Hannah and Her Sister Are Partners in Crime-Busting in Strawberry Shortcake Murder

Hannah Swensen is a talented baker renowned in the tiny Minnesota town of Lake Eden for her scrumptious cookies. Lately, however, she's getting a reputation for something else: stumbling upon dead bodies. You wouldn't think this would be a frequent occurrence in a quiet place like this, but homicidal urges bubble beneath the surface of several seemingly placid residents.

In Strawberry Shortcake Murder, the second book in Joanne Fluke's series that has grown to include 14 volumes and counting, Hannah's list of discovered victims expands from two to four. While her meddling mother Delores is mortified, Hannah finds in her ensuing investigations a surprisingly fertile opportunity to bond with her sister Andrea, an elegant real estate agent. Andrea's charm and Hannah's cleverness serve them well as they hunt down clues together. On this outing, Andrea and Hannah are definite partners in crime-busting.

This book picks up a thread from the first as it involves Boyd Watson, a coach beloved by the young men he mentors but reviled by Hannah for his abusive treatment of his mousy wife, Danielle. When Boyd winds up dead in his garage, Danielle is the prime suspect, and no one aware of her situation would blame her much for taking a hammer to the head of the guy who was always knocking her around. But she insists she didn't do it. Hannah believes her and worries that with so much circumstantial evidence pointing toward her, the sheriff's department won't try too hard to look elsewhere for a killer. She can't let her friend be falsely charged with murder, even if she gets off lightly because of self-defense.

I like the personal motivation Hannah has for taking on the case this time around, and it's nice to see her becoming closer with her sister, who is the most prominent secondary character in this installment. The book also is a decent showcase for Lisa, Hannah's hard-working assistant at The Cookie Jar, and Norman, the easy-going dentist who is one of Hannah's two love interests. The other, hardened detective Mike, is slightly less involved in the story even though it's his case. That's because, while he seems like a nice enough guy, he's pretty condescending, and he's warned Hannah not to do any amateur sleuthing.

In some ways, this book is quite similar to the first, and Fluke could perhaps have changed things up a bit more. In both, Hannah finds one body early in the book, then another midway through while she's chasing down a lead regarding the first murder. The climax also has striking parallels. Some of the tactics Hannah uses to get information are definitely a little shady, not to mention a bit dangerous. Her instincts are getting better, though; not all of her ideas are very fruitful, but she seems to spend less time chasing false leads on this outing.

This mystery takes place during the week of a bake-off, so in addition to all of Hannah's regular Cookie Jar activities, we get an extra dose of delectable desserts. I also found some of the commentary on the inane banter of evening news personalities to be pretty amusing. While the book is set during December, its central dessert is one I always associate with early summer, and Fluke describes it in great detail, so now I have a major hankering for strawberry shortcake. Of course, since she provides the recipe – along with six others that look nearly as tasty – I might just have to do something about that soon...