The Secret in the Sampler: A Plain Truth Mystery
Amish Adjacent Cozy Mystery with Slow-Burn Romance
1st in Series
Setting – Ohio
Publisher ‏ : ‎ Plain Truth Press
Publication date ‏ : ‎ May 31, 2026
Print length ‏ : ‎ 358 pages

Synopsis

What would you do if the family heirloom hidden in your aunt’s estate could expose a stolen inheritance—and make you the next person someone needs silenced?

Two years after losing her husband, Nora Bell returns to the quiet Ohio Amish-country town of Briar Creek to settle her late aunt’s estate. She expects dusty type drawers, unpaid bills, and enough sympathy casseroles to survive a minor siege. Reopening The Bell & Quill, Aunt Lenora’s old letterpress and stationery shop, is supposed to be a temporary project—not the beginning of an entirely new life.

Then Nora discovers an antique hand-stitched sampler concealed inside a cedar trunk.

Its mismatched initials, reversed border, and nearly invisible name suggest that the sampler is more than a family keepsake. It may be the only surviving record of a child erased from Briar Creek’s history—and an inheritance quietly stolen decades ago.

Before Nora can uncover what her aunt knew, a local estate appraiser is found dead. He had been asking questions about the sampler, searching for a missing auction ledger, and meeting privately with someone determined to keep an old land transfer from being examined too closely.

Now Nora is following a trail of altered records, old letters, disputed property, and carefully guarded family secrets. Her unexpected ally is Eli Yoder, a reserved Amish widower and auction clerk who knows Briar Creek’s family histories almost as well as he knows when people are refusing to tell the truth.

Eli’s dry humor and steady presence make him useful. The grief he recognizes in Nora makes him dangerous in an entirely different way.

As suspicion spreads through the Amish farms, antique shops, auction houses, and polished tourist businesses surrounding Briar Creek, Nora realizes the sampler does not simply reveal what happened in the past. It threatens someone’s money, reputation, and future.

And the person who killed to keep its secret hidden may already know Nora has begun to unravel the pattern.

Readers will discover:

• A clever, emotionally grounded amateur sleuth whose knowledge of printing, paper, handwriting, and design helps her notice what others overlook.
• An atmospheric Amish-country setting filled with rural roads, estate auctions, quilt work, family businesses, and small-town secrets.
• A layered, low-gore cozy mystery involving an antique sampler, a hidden heir, altered records, and a disputed inheritance.
• A clean, chaste slow-burn romance between two widowed people rebuilding their lives through trust rather than instant attraction.
• Warm community characters and lightly witty dialogue without turning the mystery into slapstick.
• A satisfying standalone investigation that opens the door to more secrets from The Bell & Quill.

The Secret in the Sampler is the first novel in The Plain Truth Mysteries, a gentle Amish-adjacent cozy mystery series about old objects, hidden histories, rural grudges, and the truths people leave behind on paper and cloth.

Perfect for fans of Amanda Flower’s Assaulted Caramel, Laura Bradford’s Hearse and Buggy, and Vannetta Chapman’s Falling to Pieces.

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Guest Post

Coming Back to Briar Creek

Returning to Briar Creek was not like coming home.

People use that phrase too easily. Homecoming suggests recognition, relief, and perhaps someone waiting on the porch with the proper key. I arrived with Aunt Lenora’s estate papers, several boxes I had not packed carefully enough, and the vague intention of leaving again once everything had been sorted.

Briar Creek had other plans.

I remembered the town from childhood visits, but memory is an unreliable guide. The Main Street of my recollection had been smaller, brighter, and largely organized around Aunt Lenora buying me a pastry after I promised not to touch the type cases. The adult version included empty storefronts, newer tourist businesses, muddy buggy tracks, and people who knew exactly who I was before I introduced myself.

That required adjustment.

In Columbus, a person could enter a store, purchase something, and leave without discussing her aunt’s health twenty years earlier. In Briar Creek, my return was community information. By the end of my first morning, Maeve Hartley knew I had unlocked The Bell & Quill, insulted the fern in the front window, and failed to eat a proper breakfast.

Maeve owns Hartley House Bed-and-Breakfast and practices hospitality with the strategic precision of a military operation. She brings food when people say they do not need it, asks questions while appearing to discuss the weather, and has never encountered a private matter she could not approach through baked goods.

I found her interference irritating.

I also stayed at her inn while the apartment above the shop was being repaired, ate the meals she placed in front of me, and eventually learned that some forms of intrusion are simply concern wearing an apron.

The Amish families surrounding Briar Creek were more difficult for me to understand at first, largely because I had arrived with the usual assortment of assumptions carried by people who live nearby without truly belonging.

I knew enough not to treat the Amish community as scenery. I also knew enough to recognize that knowing this did not make me knowledgeable.

Eli Yoder became my most patient guide, although he would object to the word guide. Eli is an auction clerk and estate-sale specialist who knows which family once owned a farm, which objects changed hands during an old sale, and which disagreements have been maintained so politely that outsiders assume they ended years ago.

He rarely explains more than he believes necessary.

I often believe more is necessary.

This has led to discussions.

What I gradually learned is that Briar Creek’s quietness does not mean nothing is happening. It usually means people are watching, remembering, and deciding whether you have earned the right to be told.

The Englisch residents operate differently, but not necessarily more openly. They may speak faster and use fewer pauses, yet information still travels through particular channels: the bakery, Hartley House, the historical society, church activities, auction previews, and any place where two people can stand near a pie without appearing to gossip.

There were moments when I felt thoroughly unwelcome. Some people remembered Aunt Lenora as a trusted keeper of private business and viewed me as an outsider rummaging through records I did not understand. Others resented that I had inherited The Bell & Quill without having lived in Briar Creek for years. A few seemed to believe widowhood should have made me quieter, more grateful, and less likely to ask direct questions.

They were disappointed.

There were kinder experiences too, though kindness in Briar Creek is rarely announced.

A farmer repaired a loose step behind the shop and left before I could pay him. Someone delivered firewood during a cold spell without signing the note. Amish women trusted me with memorial cards, wedding invitations, and family names that had to be printed exactly right. Customers began bringing me old papers and asking whether the ink, type, or date looked wrong.

The Bell & Quill gave me a place in town before I was ready to admit I wanted one.

People came through its door needing auction bills, labels, stationery, funeral cards, or help identifying something found in a drawer. They also came because Aunt Lenora had listened to them, and they wanted to know whether I might do the same.

I am not Aunt Lenora. That became one of the first useful things I understood.

She had decades of local history stored in her memory. I had questions, a graphic designer’s eye, and a tendency to notice when a person answered something other than what I had asked. It was not the same kind of knowledge, but it became useful.

Living in Briar Creek taught me that belonging is not a warm feeling delivered all at once. It is repetition.

You open the shop in bad weather. You remember the correct spelling of a family name. You attend the benefit auction. You refuse to turn someone’s private pain into public entertainment. You show up again after an argument.

Eventually, people stop asking how long you intend to stay.

Then one day, without warning, you realize you have stopped asking yourself.

Excerpt

Vernon turned back to her. “I understand there was a cedar trunk among the items.”

“There is a cedar trunk listed.”

“May I see it?”

“It’s on the platform.”

“I mean the contents.”

“The contents are under review.”

“By you?”

“Yes. That is what inheritance generally means.”

He smiled again, but this time it did not warm. “Of course. Your aunt had shown me certain pieces before she passed. I would hate for something valuable to be overlooked.”

Nora’s hand tightened around the coffee cup. “Which pieces?”

“A few linens. Some printed ephemera. A trunk lot.” His gaze flicked down toward her satchel. “Possibly a small stitched piece.”

Maeve’s eyes moved to Nora’s satchel, then away quickly.

Nora hoped Vernon did not catch it.

Naturally, he did.

“Do you have it with you?” he asked.

“Have what?”

“A sampler.”

The word made the damp air feel suddenly colder.

Nora kept her expression mild. She had learned from Aunt Lenora that the best way to annoy an intrusive person was not to look annoyed. It forced them to wonder whether they had failed.

“I don’t believe I mentioned a sampler,” she said.

“No, but Lenora did.”

“Did she?”

“Briefly.”

“When?”

“A few weeks ago.”

Maeve looked at him. “That is curious. Lenora did not mention it to me.”

“I cannot account for whom Lenora chose to trust.”

The sentence should have been harmless. It was not.

Nora set her coffee on the table. “What exactly did my aunt ask you?”

“Whether I had seen similar work. Whether certain motifs carried family significance. Whether there might be market interest if it proved connected to a known maker.”

“You remember all that from a brief mention?”

“I have an excellent memory for valuable things.”

“How comforting.”

His eyes gleamed. “May I see it?”

“No.”

Maeve’s eyebrows lifted. Vernon’s smile faltered by the width of a thread.

“No?” he repeated.

“No, thank you.”

“That is not quite the usual response to a professional appraisal.”

“I’m not having it appraised.”

“Then you may not know what you have.”

“I’ve found ignorance can be corrected more easily than regret.”

From behind Vernon, Eli approached, his hat in one hand, his expression unreadable. “Vernon.”

“Eli.” Vernon sounded amused. “I see Mrs. Bell has acquired counsel.”

“I was already standing nearby.”

“A convenient habit of yours.”

Nora looked from one man to the other. “Does everyone in this town speak in quilting patterns?”

Maeve answered at once. “Only when lying would be too obvious.”

Eli’s eyes flicked toward Nora, and for the first time that morning, she saw amusement break through his reserve. It was brief. It was also unfortunately attractive, in the way competence sometimes became when a person was tired and undercaffeinated.

Vernon noticed that too.

He noticed far too much.

“I am only offering assistance,” Vernon said. “A sampler can be difficult to place. Especially one with an old Keim border.”

Nora went still.

Eli did too.

Vernon’s smile remained, but it changed. He knew. He knew he had said too much.

Nora’s voice came out calm. “What did you say?”

“Keim border. A common regional term.”

“Common enough that you recognized it without seeing the sampler?”

He spread his hands. “Lenora described it.”

“No,” Nora said. “She didn’t.”

It was a guess. A bold one. An invitation for him to correct her.

He did not.

Eli’s gaze lowered for a moment, then returned to Vernon. “You have seen it.”

Vernon’s face tightened. “I have seen many samplers.”

“That one,” Eli said.

The quiet words did more than an accusation would have. Vernon’s gloved fingers flexed once.

Maeve stepped in lightly, which for Maeve meant with the tactical grace of a woman moving a knife behind a cake plate. “Mr. Pike, I believe Gideon is calling for you near the office. Something about a reserve price.”

Vernon looked at her. “Is he?”

“He will be once I tell him to.”

For a moment, no one spoke.

Then Vernon laughed.

“You are formidable, Maeve.”

“Intermittently.”

He turned back to Nora. “Mrs. Bell, do be careful. Sentimental objects have a way of making people irrational.”

“I thought valuable things did that.”

His smile faded completely.

Then it returned, thinner and brighter. “Sometimes both.”

About the Author

Abigail B. Hartwell writes gentle Amish-adjacent cozy mysteries rooted in the small towns and wooded backroads of east-central Ohio. Though she is not Amish, she lives near Amish communities and draws inspiration from the region’s quiet rhythms, close-knit families, old stories, and rural traditions. She shares a modest home on five wooded acres with her long-haul truck driver husband. They have two grown daughters and three grandchildren. When she is not writing, Abigail enjoys church activities, family time, and the peaceful beauty of the Ohio countryside.

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