Audiobooks by Gail Bowen

From the "Queen of Canadian crime fiction" (Winnipeg Free Press) comes the 16th instalment of the much-loved Joanne Kilbourn series. The latest novel in the Joanne Kilbourn Shreve series opens in the month of May, a time of beginnings when all things seem possible. Joanne's husband, Zack, recently elected mayor of Regina, is optimistic that he can garner the public support necessary to make Regina a city that works - not just for the few, but for the many. Their oldest son Peter is marrying Maisie Crawford, a woman as clever and forthright as she is lovely. Their lakeside wedding is a dream come true, but when a former lover of a member of the bridal party shows up, the dream becomes a nightmare. Before the bride's bouquet has wilted, there's an act of sickening cruelty; soon afterwards, there's a murder. Devastated, Joanne and Zack search for answers. As it becomes increasingly unclear whether political agendas, shattered romance, or a secret buried deep in the past have motivated the crimes, the loyalties of the Shreve family are tested. A gripping mystery with a social conscience, this is a novel of high stakes and innocence lost. Bespeak Audio Editions brings Canadian voices to the world with audiobook editions of some of the country's greatest works of literature, performed by Canadian actors.

Gail Bowen (Author), Athena Karkanis (Narrator)

Audiobook

The Winners' Circle

Book 17 of the nationally bestselling Joanne Kilbourn series is classic Gail Bowen: masterfully compelling storytelling that combines a modern, urban family with a gripping, satisfying mystery. As Joanne Kilbourn-Shreve, her husband, Zack, and their soon-to-be seventeen-year-old daughter, Taylor, rush through the rain from their cottage to their car, the Thanksgiving weekend they just spent at the lake with Zack's law partners is already slipping away, burnished into memory as pleasantly as the hundreds of other weekends the Falconer-Shreve families have shared at Lawyers' Bay. Thoughts of the weekend past will now focus on the future and be prefaced by the words "next time." Within weeks, a triple homicide will rip apart the lives of those related to the lawyers who, at the end of their first year in law school, only half-jokingly styled themselves "The Winners' Circle." Dazed by grief, Joanne will seek answers to an impossible question: "Why did they die?" The facts behind the suicide of Christopher Altieri, known by his law partners as "the conscience of The Winners' Circle," appear to provide insights, but for Joanne those insights raise new, unsettling questions. Knitting this powerful narrative together is Joanne's unshakeable belief that the only thing worse than knowing is not knowing. Bespeak Audio Editions brings Canadian voices to the world with audiobook editions of some of the country's greatest works of literature, performed by Canadian actors.

Gail Bowen (Author), Athena Karkanis (Narrator)

Audiobook

12 Rose Street: A Joanne Kilbourn Mystery

The indomitable Joanne Kilbourn is back! From beloved author Gail Bowen comes the 15th installment in the nationally bestselling series. For readers of Louise Penny, Ruth Rendell, and Peter Robinson. Joanne's husband Zack is the leading progressive candidate in a neck-and-neck race, with the existing mayor, for Regina's top job. The tough campaigning is well underway when a disturbing threat disrupts the celebration for the opening of the Racette-Hunter Centre - a project Zack has been spearheading, intended to benefit the impoverished community of North Central Regina. Joanne soon realizes that sinister interests are working behind the scenes of the election, and another savage act makes clear that someone will stop at nothing to maintain the status quo. The Shreve campaign perseveres, but when Zack's opponents share some shocking information about the past, the revelation sends Joanne reeling. As tensions around the election build, Joanne tries to hold herself together, keep her family intact, and get to the bottom of why a series of violent incidents, seemingly related to the mayoral race, all lead back to a mysterious property in North Central, 12 Rose Street. A gripping novel about family and friendship, competition and betrayal, 12 Rose Street confirms why Gail Bowen is indeed the "queen of Canadian crime fiction" (Winnipeg Free Press).

Gail Bowen (Author), Athena Karkanis (Narrator)

Audiobook

An Image in the Lake: A Joanne Kilbourn Mystery

From Arthur Ellis Award-winning, Grand Master of Crime Writers, and "the queen of Canadian crime fiction" (Winnipeg Free Press) comes the newest installment in the Joanne Kilbourn series A dark secret threatens the future of the Shreve family It's August 24 and Joanne Shreve and her husband, Zack, are savoring the last lazy days of summer and looking forward to the birth of a new grandchild; involvement in the campaign of Ali Janvier, a gifted politician with a solid chance of becoming the province's next premier; and the debut of Sisters and Strangers, the six-part series Joanne co-wrote that focuses on her early life. The series is the flagship of a new slate of programming, and MediaNation is counting on a big return. Joanne and Zack's stake in the series's success is personal. Their daughter, Taylor, is in a relationship with one of the show's stars, and Vale Frazier is already like family to them. It seems the "season of mist and mellow fruitfulness" will be a bountiful one for the Shreves. But when a charismatic young woman wearing a grief amulet that contains a lock of her dead brother's hair and a dark secret becomes part of their lives, the success of Sisters and Strangers and the future of Taylor and Vale's relationship are jeopardized, and only Joanne and Zack can put an end to the threat.

Gail Bowen (Author), Athena Karkanis (Narrator)

Audiobook

A Killing Spring: A Joanne Kilbourn Mystery

Gail Bowen, winner of the 1995 Arthur Ellis Award for best crime novel for her last Joanne Kilbourn mystery, "A Colder Kind of Death", is back - with her most daring mystery to date. In the horrifying opening paragraph of "A Killing Spring", Reed Gallagher, the head of the School of Journalism at the university where Joanne Kilbourn teaches, is found dead in a seedy rooming house. He is dressed in women's lingerie, with an electric cord around his neck. Suicide, the police say. A clear case of accidental suicide. But for Joanne, who takes on the thankless task of breaking the news to Gallagher's wife, this death is just the first in a series of misfortunes that rock her life, both professional and personal. A few days after Gallagher's death, the School of Journalism is vandalized - its offices and computers are trashed, and homophobic graffiti are sprayed everywhere. Then an unattractive and unpopular journalism student in Joanne's politics class stops coming to school after complaining to an unbelieving Joanne that she's being sexually harassed. Clearly, all is not as well at the university as Joanne had thought. Nor is all well in her love life after the casual racism of a stranger drives a wedge between Joanne and her lover, Inspector Alex Kequahtooway. To make matters worse, Joanne is unceremoniously fired by her best friend from the weekly political panel on Nation tv, which she's being doing for years. Badly shaken by these calamities, Joanne struggles to carry cheerfully on. Action, she knows, is better for her than moping. She decides to find out why her student has stopped coming to class, and in doing so, Joanne steps unknowingly into an on-campus world of fear and deceit and murder.

Gail Bowen (Author), Lisa Bunting (Narrator)

Audiobook

One Fine Day You're Gonna Die: Book #2 of the Charlie D. Series

Charlie D is back doing his late-night radio call-in show. It's Halloween-The Day of the Dead. Not a day filled with good memories for Charlie, but the show must go on. His studio guest this evening is Dr. Robin Harris, an arrogant and ambitious "expert in the arts of dying and grieving," who also seems to be auditioning for her own radio talk show. Charlie and Dr. Harris do not hit it off. Things go from bad to worse when the doctor's ex-lover, Gabe, goes on air to announce that he's about to end his life. Dr. Harris is entirely unsympathetic until she learns that Gabe also has her daughter Kali and plans to poison her too. It will take all of Charlie D's on-air skills to save both Gabe and Kali.

Gail Bowen (Author), Daniel Maté (Narrator)

Audiobook

The Unlocking Season: A Joanne Kilbourn Mystery

Arthur Ellis Award-winning author Grand Master Award of Crime Writers of Canada (2018) The "queen of Canadian crime fiction" (Winnipeg Free Press) returns with a new installment in the Joanne Kilbourn series that is perfect for readers of Louise Penny, Ruth Rendell, and Peter Robinson. On a Saturday bright with harbingers of spring, Joanne Kilbourn-Shreve, her husband, Zack, and their family prepare to celebrate the season. Joanne's life is full, and at 60, she has been given the chance to understand a part of her history that for years was shrouded in secrecy. Living Skies is producing Sisters and Strangers, a six-part TV series about the tangled relationships between the families of Douglas Ellard, the father who raised Joanne, and Desmond Love, her biological father. Joanne is working on the script with Roy Brodnitz, a brilliant writer and friend. The project's future seems assured, but before the script is completed, Brodnitz disappears while scouting locations in northern Saskatchewan. Hours later, he's found - sweat-drenched, clawing at the ground, and muttering gibberish. He dies in a state of mortal terror. Heartsick and perplexed, Joanne resolves to learn what happened in the last hours of Roy's life. What Joanne discovers threatens Brodnitz's legacy, and the decision about whether or not to reveal the truth is hers to make. The Unlocking Season is another deeply satisfying and thought-provoking novel from one of Canada's finest crime writers.

Gail Bowen (Author), Athena Karkanis (Narrator)

Audiobook

Wandering Soul Murderers: A Joanne Kilbourne Mystery

Canadian Bowen's latest, after Love and Murder, is a harrowing look at the difficulties faced by those trying to break away from the effects of an abusive childhood. University instructor Joanne Kilbourn is horrified when her grown daughter Mieka finds the body of Bernice, a teenaged office cleaner, hanging out of a dumpster. Although it looks as though Bernice is another victim in a series of prostitute killings, significant details-including a teddy bear tattoo on the girl's buttocks-persuade police that it is a copycat murder. Concurrently, Mieka prepares for her wedding and Jo's son Peter is pursued by obsessive Christy Sinclair. When Christy becomes an apparent suicide, Jo is surprised to find herself listed as Christy's next of kin; then she learns that Christy also had a teddy bear tattoo. Investigating both deaths, Jo and her TV news director friend Jill run up against an unsavory secret being kept on an island in the northern Canadian woods. This poignant story exposes the danger that can hide in good intentions as Jo's efforts uncover the surprising identity of a sex ring's mastermind and put her young adopted daughter Taylor in danger. Copyright 1994 Reed Business Information, Inc.

Gail Bowen (Author), Lisa Bunting (Narrator)

Audiobook

A Colder Kind of Death: A Joanne Kilbourne Mystery

When a prisoner is shot to death in the exercise yard of a Saskatchewan penitentiary, Joanne Kilbourn finds herself haunted by a part of her past she wished had never happened. The dead prisoner is Kevin Tarpley, the man who six years earlier had brutally killed her politician husband, Ian, in a seemingly senseless act alongside the TransCanada Highway. The haunting takes on a more menacing cast several days later when Tarpley's sinister wife, Maureen, is discovered dead in a snow-swept Regina parking lot. A brightly coloured scarf is found wound tightly around her neck, a scarf that belongs to none other than Joanne Kilbourn. Soon this single mother, author, university professor, and TV-show panelist is deemed the "number one" suspect in Maureen Tarpley's demise. Joanne knows there has to be a connection between these two murders. But what is it? A cryptic letter sent to Joanne by Kevin Tarpley just days before his death intimates that Ian Kilbourn's killing may not have been as senseless as first assumed. In fact, there are hints that some of Ian's political colleagues may have been involved. But how deeply and in what way? Then there's the faded photograph of a pretty young woman and her baby that Joanne finds tucked in the wallet of her dead husband. Does it offer any clue to Ian's murder, or to the deaths of the Tarpleys? Warily, Joanne Kilbourn is forced to follow a tangled trail deep into a heartbreaking past she never knew existed. A Colder Kind of Death is the fourth novel featuring Gail Bowen's "reluctant sleuth," Joanne Kilbourn. With its deft mix of wry humour and mayhem, closely observed family scenes and gripping suspense, warm characterization and betrayal, it confirms Gail Bowen's stature as one of the greats of mystery fiction. From the Hardcover edition.

Gail Bowen (Author), Lisa Bunting (Narrator)

Audiobook

The Gifted

Joanne Kilbourn is as feisty as ever in the 14th book of the series that bears her name. This time, Jo and Zack's young daughter Taylor's precocious talent as a painter has drawn the attention of people who may not be at all what they seem . . . Jo and Zack are both proud and a little concerned when their youngest daughter Taylor -- whose birth mother was a brilliant but notoriously promiscuous artist -- has two paintings chosen for a high-level fund-raising auction. One they've seen; the other, a portrait of a young male artist's model, Taylor has carefully guarded in her studio. Their concern grows when it becomes clear (and quite public) that the young man is the lover of the older socialite who organized the fund-raiser -- and whose husband is Zack's old friend. Soon, an ugly web of infidelity, addiction, and manipulation seems to be weaving itself around the Kilbourn-Shreve family. Jo and Zack are doing their best to keep everyone safe, but when one of the principal players in the drama is found murdered, events begin to spiral, Taylor seems to be drifting further away, and their very darkest fears seem about to be realized. The Gifted reconfirms Gail Bowen's incomparable ability to interweave the domestic and the dramatic, and to explore the dark side of human nature while ensuring that the life-affirming pillars of family and friendship remain standing.

Gail Bowen (Author), Lisa Bunting (Narrator)

Audiobook

Love You to Death

Charlie D is the host of a successful late-night radio call-in show. His listeners have a particularly intimate relationship with him and often reveal much about themselves, confident that he will honor their trust and that he can save them. In their minds, he is perfect: one of life's winners. But Charlie feels he's something of a fake. His easy confidence on-air belies the reality for a man born with a wine-colored birthmark that covers half his face. Love You to Death covers one hour on "The World According to Charlie D"--an hour during which he must both discover the long-time listener who is killing the people who trust him and attempt to come to terms with the man behind the birthmark.

Gail Bowen (Author), Daniel Brooklyn Maté (Narrator)

Audiobook

The Shadow Killer

It's Father's Day weekend—a tough time for Charlie D, host of a late-night radio call-in show that offers supportive advice to troubled listeners. For years Charlie has been alienated from his father—a retired politician who was always too busy for his son when Charlie was growing up. The trouble is, his dad has chosen this weekend to attempt to reconcile with his son. Charlie is not keen to forgive. But Charlie's personal issues suddenly seem mundane when an email arrives from a young listener that outlines his very specific plans to kill not just his father but his entire family. The deeply troubled boy could be anywhere, and Charlie has just two hours to discover his identity and stop him from murder.

Gail Bowen (Author), Daniel Maté (Narrator)

Audiobook