Vera Wong's Guide to Snooping (on a Dead Man)

Vera Wong’s Guide to Snooping (on a Dead Man) is a 2025 cozy murder mystery by Jesse Q. Sutanto. The sequel to the highly popular Vera Wong’s Unsolicited Advice for Murderers (2022), this novel tracks tea shop owner and amateur sleuth Vera Wong as she stumbles across the mysterious death of social media influencer Xander Lin. When Xander’s body is discovered in San Francisco’s Mission Bay and no one seems to know his true identity, Vera takes it upon herself to uncover the truth, navigating a web of secrets, lies, and unexpected friendships. The book explores themes like The Importance of Community and Found Family, The Need to Empower Older Individuals and Challenge Ageism, and The Clash Between Online Personas and Reality.

Sutanto is the author of several books for children and adults, including Dial A for Aunties, which was named a best book of 2021 by NPR and was optioned by Netflix. She has a Master’s in Creative Writing from Oxford University and currently lives in Jakarta. Her works often feature humor, intergenerational and intercultural conflicts, and feisty female protagonists.

The guide is based on the HQ, Harper Collins 2025 Kindle edition.

Content Warning: The source material and guide feature depictions of gender discrimination, emotional abuse, substance use, death by suicide, physical abuse, graphic violence, bullying, and death.

Plot Summary

Sixty-one-year-old Vera Wong has a bustling, fulfilling life, with an ever-growing circle of family and friends and her cozy, warm teashop in San Francisco’s Chinatown. She is also optimistic about her son Tilly’s relationship with his police officer girlfriend, Selena. However, Vera wants another murder mystery to solve, and she gets her wish in an unexpected way. After Vera is targeted in a credit card scam, she visits a police precinct to meet Selena and file a report. Outside the precinct, Vera spots a nervous young woman and, on a whim, invites her to tea. The woman introduces herself as Millie and explains she wanted to report that her friend Thomas is missing, but she says she lost her nerve. She shows Vera a picture of Thomas, and Vera comments on his good looks. When Vera asks for more details, Millie becomes visibly anxious, so Vera backs off.

Later, while feeding Tilly and Selena’s cat when they are out of town for the weekend, Vera spots a locked briefcase in their bedroom. Suspecting that it contains Selena’s case files, Vera picks the lock with a hairpin. One of the cases is about a suspected suicide by drowning, and Vera is shocked to see that the photo attached is of Millie’s friend Thomas. Vera takes pictures of Thomas’s file and replaces the file in Selena’s briefcase.

Vera invites Millie to her teashop again, and over tea, she gently reveals that Thomas is dead. Through online searches, Vera has also uncovered another secret: Thomas was living under the alias of Xander Lin, a social media influencer who posted images and videos from his seemingly perfect life that included a beautiful girlfriend. Millie is devastated at the news of Thomas’s death and is also shocked that she never knew the full truth of his life. Before she rushes away again in her characteristic nervous manner, Vera promises to help Millie unlock Xander’s secrets.

Unbeknownst to Vera, Millie has a secret of her own. Her real name is Lin Penxi, and she was trafficked from Yunnan, China, when she was 12. She was forced to work on scamming operations from an abandoned warehouse in East Oakland. Her handlers are a married couple she addresses as Mother and Father, and they use violence, threats, and abuse to ensure compliance. After Millie turned 16, Mother gave her a new assignment: Millie was to date men and then dupe them of large sums of money. Millie became close with Thomas, who lived in the room next to hers and was also a trafficking survivor. Millie suspects that Thomas wanted to expose Mother and Father before he disappeared.

Vera begins investigating Xander’s online presence, tracking the people he tagged most often in his posts: Aimes, who posed as Xander’s girlfriend; TJ, his manager; and Qiang Wen, an elderly dumpling shop owner who considers himself Xander’s adoptive grandfather. As Vera questions them, she realizes that none of them truly knew Xander or had a real relationship with him. Aimes reveals that their relationship was staged for content and TJ barely interacted with him offline. As Vera grows closer to Aimes, Qiang Wen, TJ, and his teenage daughter, Robin, she also tries to set up Millie with her adopted nephew, Oliver, who is a writer.

Meanwhile, Aimes shows Vera viral videos of people cooking, and Vera decides to create her own. In the videos, Vera makes tea or prepares delicious food while discussing Xander’s disappearance in a voiceover. Gradually, the videos gain traction, and one night, Vera’s store is vandalized; the perpetrator paints a warning message on her shopfront. In a parallel storyline, Millie and Oliver go out on a few dates, and Millie is devastated when Oliver tells her he only wants a platonic friendship. Millie also senses Mother and Father’s involvement in the act of vandalism on Vera’s tea shop, and fearing for Vera’s safety, decides to distance herself.

Back at the warehouse, Mother and Father punish her for spending too much time with Vera and for failing to successfully target Oliver. They lock her up in her room without food or water and confiscate her phone. Vera texts her, and Mother and Father text back, posing as Millie. Vera can tell the tone of the messages is odd and backs off. Matters escalate when a man sent by Mother and Father throws a brick through Vera’s shop window, and the shattered glass slices her forehead. The man warns her to stop investigating Xander.

Realizing she is in over her head, Vera reaches out to Tilly and Selena for help, telling Selena everything she has learned in her sleuthing so far. Though Vera promises Selena that she will stop investigating, she secretly continues. Vera gathers Aimes, TJ, and other members of her growing chosen family, and with their help, she begins piecing together Millie’s location since she believes that Millie’s safety might be compromised by the same people who targeted Xander. As the group discusses possible clues, Oliver notes that Millie would take a bus to East Oakland, where she presumably lives. Qiang Wen recalls that Xander described living next to an ugly red building. Combining this information, they zero in on Millie’s possible location in the East Oakland area, and Oliver shares the location with Selena. Vera heads to the location herself with the others, though they stay parked at a safe distance.

Locked in the warehouse, Millie writes a letter to Vera confessing everything: her real name, her trafficking history, and her fear of involving the police due to her status as an illegal immigrant. Millie says she finally wants to do the right thing and hopes her letter will find its way to Vera.

As Millie weakens, the police raid the warehouse. Mother and Father are arrested, and the other victims are taken in by the authorities. Millie faints from dehydration, and when she awakens in the hospital, Vera is next to her. Vera says she has read her letter and tells Millie she is part of Vera’s family now, referring to her by her real name, Penxi. Mother and Father have been charged with Xander’s murder. 

As the novel ends, a chapter narrated in Xander’s voice reveals that he was planning to publicly confess that his online persona was a lie and expose Mother and Father’s crimes. Millie is reunited with her parents from China. Selena and Tilly gift Vera a holiday to Paris with her neighbor, Winifred. Vera accepts, dreaming of solving murders in France.