Murder She Baked

When I first started reading Joanne Fluke’s series a few years ago, I had no idea it was being adapted into mystery movies. Imagine my delight in discovering that our HULU live subscription (obtained to watch sports) includes offerings from the Hallmark Channel. You might say a little something for everyone, including my teenage son who is just as likely to watch a Hallmark Christmas movie as he is a football game. Until the Christmas romance watching commences, I’ve been biding my time with the Hannah Swenson mysteries, some of which can be found under the title Murder She Baked. While true to the characters, the movies do change the perpetrators from the books, so no spoil alerts needed if you are watching after reading.

If you do want to read before you watch, this is a post I wrote about the books in 2016.

In the murder mystery series by Fluke, Hannah Swenson owns a bakery in Lake Eden, Minnesota. However, in between baking the next day’s batch of cookies or catering her mother’s Regency Romance club, she has a nasty habit of stumbling upon dead bodies.

Comfort food for the serial reader, this series is predictable in plot (find a body, eat chocolate, go behind boyfriend detective’s back to interview suspects, make a cake, get trapped in a small space with the killer, eat more chocolate).  Swensen’s obsession with new recipes (helpfully printed at the end of each chapter) and the dilemma of which suitor to marry - detective or dentist - is quaintly old-fashioned, in our age of Instagram and Tinder. Also, comforting, once you’re hooked, is knowing that there are 17 or 18 more to read.

And recipes involving double or triple chocolate to try.

"I should have known better than to let myself get swept away"

When a movie comes out on a streaming service we don’t have, I look to see if it was based on a book. So when I saw this trailer, I was excited to find Loveboat, Taipei by Abigail Hing Wen. If you enjoy this one and the second, Loveboat Reunion, you’ll be thrilled to know  Loveboat Forever comes out next week.

In the first book, it’s the end of senior year for Ever Wong. She’s been accepted to a pre-med program at Northwestern. Her parents are ecstatic. Little do they know she’s been secretly applying to dance programs. And little does she know they’ve signed her up for an intensive language and culture program for the summer in Taiwan. In the program, she meets Xavier, the son of a mogul, who would rather be drawing than aspiring to run a company. Other key players (pun intended) are cousins Rick and Sophie. Rick becomes one of Ever’s love interests and Sophie discovers her prowess at social connections can be put to good, after she admittedly does some evil  

Fans of Crazy Rich Asians will find some familiar tropes - social media exchanges, extravagant parties, people who own private jets, and matchmaking schemes. Wen provides plenty of teen angst, over the top drama, and will they/won’t they moments to keep the plot moving.

Turns out they almost always will.