Cousins Judith and Renie seem to have a knack for having trouble fall into their laps – or their trunks, as the case may be.  The cousins become curious about a local house, unique in its Spanish-style beauty, but getting more rundown as the years go by.  Once they learn the house is indeed inhabited, they decide to investigate a little to learn about the owners. 

Shortly after meeting and interrogating the milkman when he’s delivering to the “mystery” house, Judith does a bit of shopping  and returns to load her groceries into her trunk – to find the corpse of the milkman inside!  Now the cousins are convinced that there’s something sinister about the house, and they won’t stop until they get to the bottom of it. 

Since THIS OLD SOUSE is Mary Daheim’s twentieth bed-and-breakfast mystery, she must have a solid supportive fan base.  Unfortunately, the mystery didn’t appeal to me. From the opening scene, when Judith is scared nearly to death of a six-foot cutout of a germ on her front porch, to the dubitable conclusion, when the “bad guy” confesses in a style straight from a Scooby Doo cartoon, I simply couldn’t buy into any of the story.