Last Rehearsal

The Last Rehearsal is Book Five in the Bellweather Mysteries, a character-rich, fair-play mystery of theatre, reputation, and murder.At the Bellweather Festival, everyone knows the show must go on. Until the executive director is found murdered backstage.Helen Ormond was exacting, practical, and determined to correct a safety report that powerful people would rather leave alone. Then she is killed during rehearsal—at the very moment the man with the strongest motive appears to be visible onstage.Retired intelligence officers Linda Cullicott and Bram Calder are drawn into a case built on timing, sightlines, professional loyalties, and the small lies people tell to protect careers, reputations, and one another. A stage manager has altered an account. An injured actor has kept quiet. An understudy is hiding what he did during a crucial lighting cue. And a celebrated star seems to have an alibi witnessed by an entire theatre.But in a place devoted to performance, seeing is not always the same as knowing.As Linda and Bram untangle what happened during the final rehearsal, they must separate guilt from loyalty, kindness from innocence, and the person everyone believes they saw from the role that was actually before them.