This book actually tells of an event which took place early in Hannah Swensen's cookie-baking career. Hannah and her sisters charge their mom with recreating a Christmas Cake Parade like the one an older lady named Essie discusses. They discover a manuscript written by Essie. Hannah purchases the building which will become the Cookie Jar. We finally reached an "attempted murder" near the end of the book, but most of this is simply back-story. While the descriptions of eating the baked goods is quite good, I'm always frustrated by the "extra comments" in the recipes which make them difficult to use in a real kitchen. As a reader, I wish I'd been alerted in some manner this book, written as the 23rd installment of a series, is chronologically first (or wherever it may actually fall since it's been so long since I read the first installments). I received an advance egalley from the publisher through NetGalley with expectations of an honest review.

This was the first time I read a Hannah Swensen cozy mystery and I was surprised that I enjoyed the book very much!

The Hannah Swenson series is a long running favorite of mine . I have read the entire series and loved it over the years so I was thrilled to receive this for review. Thank you to the publisher and to the author for the opportunity.
This is a fascinating step back in time with Hannah to the beginning of her story. This is before her bakery opens and begins right after the death of her father. Hannah is helping her Mother navigate being a widow and busy trying new and old recipes for her family while they grieve. I enjoyed as always the fantastic recipes and the author has gone to great detail. in each and every recipe.
It is a fun read to step into the Christmas season and a fun Christmas party that Hannah is baking cakes for. The party is for a elderly friend in hospice care and Hannah begins to review her notes on previous parties and timeless recipes Hannah discovers more to her friend then she ever imagined. We learn in this book how her business came to be, how she came to own her condo . I found these details just fascinating and so integral to the series as a fan. There’s a mystery involving a very old manuscript and the sleuth is interesting and kept me guessing. This is a short read but full of fascinating information about the start of the series as well as a great sleuth. It was very refreshing to step back in time and as a long time reader of the series I couldn’t put this book down! Very well done to the author and thank you for this look back on the beginning of such a successful long running series . The Christmas theme and the party was written to perfection with every detail.
Thank you to the author for your efforts in bringing Hannah and her world alive for us .

Dreams of opening her own bakery may have to wait, as Hannah Swensen finds herself tangled up in another mystery, this one with ties to an elderly local resident. Another solid outing from Joanne Fluke and as always, I love the addition of the recipes.

Did you ever wonder how Hannah became the owner of The Cookie Jar? Or what her life was like before she began finding dead bodies? The Christmas Cake Murder has the answers. This is basically a prequel to all the other books. Of course Joanne Fluke has included the recipes that we expect because, truthfully, that's part of the reason her books are so popular. There is a wonderful story within the story too! I did have to adjust somewhat in my expectations because the book does not include Moishe or Andrea's girls or excessive coffee drinking. There is even a scene where tea is offered! (Gasp!) Overall I thoroughly enjoyed the book and recommend the Christmas Cake Murder.
I voluntarily received this book through Netgalley.

This is a prequel of sorts to a looonnng running series and it's short. While I was looking forward to an "origin story" for Hannah to get me back into the swing of the series (which I had stopped reading for a while), I was confused by this. The story is good enough but it is seriously in need of an editor. The writing doesn't flow and there are some odd bits of dialogue. It made me wonder whether this was one of those rejected scripts that gets pulled out of the drawer when the author doesn't have something to fulfill the contract. The pluses include the recipes and the change to see Hannah at the start. Thanks to net galley for the ARC.

Hannah Swensen and her sisters Andrea and Michelle are worried about their mother Delores. Delores is grieving after her husband's death and is withdrawing from everything and everyone she loves. Delores is able to put her grief aside to plan a Christmas Ball in honor of an elderly woman who is beloved in the town of Lake Eden. Hannah is put in charge of baking for the Ball which gives her the confidence to pursue her dream of opening her very own bakery.

This short novel is a prequel that takes place before any of the other Hannah Swensen books, shortly after Hannah's father's death. Hannah has left college after a disastrous romance and is considering making her dream of running a bakery and coffee shop come true in Lake Eden. I enjoyed seeing how Hannah makes her dream a reality. Her mother Delores is surprisingly supportive of Hannah in this installment. This was a nice change because Delores was highly critical of Hannah especially in the earliest books in the series. Hannah works closely with Delores and her sister Michelle in this book and neither Mike, Norman, nor Ross is mentioned at all.

This book is not like others in the series which usually begin with Hannah discovering a dead body and then investigating the murder. The mystery in this book involves Essie Granger, the elderly woman the town is trying to help. Hannah discovers notebooks Essie has written which appears to be an unfinished novel the woman had been writing. Essie writes about an expectant mother who flees New York for Minnesota to protect the life of her unborn baby. The stories give Hannah the information she needs to solve a real mystery that takes place at the Christmas Ball, near the end of the book.

The book is very short and unfortunately the dialog between Hannah and her family is overly stilted and formal. The conversations don't seem natural at all and the awkwardness is hard to read after a while. I've read all of the prior Hannah Swensen books and this is a weak installment in this series, but is okay for a quick, light read for the holidays. The author has included recipes for many of the dishes Hannah describes throughout the book.

I received this book from NetGalley through the courtesy of Kensington Books. The book was provided to me in exchange for an honest review.

A quick, easy read - pre-Cookie Jar and pre-love triangle. No Moishe either! This book takes place soon after Hannah's dad passes away.

Delores is still bossy and the characters still say dumb things and the writing is still clunky. Still, I like these books because they're quick and I love all the descriptions of food.

Thank you, Netgalley, for this arc.

Goodreads review: https://www.goodreads.com/review/show/2524222335

I haven't read any previous book of this series before, and I didn't know what I would encounter, but this was not it. I thought the premise was really interesting and that's a great step to get my attention but when I started reading it took a while for me to start liking the book (a long while).

At 50% I was thinking of giving up, but I really wanted to stick to it and try and finish so I continued, and the ending was much better, I felt like the first half was boring and there was no murder what so ever, but the second half was more intriguing and interesting.

Let's just say that I won't read the previous 22 books and I don't think I'll be reading the next ones that come out, but this was ok and I'm actually glad I decided to try and finish.

And one more thing, if I received 1 euro every time the word "dear" or "mother" showed up then I would be almost rich.

Thank you NetGalley for the advanced copy to read and review. I have read several books in this series and this book continued to be as enjoyable as the rest. These books, while considered mysteries, are very light reading and just an all around pleasant to read. It was nice to see how Hannah came to begin her bakery and it is always a nice touch having the recipes in the book.

If you like Joanne Fluke's Minnesota mysteries, this will be no exception! Really enjoyed this one, and it is good to be able to recommend a title that is holiday themed. Grief and the healing power of community are well explored here, along with the tried and true mystery formula that keeps Ms. Fluke's readers coming back for more!

This is a prequel to the other books in the Hannah Swensen series. The story provides the background to the rest of the novels, telling how Hannah opened her bakery. This needed to be made clearer to the reader at the outset, as it seemed a little confusing to me at first. There was no introduction to let the reader know the date or timing of the story. This would be key for those who have read all the other novels in the series, since this one is out of sequence and almost seemed like an afterthought.

I like her sisters and her mom Delores, but I do not always like Hannah. I also enjoyed the "story within a story" which is a key feature of this novel. As a Christmas cozy, it was a fun read, but the murder happened too late in the story for me to classify it as a murder mystery.

Having read all the other books in the series, I was getting really tired of the love triangle thing. This story does not include that aspect of the novels, thankfully. I do enjoy the recipes, although the "impeccably clean hands" remark got old after awhile. I also skimmed and scanned over the many minute descriptions of how to bake things--I am perfectly capable of reading the recipes myself. I felt like this was filler and the story needed to move forward without the details.

I received this book from NetGalley in exchange for an honest review. The opinions expressed here are entirely my own.

This is my favorite cozy series and this installment doesn’t disappoint! We leave behind the Norman/Mike/Ross drama and are transported back to a Christmas season before Hannah ever opened The Cookie Jar. We learn how her business came to be, how she came to own her condo and more. There’s a mystery involving a very suspenseful manuscript and Hannah is baking up a storm for a Christmas party. It was interesting to go back in time and The story within a story was so riveting I couldn’t put this book down!

Thank you Kensington for the advance copy!

I loved it I really like how she put the recipe in the end of each chapter of the main ones they talked about in each. I couldn't put it down Hannah was my favorite character she really wanted to open up the cookie Jar taken shape! Oh the twist in the story will really have you glued to your seats wanting to know more.. enjoyed....

I cannot say enough how much I loved this book! This was a flashback and I got to see a glimpse of Hannah before the series began. We got to see life with her family when she first came home after the loss of her father and the dream she had of opening the bakery. Like others, I enjoyed the pre-love triangle. I also loved all the yummy recipes, and know I will be making several of these for the holidays this year. I honestly thing this is one of my favorites so far. I always look forward to the holiday books like Christmas, and this was no exception. Now, I cannot wait to read the next in the series coming out in February.

Thank you to the author, publisher, and Netgalley for the honor, and pleasure of reading this ARC. Great job Ms. Fluke, and keep up the good work!

Christmas Cake Murder by Joanne Fluke, thank you Netgalley and the Publishers for allowing me to read this ARC book and give my honest opinion. This is a nice little cozy mystery, what I like is how the recipes are added so you can make them yourself. Interesting and quick read, but did not grip me as much as I had hoped.

As with all the books in the Hannah Swensen Mystery series this story is an easy to read cozy with amazing recipes. This story is a prequel so it dates back before the first 22 books to Hannah's college days. For all the Hannah fans waiting to see what happens after the cliffhanger at the end of book 22 this will be a disappointment since you will not get any answers on the Ross situation. So now we will all need to wait anxiously for book 24.

Joanne Fluke has all but lost me in her last few books. I requested a copy in exchange for my review from NetGalley because it is a Christmas theme cozy which I love. The fact that we see Hannah and her mother and sister without the convoluted love triangle of present is nice. This book goes back many years to the early years of the cookie jar. It’s not as good as her earliest books, but the recipes make the book worth it.

There are plenty of things readers can complain about with this series (the formal dialogue, the fact that Lake Eden is actually in the Land that Time Forgot instead of semi-rural Minnesota, the everlasting love triangle, the list goes on), but if you're still reading the series at this point, it's probably time to accept these things for what they are and move on. Christmas Cake Murder is actually a really fun "prequel" of sorts to the Hannah Swenson series- it takes readers back to the time shortly after her father's death when Hannah has returned to Lake Eden, struggling to help her mother and deciding what to do with her life. We see the seeds of how the Cookie Jar was started, how Hannah's relationships with her mother, sisters, Lisa, and others in the town developed. The story within a story in this book is entertaining. It's really just kind of a feel good, sweet holiday story for longtime fans of Hannah and her community, and it's a lot of fun.

This series is my favorite cozy mystery series, and I was so excited to receive an advance copy from Netgalley! I have read several of the other novels, though not all of them. This one was a little different. It goes way back to when Hannah opened her bakery, so it is a prequel of sorts. I did really enjoy reading about the very beginning of Hannah’s journey. And, as always, the book has several amazing looking recipes. Loved that. I do think this would be a good book to start with if you have never read this series, and fans may enjoy this book, as I did.

I was, however, disappointed in the murder mystery aspect of this book. I read this book on a Kindle and the “murder part” occurred 10 minutes from the end of the book. So if you are looking to read an actual mystery, this falls very short in my opinion.