Carrot Cake Murder (Hannah Swenson Mysteries with Recipes)- Hardcover

Filled with juicy scandal, delightfully eccentric characters and 21 tempting recipes from Cream Cheese Frosting to Lemon Fluff Jell-O, bestseller Fluke's 10th Hannah Swenson mystery (after 2007's Key Lime Pie Murder) centers on a family reunion that turns deadly. Hannah's friend Marge Beeseman is thrilled when her brother, Gus Klein, who disappeared from Lake Eden, Minn., more than 30 years earlier, unexpectedly arrives. At the big family party, everyone wonders how the elegant, well-dressed Gus heard about the reunion and why he came back. When Gus fails to show up for the group photo the next morning, Hannah finds his body on a pavilion floor—with ants crawling around pieces of her carrot cake nearby. Hannah's malcontented cat, Moishe, and flickers of romance with her devoted dentist and the no-less attentive local police chief add spice to the subsequent murder investigation. The ending will leave cozy fans gasping for breath. (Mar.)
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Daily life’s many preoccupations engage Hannah Swensen’s attention. And life in Lake Eden, Minnesota, fairly brims with church activities, cooking, family gatherings, and the demands of a mischievous cat. Moreover, Hannah runs a bakery, and her carrot cake is famed across the region. A piece of that cake shows up one day beside the corpse of her business partner’s uncle Gus. It’s up to Hannah to find out who did him in, and her sleuthing techniques are tested to the limit as she discovers many potential killers who each had good reason to want Gus out of the way. Recipes appear throughout the text, tied to plot developments. There’s even a culinary mystery: What’s the secret sauce on those tasty salmon cakes? The popularity of Fluke’s earlier food-focused mysteries will undoubtedly raise demand for this newest title even beyond its expected audience in the Upper Midwest. --Mark Knoblauch