The Last Good Day: a Joanne Kilbourn Mystery (Joanne Kilbourn Mysteries),Used

ReviewThis is a classic whodunit, in which everything from setting to plot to character works beautifully. . . . The Last Good Day is a treat from first page to final paragraph.Globe and MailFrom the Paperback edition.Product DescriptionThe ninth novel of Gail Bowens popular series finds Canadas favourite amateur sleuth, Joanne Kilbourn, on holiday at a cottage borrowed from a lawyer friend, one of a cluster of summer homes owned by lawyers from the same prestigious firm. When one of them kills himself the night after a long talk with Joanne, she is pushed into investigating just what her neighbours are involved with, an investigation that has startling and fatal consequences.Bowens depiction of this community of lawyers, each in his or her way now divorced from the ideals of justice and mercy that once motivated them all, is both compassionate and hardnosed. There is Zack, the charming but controlling paraplegic; Blake and Lily, whose daughter, Gracie, struggles to keep her dignity as her parents marriage falls apart; Noah, who would rather practise carpentry than the law, and his wife, Delia, who is consumed by worry about the firm. The mounting stress among these lawyers is palpable as Joanne delves into their lives. And Joanne faces her own personal anxieties too when she discovers that her former lover, Inspector Alex Kequahtooway, is mixed up in what seems to be some very sordid legal business.From the Inside FlapThe ninth novel of Gail Bowen's popular series finds Canada's favourite amateur sleuth, Joanne Kilbourn, on holiday at a cottage borrowed from a lawyer friend, one of a cluster of summer homes owned by lawyers from the same prestigious firm. When one of them kills himself the night after a long talk with Joanne, she is pushed into investigating just what her neighbours are involved with, an investigation that has startling and fatal consequences.Bowen's depiction of this community of lawyers, each in his or her way now divorced from the ideals of justice and mercy that once motivated them all, is both compassionate and hardnosed. There is Zack, the charming but controlling paraplegic; Blake and Lily, whose daughter, Gracie, struggles to keep her dignity as her parents' marriage falls apart; Noah, who would rather practise carpentry than the law, and his wife, Delia, who is consumed by worry about the firm. The mounting stress among these lawyers is palpable as Joanne delves into their lives. And Joanne faces her own personal anxieties too when she discovers that her former lover, Inspector Alex Kequahtooway, is mixed up in what seems to be some very sordid legal business.About the AuthorWith her Joanne Kilbourn mystery series, Gail Bowen has become a name to reckon with in Canadian mystery letters (Edmonton Journal). The first book in the series, Deadly Appearances, which was published in 1990, was nominated for the W.H. SmithBooks in Canada award for best first novel. It was followed by Murder at the Mendel (1991), The Wandering Soul Murders (1992), A Colder Kind of Death (which won the Arthur Ellis Award for best crime novel of 1995), and A Killing Spring (1996). Gail Bowen is also head of the English Department at the First Nations University of Canada.Excerpt. Reprinted by permission. All rights reserved.CHAPTER 1The cosmos should send forth a sign when a good man approaches death, but the night Chris Altieri joined me in the gazebo to watch the sun set on Lawyers Bay, there was nothing. No fiery letters flaming across the wide prairie sky; no angels with bright hair beckoning from the clouds. The evening was innocent, sweet with summer dreams and the promise of life at a cottage in a season just begun. It was July 1, Canada Day. The lake was full of fish. The paint on the Muskoka chairs was crayon bright; the paddles, sticky with fresh varnish, were on their hooks in the boathouse; and the board games and croquet sets still had all their pieces. September wi