The Man Who Swore He'd Never Go Home — David Handler

In this case from early in Stewart Hoag's career, the newly successful writer revisits his hometown to investigate the murder of a beloved librarian.

Stewart “Hoagy” Hoag always swore that he would never return to Montdale, Connecticut, the small mill town where his family lived for generations. He certainly has no desire to interrupt his high life as the newest great American novelist to revisit the town that hates his family and will only bring back memories of his unhappy childhood. But when his childhood sweetheart phones to say that her mother, Mary McKenna, the librarian who inspired Hoagy's dream to be a writer, has died, Hoagy knows he has to return for her funeral. Especially when Maggie adds that her mother didn't die of natural causes.

Who would want to murder a beloved mill town librarian? Determined to pay his respects to one of the few people in his hometown he truly cared for, Hoagy hops in his Jaguar and heads to Montdale with his new girlfriend Merilee and even newer basset hound puppy Lulu in tow. The town where his family's brass mill once thrived is now a toxic, lead-poisoned ghost town filled with illegal drugs, broken families, violence, bitterness, and resentment. Hoagy is surprised to discover former classmate and bullying target, Pete Schlosski, has become the State Police Resident Trooper. But while Pete seems to have forgiven his past tormentors, he doesn't have any ideas as to which of them might be a killer. Hoagy, on the other hand, has learned plenty about the art of investigation from hours spent in the library, and his four-month-old puppy shows a surprising knack for tracking down clues…

Readers will be delighted to return to where it all began and experience Lulu's very first case in this charming installment of the Edgar Award-nominated Stewart Hoag series.