Grey Matters — Clea Simon

For Harvard doctoral candidate Dulcie Schwartz, the pressure to finish her thesis is murder -- and so is the body she discovers on the steps of her professor's office. The male victim, a fellow grad student, was a brilliant linguist and charmer who had stolen more than a few ladies' hearts. But now he's dead, and Dulcie's quiet world of academia is rife with mystery, manipulation...and danger.

The clues soon lead Dulcie deeper into her professor's obsessive world and produce an odd list of suspects, at the top of which is the strange man himself. Adding to the puzzle is the curious behavior of his two assistants and a suspicious rare book dealer. With the ghost of her beloved cat, Mr. Grey, offering cryptic messages, Dulcie attempts to piece together the events that led to murder, all the while fighting to keep a grip on her grant money, sanity and life.