Fresh Pick | PLUM PUDDING MURDER by Joanne Fluke

Hannah Swensen #12

October 2009
On Sale: September 29, 2009
256 pages
ISBN: 0758210248
EAN: 9780758210241
Hardcover
$24.00

Mystery Woman Sleuth
Buy at Amazon.com

Plum Pudding Murder by Joanne Fluke

The yuletide season in Lake Eden, Minnesota, guarantees a white Christmas, delectable holiday goodies from Hannah Swensen's bakery, The Cookie Jar—and murder.

As a shadow hangs over her friends' Christmas wedding, Hannah's determined to cook a killer's goose before anyone else gets burned... The Cookie Jar's busiest time of the year also happens to be the most wonderful time...for Christmas cookies, Hannah's own special plum pudding—and romance!

Holiday orders are high, and Hannah's slated to provide dessert at the Reverend Knudsen's upcoming nuptials. She's busy as can be and loving it. She also gets a kick out of “Lunatic Larry Jaeger's Crazy Elf Christmas Tree Lot,” a kitschy carnival taking place smack-dab in the middle of the village green. Larry thinks he's crazy like a fox with his wild business schemes, but this time, the entrepreneur may have bitten off more than he can chew. Rumor has it that Larry's in the red—an idea that takes a sinister turn when Hannah discovers the man himself dead as a doornail in his own office...

It seems quite a few people would have liked to fill Larry's stocking with coal and then bash him with it— including his bitter ex-wife, his ex-partner's daughter, a woman he was wooing, and the Crazy Elf Tree lot's extremely exasperated investors...

Now, with so many suspects to investigate and the twelve days of Christmas ticking away, Hannah's running out of time to nab a murderous Scrooge who doesn't want her to see the New Year...

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Fresh Pick | CREAM PUFF MURDER by Joanne Fluke

Hannah Swensen #11

March 2009
On Sale: March 1, 2009
Featuring: Mike Kingston; Hannah Swensen
288 pages
ISBN: 0758210221
EAN: 9780758210227
Hardcover
$24.00

Mystery Woman Sleuth
Buy at Amazon.com

Cream Puff Murder by Joanne Fluke

Winter in Lake Eden, Minnesota, is the perfect time to curl up by a cozy fire with something-and someone-sweet. But while bakery owner Hannah Swensen can provide herself with the confections, cuddling will have to take a back seat to sleuthing when her sometime-squeeze becomes a murder suspect...

With the launch party of her mother's novel around the corner, Hannah has a dress to fit into and a date with her sister, Andrea, at Lake Eden's new health club, Heavenly Bodies. Dragging herself out of bed on a frigid Minnesota morning for exercise, of all things, is bad enough. Discovering a dead body floating in the gym's jacuzzi? Okay, that's worse. Nor does it help that there's a plate of The Cookie Jar's very own cream puffs garnishing the murder scene. The fact that they were purchased by none other than Hannah's part-time flame, Detective Mike Kingston, is simply the icing on what's shaping up to be one very messy cake...

Mike may be the prime suspect in the murder of man-eating bombshell Ronni Ward, but he's by no means the only one. Ronni, a fitness instructor at both the Sheriff's department and Heavenly Bodies, made a nasty habit of throwing her own heavenly body at every man, eligible or not, who crossed her path. Plenty of Lake Eden's ladies won't miss Ronni, including her ex-fiance's former girlfriend, the angry mother of one of her would-be conquests, and even the mayor's wife. Could any of them have wanted her gone badly enough to make it happen? Mike's recruited Hannah to find out, and, as any suspended, suspected detective would, he's micromanaging her every step of the way...

Between trying to narrow the list of Ronni's enemies down to fewer than half the town'sfemale population and resisting the urge to remove Mike from the running by throttling him herself, Hannah has her plate full. Trouble is, when it comes to cookies-and to murder-there's always room for one more...

Includes 12 original dessert recipes for you to try!

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