Books & Bakes: Murder at the Pumpkin Pageant
For this Books & Bakes, I read Murder at the Pumpkin Pageant by Darci Hannah and baked the Pumpkin Chocolate-Chip Muffins from the included recipes.
Official Description:
It’s Halloween weekend and Beacon Harbor, Michigan, has a packed schedule of events, including the Pumpkin Pageant, featuring humans and their canine counterparts. For treats, there’s plenty of pumpkin goodness from bakery/café owner and local lighthouse resident Lindsey Bakewell. But someone wants to spoil the fun with a deadly trick . . .
Lindsey prefers to keep her bakeshop’s Halloween decor light and autumnal, rather than gruesome and ghoulish. But everyone knows her lighthouse home is haunted. Some intrepid teens have even tried to break in to witness the resident ghost themselves. Dreading Halloween night, Lindsey reluctantly allows her influencer and podcaster best friend, Kennedy, to host a live ghost-hunting investigation in the lighthouse, conducted by a professional team. Protective of her ghost, Lyndsey is understandably nervous about what they might uncover . . .
The segment is uneventful—until things take a terrifying turn. The team freaks out. As Kennedy joins the mad dash outside, she bumps into what looks like the prankster teens’ creepy clown costume hanging from a tree. But when Lindsey’s dog, Wellington, begins to whine, they make a grim discovery: the clown is no dummy. It’s a corpse.
Now Lindsey and company will need to keep their cool if they want a ghost of a chance to solve the murder—and see another Halloween . . .
Books & Bakes
I really loved Murder at the Beacon Bakeshop, so I was excited to read more in this cozy series. I loved following Lindsey as she opened her bakery (and this might have sent down a rabbit hole of searching for abandoned lighthouses I could dream of converting...) Her giant goofball dog Wellington was a delight. I liked the hunky love interest, potential haunting, and the mystery.
I jumped from book 1 to 4 in the series because I wanted a Halloween read, but I think everything made sense. There were more characters than I had originally met, but this is a series that you can read out of order.
This was the perfect October TREAT and I plan on going back to to read the rest of the books in the series.
The Halloween theme was prevalent throughout the whole book, which made it great for the season. There were lots of costumes (including for the animals!), pumpkins, and delicious fall treats throughout the pages. However, what really made it pop was that ghost hunters were visiting the lighthouse for their reality TV show to see if it truly is haunted.
It was fun to see how all the characters, including the departed Captain Willy, handled the supernatural investigators.
Then, because of how eerily the ghost hunting paired with a murder in town, it became a case that felt personal for Lindsey and her friends.
I enjoyed following all the clues, (I’ll pat myself on the back for being rightly suspicious of the proper person) and how it played out was extremely exciting.
This is a fantastically fun Halloween read!
The only warning I’ll add is that there were moments that made you worry about the canine characters. I think I was a bit overly emotional because my fur baby had just passed, but I thought it was worth noting in case you are in a similar boat where this might cause you stress.
The baking was also a joy! Admittedly, I picked what I thought would be an easy recipe from the book, but there were no TRICKS.
I selected the Pumpkin Chocolate-Chip Muffins. It doesn’t require any crazy ingredients - as long as you can get some pumpkin puree and pumpkin spice from your autumn cupboard. The instructions were clear and easy to navigate.
The only difference was that I ended up with more muffins than it suggested so this makes me think my muffin tins are not full-sized.
They tasted delicious and they were thoroughly enjoyed by my family and friends!
Overall, this was a fantastic Halloween cozy mystery read and a delicious autumn snack!
