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When thinking of centres of Canadian sophistication, most of us, myself included, would not put Saskatchewan anywhere near the head of the list. But Gail Bowen's Regina is short on grain elevators, wheat fields, and grasshoppers and very long on Kona coffee, biscotti, and extremely expensive champagne. In this eighth outing for Bowen's amateur detective, Joanna Kilbourn, media personality and college professor, preparations are underway for a double celebration--it is almost Christmas and Joanna's best friend, Jill Osiowy, is coming back to Regina to marry the man of her dreams. It will be marriage number three for the groom, Evan MacLeish, whose two prior wives died young and in spectacular fashion. This double tragedy was not altogether unalloyed, however, as MacLeish has produced two remarkable documentaries on their brief lives, films which are the basis for his considerable reputation. The wedding party includes the groom's sister, his second wife's twin sister, his daughter, the best man, Gabe, and Felix, Jill's business partner. Absent is Evan's mother, who never leaves her Toronto mansion. Joanna dislikes most of them on sight and suspects that her friend is making a possibly fatal error. Before the wedding meats are even lukewarm, she is proved correct. Unlike some of the earlier entries in this series, Bowen spends little time on Joanna's life and loves. Instead, she focusses closely on the almost Gothic MacLeish family knot and the result is a tightly-plotted, well-conceived investigation of the deadly results of the intersection of passion, ambition, and self-centredness. Bowen does have a weakness for New Age-y spirituality and inspirational self-help slogans, but she keeps it pretty much under control here and balances the tone with her usual humour. Some may find the perfection of Joanna's children a little hard to swallow, especially in a book devoted to a crime within a supremely dysfunctional family, but many will find them simply charming. For the most part, Bowen sticks to business, and the result is a darker, edgier, and more satisfying novel than some of the earlier ones in the series.
Reviewed by Yvonne Klein, September 2002
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Contact: Yvonne Klein (ymk@reviewingtheevidence.com)
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