🎧 Listened in audio | 📢 Narrated by Ozzie Jacobs
⏱ Duration: 10 hours | Genre: Cozy Mystery
📅 Pub date: November 3, 2026
ARC by NetGalley
🏷️ Publisher name: Highbridge Audio and Datura Books
Book Blurb:
Keisha Scott has spent months working alongside legendary chef Shirleen Foster, and she is ready to celebrate her boss’s famous twelve Christmas cakes. The night turns sour when Shirleen’s former collaborator and now rival, Ruby Walton, accuses her of stealing recipes. Soon after the argument, Ruby is found dead, and the police arrest Shirleen as the prime suspect. Keisha isn’t convinced. Driven by her love of true crime podcasts and helped by Shirleen’s vexing nephew, Virgil, she sets out to clear her boss’s name. It could be a piece of cake or a recipe for disaster.
Let’s talk … murder!!!
Death by Christmas Cake has a premise I was immediately drawn to: a festive cozy mystery set around a famous chef’s twelve Christmas cakes, with a rival’s accusation and a murder shortly afterward. The storyline has a lot of promise, and the early setup delivers on it.
What worked for me were the characters. Keisha is easy to root for, and her true-crime-podcast-fueled sleuthing gives the investigation energy. The crime itself was compelling, and the case felt intense and absorbing for much of the book.
Where it lost me was the misdirections. There were so many of them that they pulled my attention away from the main thread of the story. The friends and their dinners, the ex-husband, and the child prodigy all felt like detours rather than clues, and I often lost track of where the mystery was actually headed. By the time we reached the solution, it didn’t feel earned, and I wasn’t sold on it.
Ozzie Jacobs’ narration was good. It was clear and easy to listen to over the 10 hours, though not distinctive enough to leave a lasting impression.
Would I recommend it?
Death by Christmas Cake has a strong start and a cast I enjoyed spending ten hours with, but a cluttered middle and an unconvincing ending let it down for me. If you enjoy character-driven cozies with lots of subplots and don’t mind a busy plot, you may get more out of this than I did. It releases November 3, so mark the date in your calendar and add it to your TBR if a festive cozy is on your list.
⭐⭐⭐
5 book recommendations
Murder at the Christmas Cookie Bake-Off by Darci Hannah
If the baking-meets-murder setting is what pulled you in, this Beacon Bakeshop Mystery puts a town-wide holiday bake-off at the center of the case.
A Holiday Homicide by Ellie Alexander
A gingerbread baking competition and a holiday murder in a small town, for readers who want a cozy with plenty of Christmas spirit.
Candy Cane Murder by Joanne Fluke, Laura Levine and Leslie Meier
Three festive whodunits in one book, so you get short, tidy mysteries if the sprawling subplots in Death by Christmas Cake were too much.
Mistletoe Murder by Leslie Meier
A Lucy Stone Christmas mystery, a good pick if you like an amateur sleuth working a case in the middle of holiday chaos.
Hercule Poirot’s Christmas by Agatha Christie
A classic Christmas murder with a houseful of suspects, if you want to see how a crowded cast of possible culprits can work when the clues stay on track.
Slice It Up: Which Misdirection Fooled You?
Have you read Death by Christmas Cake, or is it on your list? Do too many red herrings wear you out in a cozy, or do you want a whole pile of suspects to sort through? Tell me in the comments, and drop your favourite Christmas cozy while you’re there.
Book Links
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Indiebookstores.ca | Bookshop.org | Goodreads | StoryGraph | Pagebound | Fable | Hardcover | Booktrovert
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