Take another lively food-filled murderous trip to Lake Eden in the 29th Hannah Swensen mystery, PINK LEMONADE CAKE MURDER. When a former major league baseball player returns to town for the Summer Solstice Parade and Baseball Tournament, he ruffles a few feathers and stirs up some old feuds.  When No-No Fulton is found dead under the bleachers, Hannah’s mother becomes the prime suspect and Hannah is hot on the case.

Detective Mike is burned out from his last case and Hannah takes the lead on finding No-No’s killer. Delores carried a grudge against No-No for humiliating her at a dunk-tank event and threatened to get even with the retired ball player. Now that No-No is dead, Delores becomes (kind of) the prime suspect, but Hannah knows her mother is innocent. With the help of Norman and the residents of Lake Eden, Hannah starts gathering information. Everyone saw No-No driving his flashy convertible in the parade with three teenage girls on the back. This angered some parents and one particular boyfriend. Could one of them be the killer? There’s also Zack Edwards, a ball player whose career ended on a sour note after No-No hit him in the elbow with a pitch, and rumors of illegal sports betting. With all the plausible suspects and motives, Hannah has plenty of baking and sleuthing to do, before a killer makes his final play.

The Hannah Swensen mysteries is a long-running fan-favorite series. There’s joy in revisiting Lake Eden and catching up with the locals as well as trying new innovative recipes that Hannah creates. The gang is all here with a new mystery to solve and plenty of delicious food. PINK LEMONADE CAKE MURDER will delight long-time fans, however, there are some flaws in this particular mystery that stand out. The shaming of the teenage girls who engage in a pretty mild reckless act and Delores’s outrage over a dunk tank incident is overdone and unwarranted. Hannah leading the investigation, while law enforcement sits back, doesn’t make much sense either and the end-of-book cliffhanger comes out of left field and is jarring. As a long-time reader of the series, I enjoyed reconnecting with Hannah and her friends, but the mystery is just not at the same level as previous installments in the series.