Dear Cora, Who Moved the Shrubs?

Three boxwoods disappear. By lunchtime, an entire retirement community has theories.Welcome to Sagewind Commons, where retirement comes with golf carts, pickleball, committee sign-up sheets, group texts, strong opinions about mulch-and, apparently, a landscaping crime wave.Jodi thought retirement might finally give her time to write. Instead, three perfectly healthy boxwoods vanish from outside the clubhouse, leaving behind three suspiciously empty circles and a neighborhood full of amateur detectives.Unfortunately, Jodi spent thirty-five years solving problems for a living. Walking away is not one of her strengths.Soon, she and her longtime friend Cora are pulled into an unofficial investigation involving a chewed plant tag, an irrigation flag captured in a watercolor painting, mysteriously relocated plants, doorbell-camera evidence of questionable quality, and a spreadsheet that becomes far more detailed than any shrub-related spreadsheet has a right to be.Everyone has a theory. Everyone knows something. And nearly everyone insists they are not getting involved while standing close enough to hear every word.But as the question shifts from Who moved the shrubs? to Why were they moved?, Jodi and Cora discover that the plants may be carrying more than roots. They carry memories, histories, and reminders of something easily overlooked-not everything that appears old, tired, or past its prime has lost its value.Dear Cora, Who Moved the Shrubs? is a warm, witty, character-driven retirement community mystery about friendship, belonging, purpose, second chapters, and the very human desire to still feel useful, included, and heard.There are no bodies.There are, however, golf carts, dogs, Facebook posts, suspicious mulch, unauthorized landscaping, and a neighborhood with entirely too much time to investigate all of it.Come for the missing shrubs. Stay for the people who refuse to stop growing.