What Can You Expect From the Della James Mystery Series?

Della James can speak with the dead.

She also wears a rubber tote on her head to keep ghosts out, shares a jar of peanut butter with her dog, tries to convince her mother not to talk about sex cults, and struggles to get her geriatric historical reenactment volunteers to wear underwear.

To help you, dear reader, see if Della’s adventures are what you’re looking for, I’ve put together some comparisons.

The kind of ghostly interactions Della has are not unlike those found in Karen White’s Tradd Street series, but there are true moments of terror a la Simone St. James.

Della is in that sweet, sweet spot of middle age where she’s too young to be a Golden Girl and too old to be a Spice Girl. She’s trying to keep it together like Finlay Donovan, but sometimes she ends up in a social media scandal. It happens.

Della holds a doctorate in history with a specializing in archive management. She knows how to solve a puzzle, and the mysteries she tackles are not unlike those the great Agatha Christie might have rendered. But if you ask Della, she’ll reference Nancy Drew every time.

Della as a character and the mysteries she encounters are important, but so are the things surrounding her story. Those include found family, small town antics, escape to the gorgeous Adirondack mountains of New York, a cast of recurring quirky characters, a lovable dog, and, of course, ghosts.