When the town council hires Chloe Abbington’s close friend, famous wall muralist Lana Easton, to paint a mural advertising the return of the floating amphitheater, not everyone in Whisper Cove is happy about the theater or Lana. Naysayers think the noise from concerts and visitors will disrupt their quiet community. It doesn’t help that a lot of money taken from the town’s budget is being used to pay the muralist for her services. The mood turns even more grim when Lana is found dead, and since Chloe was there alone to discover her body, that makes her the prime suspect.

Before Chloe finds herself painted into a corner as the killer, she and sister Izzie hurry to solve the case and find the real criminal. The suspect list grows to include Lana’s boyfriend and her intern, as well as a couple of local residents. The task is a tall order for the sisters, and it doesn’t help that the detective on the case is someone who doesn’t seem to care for Chloe or her interference. Clues about Lana’s past surface and point to more than one suspect. The challenge will be to decide which one is the real killer.

An old friend of Chloe’s is hired to paint the mural for a new town project. Chloe has not seen Lana for years and is looking forward to catching up but soon after her arrival Lana ends up dead. With Chloe among the suspects - she found the body moments after death - Chloe, her sister Izzie and their employee Willow set out to find the murderer. There are lots of suspects - Nick, Lana’s boyfriend; Audrey, Lana’s protégée; as well as various townspeople who were for or against the new town project.

I really enjoyed the first two entries in this series but this one, which is under a different publisher, seriously needs editing and proofing. There are a few typos, words correctly spelled but not the appropriate word for the sentence (e.g. “road” instead of “rode”); though presumably those will be caught before the book is released. The real problem comes with the continuity issues. We have Chloe deciding to talk to Aunt Constance about zoning issues Brody told her about before the scene the next day where Brody actually tells her about the issues. We have Chloe deciding to talk to Penny about an argument with Wink, then telling Izzie about the argument before the scene where the argument actually happens. We have a scene where Hunter begins to fix lunch for Chloe because she is too shaky to do so for herself and then, after a pointless phone call from a character we presumably got rid of in the last book, we just lose any mention of lunch or Chloe needing to calm down and they both just go off to work. And to cap it off, police show up to the social event, knowing who the murderer is, talk to him at the party but don’t arrest him. 

Overall the story idea was good, but the revelation of the murderer’s identity is pure deus ex machina as up to that point all the suspects are equally viable. I really like the characters and the setting; but, unfortunately, the issues with typos,  continuity and a rushed ending made this a less than enjoyable read. This is truly a shame because Ms Abbott’s series deserves better treatment and after almost a two-year-wait, the readers deserve better as well. ~~ Stephanie L Bannon

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