Customer Reviews

Deadly Appearances

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4 star:		(1)
3 star:		(1)
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Bowen's book opens with her protagonist's, Joanne Kilbourne's, second tragic and seemingly senseless loss, this time of her close friend, up-and-coming Regina politician Andy Boychuck. Not long before Joanne lost her husband in an apparently unmotivated violent crime and, therefore, Andy Boychuck's murder by poison hits her hard. To make sense of his death she, as a former political speech writer, decides to write his biography. So she dives into Andy Boychuck's life and uncovers an interesting array of secrets in the lives of their mutual friends, associates and acquaintances.

In the course of her investigations she meets a close friend of Andy's whom she feels an affinity to and whom her children also like. She starts feeling that life might be good after all and that there is a chance for happiness for herself.

But then she gets sick. Repeated visits to doctors cannot determine any physical reasons for her illness and she starts wondering whether she might be going mad.

This is as much as I am going to reveal. Gail Bowen's debut novel is one of the best crime novels ever. It features believable, three-dimensional characters the reader learns to care about. Joanne Kilbourne is the mother-next-door and then she is something rather different because she is capable of seeing a thing she believes in through, no matter what (not that most of us are not). Unlike a hero in a movie, she has her self-doubts and bad moments; when a doctor tells her there is nothing wrong with her physically she assumes - like we all would - it's in her head. But she keeps on doing what she feels necessary. Most of all she is a real person. She has a family and is ensconced in a social network - and Bowen lets us into Joanne's thought processes.

The end is logical - and totally unexpected.

I borrowed Deadly Appearances from my local suburban Australian library in early 1999; since then I have bought all her novels to date and I keep scanning magazines for new ones. My mother-in-law borrowed Deadly Appearances in May 2000; since then she has just requested the next one every single time she's finished one. And if they have been translated into German, they'll make a fantastic present for my mother, my sisters and all of my friends.

And next time I go and visit my sister in Toronto I'll make sure to have a stop-over in Regina to tour Bowen-Country.

This is a fantastic first novel! The plot is excellent and will keep you guessing right up until the end. My favourite aspects of all of Bowen's novels are the characters. They are three-dimensional and very easy to care about, especially Joanne.

There are several sub-plots which deal with her family life which add a nice extra 'layer' to the story. This is definitely not a book to be missed. The novels can be read out of order, but you will get the most out of the characters if you begin with this one and go through the series in chronological order.

Joanne Kilbourn is a political science professor and widow of a Canadian politician. After the brutal murder of her husband, she struggles to rebuild her life and raise her three children. Part of her healing process includes working on the campaign of her good friend Andy Boychuck, a rising political star. When he is poisoned at a political rally she decides to write a biography about his life and, of course the secrets she uncovers lead her straight to the murderer. Gail Bowen is one of the premier mystery novelists in Canada and her books have a satisfying blend of character development, description of Canadian life and a puzzle. Several of her books have been made into TV movies in Canada.

I have no idea where or why I might have picked this book up. I suspect that it was a thrift store find; I get a lot of my cozy mystery fixes from thrift stores. It may well be the first Canadian mystery that I have read (at least the first one that made a point of billing itself as a Canadian mystery).

Deadly Appearances (1990) was the first novel featuring Joanne Kilbourne. Kilbourne is a Saskatchewan based widow/mother and political analyst who has the habit of getting involved in mysteries. Classic cozy territory. In this first book, Kilbourne is nearly paralyzed as murder strikes again in her life-- this time taking her long-time friend and candidate of choice, Andy Boychuck. At first it seems incomprehensible that someone would want to harm Andy, but the more that Joanne digs in the layers of his life, the more tragedy she finds. After a time the question is no longer who would want to kill Andy, but who didn't?

For a thrift store buy, the book had some surprisingly strong bits. Bowen has a good feel for the emotional aftermath of tragedy. Joanne is sometimes nearly tragically real. In general, the character moments were very strong.

Unfortunately, her grasp of plot is less stunning. There are holes that you could drive a truck through in relation to the Villain of the Piece. I found the motivations involved implausible (and that's polite) and the methods employed did violence to credulity.

All in all, interesting. I wouldn't mind reading another.