by the dead woman’s nanny, a newly commissioned (and very handsome and eligible) FBI agent, and a cloistered nun with a complicated past, the motley crew of unlikely friends are determined to get to the bottom of the murder of one of their own.

Enjoy an exclusive excerpt from Making Friends Can Be Murder

April 29, 2023
Sarah lined up amethyst, moonstone, rose quartz, and smoky
quartz on her dresser as she pawed through her pile of running
tights. The most flattering were the black compression ones with
a zipper pocket for her phone. The most striking were pink with an
abstract flower print.
Black, she decided, for straightlaced FBI agent George. When
she pictured an agent, it was navy, black, and those iconic brightyellow
letters on the backs of their rain slickers.
How did a nice guy like George end up in the FBI? And where
did he keep his gun during their training sessions? She’d googled
it and discovered that agents typically packed heat at all times. But
if there’d been a firearm on his body, Sarah would have noticed. It
wasn’t like George came to LifeSport in baggy sweats.
Sarah added “Why the FBI?” to the list of topics she’d written
on a sticky note and plunked on her dresser. Her first conversationstarter
ideas had been pets and favorite ice cream flavors. But
George’s FBI origin story might be slightly more interesting.
In addition to planning ahead for scintillating conversation,
Sarah had checked the weather sixteen or seventeen times in the
last twenty- four hours. It looked like the NOAA, European, and
North American models had all settled around forty- four degrees
and sunny. Not bad for running, but not great for being outside
without a heavier jacket.
Sarah picked a newish light blue pullover and a pink ear band.
They could end their run near the two- story converted- firehouse
coffee shop just down the street from her apartment. There was a
two- top on the second floor near a gas fireplace. She’d cruise
through her memorized sticky note of topics and garner as much
information as possible about the Fed Sarah murder investigation
to report back to TSJP so they could follow up on any new leads.
And then, when the conversation had run its course, she could offer
to give George a ride home. He was running to meet her, covering
all of the miles she’d prescribed for him that weekend.
At precisely seven minutes before their designated meeting
time by the cherry- and- spoon sculpture, Sarah left her apartment.
Her hands shook as she locked the door, and she compulsively
opened it again, checking for who knows what. Her Garmin showed
her heart rate at 120 beats per minute, typical only if she’d already
warmed up with an easy mile.
Sarah understood her extra nervousness, as this was her first
date in Minneapolis. And she hadn’t dated anyone back in Vermont
besides Brian. She and Brian hadn’t really even had a first
date. Lock- in night at Montgomery Junior High hardly counted,
though they had swapped spit behind the second- floor stairwell.
After that, it had always been Brian. She was thirty years old and
hadn’t even kissed anyone else. Her nerves nearly pulled Sarah
back to her apartment door, but then she saw her mother in her
mind’s eye, her happy smile in that framed photo, her iconic love
story. Sarah couldn’t procure happiness like that if she wasn’t brave
like Ainsley had been.
As she ran toward the sculpture, Sarah wondered if she’d kiss
George after the run. His mouth would taste like the mint she’d
smelled on his breath during their sessions. Despite the cool temp,
Sarah could already feel warmth in her cheeks when she crossed
the intersection in front of the sculpture garden. The place was
mostly empty on this cool morning. For a second, she wondered
what she’d do if George stood her up. He wouldn’t, would he? He
was in the FBI, for goodness’ sake, and therefore a serious and reliable
person.
Before she could give it a second thought, she saw him loping in
front of the giant cobalt rooster sculpture. It hadn’t been there in
her mother’s day, though the garden had. Things changed, Sarah
knew, which was all the more reason to seize every moment. She
hadn’t been doing that in Vermont.
Sarah waved as she ran toward George.
“Look at that!” George said when he got close. “We timed it perfectly.
I was worried.”
“I realized we didn’t think about the coffee when we made
this plan.” Sarah wasn’t sure how to broach her idea of driving him
home.
“Yeah,” George said. “I thought of that on the way over. I figured
I could Uber if my stomach got too sloshy. Or— ”
Sarah giggled. “Or, I could drive you.”
“I thought of that, too.”
Sarah pointed toward the bike path that led to the Mississippi
River. They’d run in the direction of the bridge under which Fed
Sarah was found. Sure, it gave the date a bit of the macabre, but
also, the other Sarahs would expect her to take advantage of the
situation.
“On our way to the River Road?” George asked.
“Minneapolis really does have the best places to run,” Sarah
said.
“I’d imagine that Vermont is picturesque for the marathoner?”
They’d settled in next to each other, their strides in sync.
“It’s hilly.” The Minnesota Twins stadium rose before them, its
scoreboard visible above the wall. “But it’s nice to see city stuff.”
“Are you a baseball fan?” George asked.
“Not really,” said Sarah. “So slow.”
“Seven innings too many for you?”
“It’s nine, isn’t it?”
George guffawed. “I can’t believe I said that. I played Little
League and everything. My dad is huge on the Twins. He listens to
all the broadcasts on gigantic headphones while doing work around
camp.” He put his hands over both ears, showing the size.
“Camp?” Sarah planned to take a drive up to her mother’s camp
that summer, to look at the lake that had meant so much to her.
She’d mapped it. It would take three hours, and there were charming
rentals nearby. She could even take a boat on Lake Whitehook,
retrace Ainsley’s canoe trips based on her notebooks.
“We own a camp,” George said. “Well, my parents do.”
“You worked there?” She flashed on George in red lifeguard swim
trunks, and then on George with a camp polo and cargo shorts.
Sarah’s entire frame of reference about summer camp was from
movies. Her mom had always talked about sending her to sleepaway
camp, but then she’d died. It had never seemed right for Sarah
to leave for the summer again.
“For the most part, I was marina director,” George said. “I pulled
water- skiers and rescued canoes in the wind. Repaired windsurfing
equipment. That kind of stuff. I still work there sometimes. My
parents need me to put in the docks in a couple of weeks.”
“You have time for that with your new job?”
“What is time anyway?” George mused, and Sarah laughed
again.
“This is a dumb question, but do FBI agents work nine- to- five?”
Sarah’s watch beeped, showing a first- mile split of eight minutes
and twenty- four seconds. Easy enough to talk. “Pace okay?” she
asked.
“Good for me,” George said. “And yeah, we work forty hours per
week unless something big happens. Which is often. Otherwise,
there are shifts. All that jazz.”
“Does the Sarah Jones murder count as something big?”
“One hundred percent,” George said. “I got named to the task
force and everything.” He seemed proud.
“Task force?” Sarah asked. “Sounds fancy.”
“It just means we share information and coordinate tasks with
the Minneapolis Police Department.”
“Have you seen the transcript of my friend Twenty- Seven’s interview
with the police?” Sarah blurted. She held back from saying
that she’d thought Twenty- Seven should have secured a lawyer.
“I have.” Sarah tried to judge George’s expression, but it appeared
flat from the side.
“It’s ridiculous, right?” Sarah asked. “Certainly she’s not a suspect?”
“I’m not supposed to say a ton,” said George.
“But I’m your official informant!” Grandma Ellie, who’d hooked
Sarah on Agatha Christie as a kid, had been thrilled with the title.
Sarah’s father, the stalwart family physician, had been less enamored
of her involvement in a law enforcement investigation. Sarah
couldn’t help feeling he was always a little disappointed in her.
They’d planned for her to join his practice.
But then, her failure had been so swift in the physician internship.
After she fainted the first time, she and Brian had brainstormed
solutions. There’d been cognitive behavioral therapy, exposure
therapy, repeated self- flagellation, and even hypnosis. But, in the
end, everyone agreed: someone who couldn’t remain conscious at
the sight of blood couldn’t actually complete medical school.
The personal training certification had taken only weeks, given
her premed coursework in biology and physiology. She finished the
master’s in genomics as a consolation.
“You are a Confidential Human Source,” George agreed, using
official terminology. “It’s in the paperwork and everything.”
“So you can tell me what you thought of the interrogation. Was
it an interrogation? What’s the difference between that and an interview?”
“One seems friendlier?” George smiled.
“And what else do I get to know?” Sarah thought about the amazonite
crystal on her dresser, good for luck and overall success.
She could enjoy George and also make investigative progress.
“I’m thinking.” George picked up his pace a little, squinting.
Sarah reviewed what she already knew. “Twenty- Seven and Fed
Sarah had dinner as usual. That was a standing date.”
“Fed Sarah,” George repeated. “I like that.”
“Better than Dead Sarah?”
“Indeed,” George agreed. “Anyway, yes, they had dinner, but it
was later than their usual dinner, which was interesting to the police.
And”—he looked up at the cloudy sky, considering—“I will say
that it does seem like your friend and the deceased were very close.”
“You know what’s weird?” Sarah blurted again. “I’ve heard that
they were best friends a couple of times now, and I didn’t know
that. And I feel like Sarah and I are very good friends.” She dug a
fingernail into the pad of her gloved thumb and felt her cheeks
warm. Her jealousy felt junior high, embarrassing like the lock- in
with Brian. “How could your best friend have another best friend
you didn’t know about?”
The two of them approached the path next to the Mississippi
and Sarah veered right. They’d see the Hennepin Avenue Bridge in
just a couple of blocks. “Maybe there’s stuff she doesn’t tell you?”
George’s voice was soft.
Sarah knew Miranda rights from Law & Order. Anything you
say can be used against you. The things she said now could be used
against Twenty- Seven. That was the point, after all. Sarah was
George’s informant. She let a pause open as they both ran faster,
and then she remembered her sticky note with conversation starters.
This semiawkward moment was why she’d written those out.
“Soooo.” She let her arm bump against his. “Let’s go back. Why’d
you join the FBI?”
“To solve the crimes.” It was matter- of- fact, a prepared answer.
“Why?” she asked. Lots of people had the inclination to do
something that matched an elementary school fantasy like becoming
a police officer or a lion tamer. Not that many people actually
did it.
“Something happened when I was a kid,” George said, his cheeks
flaring. “Um, this is kind of heavy?”
“I can do heavy.” It was a benefit of having a dead parent. She
had practice dealing with the worst.
“Okay.” George took a couple of deeper breaths and rolled his
shoulders. “When I was in fifth grade, my friend Henry was kidnapped.”
“Holy shit! That’s so traumatic!” Sarah slowed down, but found
herself a few steps behind George right away, shocked.
“We can keep going,” he said, but he pulled the pace back.
They were quiet for a beat while Sarah thought of a follow- up
question. Just when she had it, George spoke again. “He’s still missing,
which means, well— ”
“He’s dead,” Sarah said. “I’m sorry.”
“Almost certainly,” George acknowledged. “Probably within the
first few hours. But no one knows for sure.”
“Wait. This sounds familiar.” Sarah had a vision of her mother
at the dinner table— a taco, of all things, halfway to her mouth—
talking about a missing child near her summer camp.
“It was national news,” George said. “There have been literally
thousands of tips over the twenty-two years since he’s been gone.
They go through the Minneapolis FBI field office.”
The dinner memory of her mother was new, not one of the several
that Sarah regularly replayed. She looked around it a little bit,
to see what Ainsley was wearing. Sometimes, if she tried hard
enough, she’d get the color of a sweater or a wisp of a hairstyle.
“Henry,” Sarah said, after a moment.
“O’Neill, yes,” George said.
“Was he riding his bike down a dirt road? With other kids?”
“Alone, but yeah. Dirt road.” Sarah glanced over, but George
looked calm. She could see a couple of freckles on his cheekbone
above his stubble.
“Some women detectives?”
“Yes!” George did stop then. “How do you know that? The two
county cops were women. They got skewered in the media when
they didn’t solve it.”
“I can’t believe I know this.” Sarah readjusted her headband.
“My mom said it happened just a half mile from the camp where
she’d worked. She loved it there. I think it’s the whole reason she
loved Minnesota so much. I guess, if you think about it— ”
“Wait! Your mom worked at Birdsong?”
That was a memory Sarah didn’t have to work hard to access:
Ainsley in a holey Birdsong T- shirt at the breakfast table every
weekend. The dot on the i in “Birdsong” was a nest with a tiny robin’s
head sticking up.
“You know it?”
George put a hand to his cheek. “That’s my camp,” he said. “That’s
the camp my family owns.”

Text Messages between Sarah Elizabeth Jones and
George Nightingale
April 29, 2023
Sarah: That was so fun. Thanks again.
George: I still can’t believe your connection to Birdsong. I
called my mom immediately.
Sarah: You did? In an official FBI capacity?
George: Yes. Purely professional, Jones.
Sarah: Well, I don’t want to jeopardize my status as an
official agent of the FBI.
George: You’re not an official agent of the FBI.
Sarah: Says you.
George: Exactly. That’s on the record.
Sarah: I think we both know the truth. That there’s no way
you could possibly be a successful agent of the FBI without
your partner.
George: You’re my informant.
Sarah: Your confidential human source. Do you have a
partner?
George: I have a supervisor.
Sarah: When do I pick up my .45?
George: We will not be issuing you a firearm.
Sarah: Says you!
George: Okay.
Sarah: What are you doing now?
George: I’m having my before- bed IPA.
Sarah: Just one?
George: I prefer not to get in the habit of drinking alone.
Seems bad for FBI business.
Sarah: Wish I were there, but I’ve got an early client.
George: Joyce the racewalker?
Sarah: Nope. It’s a high school runner who wants to get
swole before Algebra starts at 8.
George: Can I confess something?
Sarah: Is it about murder?
George: That’s a negative, Ghost Rider.
Sarah: You’re confusing me. Are we naval aviators or law
enforcement?
George: National security.
Sarah: Oh, right. Well, anyway, what’s your confession?
George: I chickened out in the car. I should have
leaned in.
Sarah: #obviously
George: You could have taken over. It’s on you, too.
Sarah: I guess we’ll just have to see each other again in
order to accomplish a kiss?
George: ASAP

Excerpt. ©Kathleen West. Posted by arrangement with the publisher. All rights reserved.
 
 

Giveaway: One finished copy of MAKING FRIENDS CAN BE MURDER by Kathleen West.

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Meet the Author:

Kathleen West is a veteran school teacher who writes fiction in the mornings and on the weekends. She lives in Minneapolis with her A+ human family and three B- dogs. Making Friends Can Be Murder is her fourth novel.

Buy link: https://www.penguinrandomhouse.com/books/671505/making-friends-can-be-murder-by-kathleen-west/