Author Bellamy Rose on the precarious intersection of murder-mystery and rom-com

Bellamy Rose. // photo credit Madeline Bohrer

Way back in March, Atria/Emily Bestler Books released Bellamy Rose’s Pomona Afton Can So Solve a Murder, the story of a spoiled heiress who “must investigate her grandmother’s death in order to gain back her trust fund, all while discovering how to be her own person and maybe even falling in love.”

While maybe not anywhere in our usual literary wheelhouse, if you pitch a book as being “perfect for fans of Only Murders in the Building” and release it dead-smack in a break between seasons, we’ll jump into reading it like a drowning person finding a lifeboat.

Suffice to say, Rose’s knack for clever dialogue and a mystery which kept us guessing until the final chapters made for a lovely weekend absolutely devouring Pomona’s misadventures navigating the world like everyone else whose families don’t own a hotel chain. Additionally, Pomona Afton Can So Solve a Murder is just as much a look at the haves and the have-nots as it is a murder mystery meets rom-com, meaning that–depending on one’s stance on capitalism–the reader can find joy in watching Pomona flounder without her money and/or seeing her grow as a person.

Pomona Afton Can So Solve a Murder comes out in trade paperback on Tuesday, January 20, and its sequel, Pomona Afton Can Totally Catch a Killer, wherein Pom throws a gala for her fledgling non-profit and “one of her biggest donors is found dead, threatening her charity and putting a strain on her romantic life,” is due out April 14.

We got an advance of the upcoming sequel and reached out to Bellamy Rose via email to ask her about everything Pomona Afton.

The Pitch: There seem to be a few inspirations we can guess at, but where did the character of Pomona Afton come from?

Bellamy Rose: Basically, the character of Pomona started out with, “What if Paris Hilton lost everything and had to solve a murder to get it all back?” When I was growing up, everybody stereotyped Paris Hilton as this dumb blonde trust fund baby who didn’t know how to work hard, but over the years, she’s proven that she’s so much smarter and savvier than the public persona she put on, and I wanted to show that duality in a character. Obviously the character of Pomona went through a lot of development and work to the point where she is her own person, but that was the basic first inspiration.

What sort of research did you need to do in order to portray the world in which Pomona lives?

I’m actually the heiress to a great fortune myself, so I didn’t have to do any… just kidding (if only!). Lots of reading and watching things set in that rarified world.

Why work under a different name to write these books?

I also write rom-coms and romance under the name Amanda Elliot. I wanted to keep the two genres separate and make sure readers knew what would be coming in a particular book, since the Pomona books do also have many elements of a rom-com. I didn’t want a reader expecting only a feel-good romance to find themselves facing a murder!

The first book is very much a murder mystery rom-com. How was the experience of blending these two genres?

It was a lot of fun! Both genres make your heart pound in different ways, and I think they naturally go together.

Given the first book is very much about seeing things through the eyes of Pomona as she struggles to adapt to a new world, how did you expand the story without that struggle driving it in the upcoming sequel?

Pomona changed a lot after the first book, but now she’s back in her old glamorous world with all the temptations of her former life before her. I wanted to explore how Pom would balance the desire to hold onto everything she’d learned in the outside world with the ease of melting back into her old life, and how she would manage the pressure from her old friends and family to go back to her old self.

When you started the first book, did you intend it to have a sequel? Also, do you have future adventures planned for Pomona?

Yes, I had planned on a sequel, though I didn’t know at the time exactly what it would be – it was a lot of fun figuring that out. I would love to keep writing about Pomona!

What other projects do you have planned for 2026?

My alter ego (aka romance pen name) Amanda Elliot has a new book coming out in October. Called Eight Ways to Say I Love You, it follows childhood friends who reunite each year during the winter holidays at their family’s homes and the ways they grow, change, and fall in love over the course of eight years.

Pomona Afton Can So Solve a Murder is out now in hardcover and comes out in trade paperback on Tuesday, January 20, from Atria/Emily Bestler Books. Pomona Afton Can Totally Catch a Killer is due out April 14.