"delightful grime cleaning (make that crime cleaning) amateur sleuth."

After she lost her husband to cancer, Sky Taylor left the big city to return home to Pigeon Cove, Massachusetts where she writes a cleaning lips column for the Cape Ann newspaper. She applies those same tips to clean homes, offices and bungalows in the area; because she is such a perfectionist she is in demand. In the time she has lived there she has made friends with Abel Monahan who also has a residence in Florida.

While she is cleaning the hallway outside Abe's room, Sky sees a hand print on the wall she hears his cat screaming. She opens the door and sees his dead body on the floor, blood still dripping from the blow to his head. She doesn't understand why anyone would kill such a dear old man who also cared about her nor does she know why two men staying in Abe's room are giving her the creeps especially or why they are following her around town. The newspaper reporter who has shown interest in her thinks he has answers if she believes him, but believing him will mean she never really knew Abe at all.

Readers will thoroughly enjoy SCENES OF THE GRIME (use the title is humorous), a rich focus on a heroine who compulsively cleans until everything shines. She is a special person and other characters as well as readers sense she is genuine. This is a delightful sassy tale filled with eccentric interesting characters that add to the whodunit. Told from Sky's perspective, readers learn a lot of cleaning tips that are not supposed to be used at a murder scene like she does. Suzanne Price provides a delightful grime cleaning (make that crime cleaning) amateur sleuth.

Harriet Klausner

Reviewed by Harriet Klausner
Posted May 29, 2007

Summary

Cleaning wiz Sky Taylor asserts that "messes are messes, and none are any good." But after inadvertently scrubbing an entire crime scene clean—before anyone even knows there's one to detect—it seems Sky's just created a mess of her own...

In her midthirties and recently widowed, Sky Taylor left the big city to make cozy Pigeon Cover, a hamlet on the northern Massachusetts coast, her permanent home. Nestled among B and Bs and New England pals, Sky is readapting to single life, with her popular newspaper column and her knack for creative cleaning increasingly in demand.

Then she discovers Abel Monahan, a longtime patron of the Millwood Inn, permanently checked out, Dead. And in a town of familiar faces, new comers are sprouting like bad weeds. Now Sky's juggling the police chief's questions with questionable advances from the newest crime reporter in town. But she's got her own scouring to do, uncovering dirty dealings before they leave a permanent ring on her squeaky-clean town....