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Overdue at Lake Street

Name: Overdue at Lake Street
Price: 6.99 USD
Availability: InStock
Rating: 4.4 (5 reviews)
Author: Winnie Lark

by Winnie Lark · published via Smithbook

A retired librarian finds a book returned forty years late, with a house key taped inside the cover.

★★★★☆ 4.4 · 5 reviews 93 readers English

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★★★★☆

"The ending was more tender than I expected from a cozy. I have already bought the second one."

rut•••@readers.staging.smithbook.test · verified reader

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What it covers

cozy mysteryMinnesotalibrarian sleuthsmall town

About this book

Dot Engquist retired from the Lake Street branch library after thirty-five years, and she has not stopped volunteering there on Tuesdays. When a copy of Rebecca comes back through the book drop forty-one years overdue, with a brass house key taped inside the back cover, Dot does what any reference librarian would do. She looks up the last borrower. The last borrower was a young woman who vanished from St. Paul in the winter of 1983. The first Lake Street Library mystery.

Look inside · First chapter

The book drop at the Lake Street branch was emptied every morning at nine by whoever got there first, and on Tuesdays that was always Dot Engquist. She had retired from the reference desk three years earlier, and she still came in once a week to shelve, to straighten the paperback spinner and to take one butterscotch from the jar at circulation, which she considered part of her pension. That Tuesday the bin held eleven picture books, two cookbooks, a DVD with no DVD in it and a hardback copy of

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Product details

Title: Overdue at Lake Street
Author: Winnie Lark
Format: Digital · browser reader
Language: English
Category: Mystery & Investigation
Delivery: In seconds · to your e-mail
Access: Lifetime · any device
Publisher: Independent · via Smithbook

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Reviews

4.4

★★★★☆

5 reviews

5★3

4★1

3★1

2★0

1★0

★★★★☆ · rut•••@readers.staging.smithbook.test9/30/2026

Warm and a little sad

The ending was more tender than I expected from a cozy. I have already bought the second one.

★★★☆☆ · glo•••@readers.staging.smithbook.test9/30/2026

Gentle pace

Slow in the middle, but the key and the lock pay off beautifully at the end.

★★★★★ · dal•••@readers.staging.smithbook.test9/29/2026

For every library volunteer

I shelve books at my branch on Thursdays and I recognised everyone in this book.

★★★★★ · lin•••@readers.staging.smithbook.test9/29/2026

Dot is my new best friend

She is nosy in exactly the right way. The overdue notice scene had me laughing out loud on the bus.

★★★★★ · mar•••@readers.staging.smithbook.test9/29/2026

Cozy and clever

A real puzzle, a real Minnesota winter and a lot of hotdish. I guessed wrong twice.

About the author

Winnie Lark

I spent thirty-eight years behind the reference desk of a branch library in St. Paul, and I can tell you that people will confess things to a librarian they would never tell a priest. They want a book on divorce, or poisons, or how long a body stays frozen in a lake, and they always say it is for a friend. My sleuth, Dot Engquist, is a retired reference librarian who still cannot walk past a misfiled book. I write on the couch by the front window, with a cup of coffee going cold and my husband Arne asking what is for supper. The answer is usually hotdish.

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