cover image A Few Dying Words: A Blackwater Bay Mystery Novel

A Few Dying Words: A Blackwater Bay Mystery Novel

Paula Gosling. Mysterious Press, $18.95 (344pp) ISBN 978-0-89296-510-6

Deft plotting and an appealing cast mark the second in Gosling's series, begun with the The Body in Blackwater Bay , set in a small Great Lakes resort town. While bracing for the Blackwater Bay's annual Howl--a traditional Halloween celebration of carnival rides and pranks--Sheriff Matt Gabriel agrees to meet with clearly agitated retired pharmacist, Tom Finnegan. While driving to the sheriff's office, however, Finnegan is run off the road. Matt reaches the older man's side before he dies and hears him whisper ``not an accident'' along with the name ``Jacky Morgan.'' Aided by his secretary, Tilly Moss, lawyer Dominic Pritchard and reporter Emily Gibbons, Matt learns that Jacky Morgan died during a Howl 30 years earlier when he went over a cliff in a barrel, an event that, ruled an accident, involved a group of the town's most important citizens. Then the subsequent murder of another man involved in Morgan's death impels Matt and his friends to determine which of the remaining participants in the earlier incident might be trying to silence the group. (Aug.)