Editorial Content for The Last Sister

Kendra Elliot has sold over seven million books. After reading THE LAST SISTER, her first Columbia River novel, I understand why she is so successful. FBI special agent Zander Wells was introduced in a previous series, but readers "meeting" him for the first time will be charmed and touched by his story.

In this intriguing mystery, a married couple is brutally murdered in a small Oregon logging town. Emily Mills, who is the first to discover their bodies, is horrified, especially when she sees that the man was hanged just like her father when he was killed decades earlier. She also notices a racist symbol carved into his forehead, so when the sheriff declares it a murder-suicide, she calls the local FBI office and won't get off the phone until they agree to send an agent to the scene to investigate it as a hate crime.

"Elliot succeeds in creating both a thrilling mystery and a fascinating character study of the people inhabiting these pages."

Upon their arrival, Zander and his partner, Ava, realize that they may have more than just one crime to figure out. Is there a connection between the current stabbing/hanging and what happened to Emily's father all those years before? After another homicide occurs, it seems that everything has to be examined, including where Emily's older sister, Tara, went immediately after her father's murder.

Elliot's omniscient narrator works superbly in terms of letting us be privy to what the characters are thinking and feeling. We are able to see the night of their father's murder from the point of view of both Emily and her younger sister, Madison. So we know more than they do about what each is hiding from the other.

Slowly, clue after clue is uncovered and revealed, allowing us to try to connect the different threads at the same time as the characters attempt to put the puzzle pieces in place. We also feel a genuine camaraderie with Emily, who struggles to keep their decrepit old mansion in one piece while someone is slashing her tires and harassing her and her three sweet great-aunts. Their only source of income is their diner, because the logging operation that financed the opulence that Emily's ancestors enjoyed is long closed.

Elliot succeeds in creating both a thrilling mystery and a fascinating character study of the people inhabiting these pages. It is a pleasure getting acquainted with Emily’s great-aunts, who all dress alike, and each is worthy of admiration in her own right. When the mystery is finally solved, and very satisfactorily, readers will be happy to remember that this is just the start of a series in which Zander, Ava and maybe Emily will return to entertain and amaze us.