Books Set in Pennsylvania
Our journey through the 50 states continues with a stop in Pennsylvania!
Book Club Pick – Pennsylvania
Tag, You’re It by Susan Mellon
What is Tag, You’re It about?
It’s all fun and games until someone gets hurt . . .
All Marina wants to do is celebrate her grandmother’s birthday without getting the third degree about her dating life. She needs a boyfriend and fast. Can a chance meeting on a sidewalk solve her problem?
Noticing an attractive woman wearing stilettos and pacing in front of a restaurant, Tag’s plans changed. All he wanted to do was grab some food and head home, but instead, he offers to help the frantic stranger.
As their fake dating becomes not so fake, Marina learns that Tag’s offer to help wasn’t as random as she thought.
Susan Mellon on Literary Escapes Podcast
Want to know more about Susan and her books? Listen to this conversation on the Literary Escapes Podcast!
More Sweet Reads Set in Pennsylvania
Enjoy this additional selection of books set in Pennsylvania, spanning cozy mystery, sweet romance, historical fiction, and women’s fiction. Perfect for easy reading, these delightful tales promise happy, hopeful endings.
Which one will you choose for a literary escape to Pennsylvania?
In Her Shoes by Jennifer Weiner
Genre: Women’s Fiction
Meet Rose Feller, a thirty-year-old high-powered attorney with a secret passion for romance novels. She has an exercise regime she’s going to start next week, and she dreams of a man who will slide off her glasses, gaze into her eyes, and tell her she’s beautiful. She also dreams of getting her fantastically screwed-up, semi-employed little sister to straighten up and fly right.
Meet Rose’s sister, Maggie. Twenty-eight years old and drop-dead gorgeous. Although her big-screen stardom hasn’t progressed past her left hip’s appearance in a Will Smith video, Maggie dreams of fame and fortune — and of getting her big sister on a skin-care regimen.
These two women, who claim to have nothing in common but a childhood tragedy, DNA, and the same size feet, are about to learn that they’re more alike than they’d ever imagined. Along the way, they’ll encounter a diverse cast of characters — from a stepmother who’s into recreational Botox to a disdainful pug with no name. They’ll borrow shoes and clothes and boyfriends, and eventually make peace with their most intimate enemies — each other.
As Bright As Heaven by Susan Meissner
Genre: Historical Fiction
In 1918, Philadelphia was a city teeming with promise. Even as its young men went off to fight in the Great War, there were opportunities for a fresh start on its cobblestone streets. Into this bustling town, came Pauline Bright and her husband, filled with hope that they could now give their three daughters—Evelyn, Maggie, and Willa—a chance at a better life.
But just months after they arrive, the Spanish Flu reaches the shores of America. As the pandemic claims more than twelve thousand victims in their adopted city, they find their lives left with a world that looks nothing like the one they knew. But even as they lose loved ones, they take in a baby orphaned by the disease who becomes their single source of hope. Amidst the tragedy and challenges, they learn what they cannot live without—and what they are willing to do about it.
2 AM at the Cat’s Pajamas by Marie-Helene Bertino
Genre: Women’s Fiction
An enchanting novel about one day in the lives of three unforgettable characters as they search for love, music, and hope on the snow-covered streets of Philadelphia.
Madeleine Altimari is a smart-mouthed, rebellious nine-year-old who also happens to be an aspiring jazz singer. Still mourning the recent death of her mother, and caring for her grief-stricken father, she doesn’t realize that on the eve of Christmas Eve she is about to have the most extraordinary day—and night—of her life. After bravely facing down mean-spirited classmates and rejection at school, Madeleine doggedly searches for Philadelphia’s legendary jazz club The Cat’s Pajamas, where she’s determined to make her on-stage debut.
On the same day, her fifth-grade teacher Sarina Greene, who’s just moved back to Philly after a divorce, is nervously looking forward to a dinner party that will reunite her with an old high school crush, afraid to hope that sparks might fly again.
And across town at The Cat’s Pajamas, club owner Lorca discovers that his beloved haunt may have to close forever, unless someone can find a way to quickly raise the $30,000 that would save it.
Love Walked In by Marisa De Los Santos
Genre: Women’s Fiction
When Martin Grace enters the hip Philadelphia coffee shop Cornelia Brown manages, her life changes forever. But little does she know that her newfound love is only the harbinger of greater changes to come.
Meanwhile, across town, Clare Hobbs—eleven years old and abandoned by her erratic mother—goes looking for her lost father. She crosses paths with Cornelia while meeting with him at the café, and the two women form an improbable friendship that carries them through the unpredictable currents of love and life.
Designer Dirty Laundry by Diane Vallere
Genre: Cozy Mystery
Worst first day ever.
Ready to redesign her life, style expert Samantha Kidd accepts a job in her Pennsylvania hometown as a trend specialist. But her first day goes completely A-line when she stumbles across her legendary boss dead in the elevator. And after the body disappears, she can’t help but pull on the mystery’s thread and unravel an entire wardrobe of suspects.
Supervising her deceased employer’s vogue competition, Samantha tries to hem in a sexy shoe designer and countless ego-driven creatives to stitch together the clues. But when her own name appears on the police’s suspect list, the sleuthing fashionista’s days on the catwalk could be numbered.
Can Samantha put a killer in the spotlight before she’s sewn up for a crime she didn’t commit?
Mind Your Manors by CeeCee James
Genre: Cozy Mystery
Are small towns the safest place? Or are they the best at covering up unwanted mysteries?
Meet Stella O’Neil, retired FBI agent Oscar O’Neil’s granddaughter. She’s got a lot on her plate, trying to figure out her crazy, stubborn family, the hidden secrets that caused her grandfather’s estrangement from her dad, and starting out as a real estate agent. Throw in a dead body found in what used to be the town’s “royalty” family’s manor, and she’s neck deep in a mystery.
As Stella’s curiosity leads her from one town resident to the next, a dramatic tale of family secrets starts to appear, but is she getting too close to the truth? A scary car chase in the dark has her nerves on edge, but she won’t give up until she finds out who the skeleton once was. She’s so close… but someone… maybe more than one person… will do anything to stop her.
Stella has to solve the murder and figure out the riddle so she can untangle herself from this legal and personal mess… before things go too far.
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