Annie Hardaway is a reluctant expert on house-cleaning, horticulture, and pet care, who specializes in making some of the country's most famous how-to writers look good in print. But when her long-ago high school crush is found dead in their New Jersey shore hometown, Anne has no idea "how-to" find out the truth.

BY WASHING UP ON SHORE. . .

When Tigger Mills returned home to archly conservative devoutly religious Oceanside Heights, no one was happy to see him. Tigger left twenty years ago after being accused of setting fire to an old hotel that killed the owner's little girl. Though the always maintained his innocence, no one believed him--except then teenager Anne Hardaway. After Tigger's lifeless body is pulled form the surf, everyone but Anne assumes it was suicide. Now this woman with a relentless knack for research makes it her mission to tackle the town's closed minds, curious suspicions and ancient lies, to dredge the past and uncover a twenty-year-old motive for present-day murder.