The Legacy

September 11, 2023
Bowen’s slow-moving latest adventure for retired Canadian professor Joanne Shreve, née Kilbourn (following 2022’s What’s Past Is Prologue) threatens to get overwhelmed by lukewarm family drama. More than 10 years ago, Joanne co-taught a journalism seminar with rising academic star Tom Kelsoe, who was later found guilty of double murder. Joanne’s long-simmering guilt over her failure to prevent Kelsoe’s crimes resurfaces when she’s contacted by Val Masluk, a student from that seminar, who’s just finished writing two books: a roman à clef of the Kelsoe case and a biography of bestselling novelist Steven Brooks, whose daughter is engaged to Joanne’s son. Then a journalist contacts Joanne about an anonymous email he’s received that seems intended to reignite rumors that Brooks’s work is not his own. While she’s investigating those claims, Joanne finds herself with a fresh homicide to solve—and questions about the killing’s potential origins in the Kelsoe case. Bowen lays out her sprawling cast of characters in a four-page guide before the start of the novel, setting the tone for her unnecessarily byzantine plotting, too much of which focuses on the impending wedding between Joanna’s son and Brooks’s daughter. Fans may appreciate the space dedicated to characters’ personal lives, but as a mystery, this flounders.