Book I
A Deadly Pączek
1 July 2026
The Pączek Lane Mysteries · Book One · July 2026
Marta Kowal
Culinary cozy mysteries from a small town in Poland.
Book One of six.
Released monthly through autumn.
ARC copies available now.
Kindle Unlimited at launch.
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Meet Lena & Pyza
A bakery, a body in the cellar, and a cat with opinions.
Lena Mazur is thirty-four, recently unemployed, and — as of Tuesday — the unexpected owner of her late grandmother's bakery on Pączek Lane. She came to Miłosław for a week. The stone lion in the market square is the most sensible thing she's met here. The dead man in the cellar is the least.
Pyza, the bakery's resident orange cat, has been here longer than any human and disapproves of all of them. She gets the epilogue.
I'd like to say I kept my head when I found him. I didn't. I dropped a tray of unbaked pączki on my foot, which is how I learned that yeast dough, at the wrong moment, makes an excellent cushion and a worse alibi. — From Chapter One
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Book One
A Deadly Pączek
When Lena Mazur inherits her grandmother's bakery in a Polish town she can barely pronounce, she expects dust, paperwork, and perhaps a few stubborn recipes written in Babcia Zofia's spidery hand. She does not expect a body behind the 1920s brick oven, a butcher with too many opinions, or a local police sergeant who takes his coffee the way he takes his suspects: slowly, and with great suspicion.
As the first snow settles on the market square and the stone lion turns silver in the streetlight, Lena discovers that Miłosław keeps its secrets the way it keeps its pastries — warm, layered, and not meant for outsiders. To clear her name, she'll have to learn the town, learn the oven, and learn to trust a cat named Pyza who clearly already knows everything.
The Series
Six mysteries. One small town. One very large cat.
Monthly releases, July–December 2026
Book II
Harvest of Lies
Coming August
Book III
The Baker's Secret
Coming September
Book IV
The Easter Deception
Coming October
Book V
The Summer Recipe
Coming November
Book VI
The Last Recipe
Coming December
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About the Author
Marta Kowal
Marta Kowal writes cozy mysteries set in the small towns of Wielkopolska, the part of western Poland where she spent her childhood summers. When she isn't writing, she's baking — usually badly, occasionally brilliantly — and making notes for the next Pączek Lane mystery.
She lives with too many cookbooks and one opinionated cat.
— Marta
Pączek Lane Post
Letters from Miłosław.
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