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Twin Peaks: The Final Dossier is the fourth Twin Peaks novel, written by Mark Frost, and a sequel to The Secret History of Twin Peaks. It was released on October 31, 2017.

The book, which includes some material that was originally intended for The Secret History, primarily documents events that took place between the original series and its continuation, and provides "context and commentary to the strange and cosmic happenings" present in the latter.[1]

Summary[]

OneDayMyLog One day, my log will have something to say about this.

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The novel is presented as a set of files and occasional original documents compiled by FBI agent Tamara Preston on several persons of interest, following avenues of investigation opened by her earlier work studying Garland Briggs' dossier. This investigation took place after Preston was inducted into the Blue Rose task force.

Interoffice Memorandum[]

In 2017, Tamara Preston concludes her follow-up investigation of the dossier recovered the previous year and presents the finished report, the product of interviews and personal research on the Twin Peaks residents referenced in Major Briggs' original document. In a memo, she thanks Gordon Cole for granting her the opportunity and anticipates the work still ahead of them.

Autopsy Report[]

On April 1, 1989, Albert Rosenfield conducted an impromptu autopsy on Leo Johnson, who was found dead in a cabin in the woods of Twin Peaks. After he was left in a tarantula trap by Windom Earle, Johnson was shot five times in the chest by an unknown assailant. Rosenfield notes that scuff marks on the scene indicate the shooter may have used an FBI shooting stance, and assumes it was Earle's doing. Johnson's house and truck cab were soon impounded.

Shelly Johnson[]

Shelly McCauley came from a broken home plagued by alcoholism and spousal abuse; her father eventually left the state, and she herself moved out by the age of seventeen. Shelly dated Bobby Briggs, whom she had known from elementary school, though high school, but broke up after learning he was cheating with Laura Palmer, causing a scene that disrupted the school's junior prom. At the Roadhouse the same night, she met Leo Johnson, who had just stopped off from a trucking run. Three weeks later, the two were married by a justice of the peace on their "third anniversary."

After Johnson was found dead, Shelly and Bobby placed a pause on their relationship for an appropriate mourning period. Almost one year to the day after Johnson's death, they were married during a weekend trip to Reno, Nevada. Seven months later, Shelly gave birth to their daughter, Rebecca McCauley Briggs. Bobby's mother Betty and Shelly's boss Norma Jennings pooled their resources to take out a loan, allowing the couple to buy a house in Twin Peaks.

Hornes and Haywards[]

Preston attempts to make sense of the confusing events surrounding Benjamin Horne and Dr. Will Hayward in the days after the 1989 Miss Twin Peaks Contest. On the day of the Twin Peaks Savings and Loan explosion, Horne apparently visited Hayward's home after spending the day at Calhoun Memorial Hospital with his comatose daughter Audrey. The same night, Horne was admitted to the hospital himself with a head injury, sustained, according to Dr. Hayward, when he had slipped and hit their fireplace while they talked about Audrey's prospects. The next day, while Hayward tended to Dale Cooper after his own fall, Horne was cleared by another attending physician and driven home by his brother Jerry.

Based on a later account provided by Dr. Hayward to Sheriff Frank Truman, Cooper did in fact visit Audrey Horne's room while at Calhoun Memorial. Nine months later, Audrey gave birth to a son, Richard. The father on Richard's birth certificate was listed as "Unknown."

Within three months of this incident, Will filed for divorce from his wife of twenty-six years, Eileen, and moved across the country to Middlebury, Vermont. Donna Hayward also left town after graduating from high school, relocating to New York City, leaving Eileen to raise their younger daughters, Harriet and Gersten. Preston discovered bank records showing a monthly deposit of $7,500 to Eileen's account from a Cayman Islands shell corporation, traced back to the Horne Foundation. Harriet attended the University of Washington and became a pediatrician, settling in Bellevue. Eileen passed away in 2009, due to complications from pneumonia. Horne declined all interview requests from Agent Preston on the matter.

Donna Hayward[]

After turning eighteen, Donna moved to New York to attend Hunter College and find modeling work with the Ford Modeling Agency. She severed all contact with anyone in Twin Peaks except Audrey Horne, with whom she exchanged two letters, the contents of which she declined to disclose to Preston. After her freshman year, Donna dropped out of school to focus upon her career, becoming very successful throughout the 1990s. Her alleged love affairs were the subject of many tabloid articles, though she eventually married a prominent New York venture capitalist. During a charity event, she encountered Lana Budding Milford and the two were photographed together for the New York Post's society page.

Meanwhile, Donna had become dependent on drugs and alcohol and admitted herself to rehabilitation four years into her marriage. Overall, she was checked into rehab four times over the next five years. The last of these stints was in 2009 and prompted by an intervention after she went missing and was found in a Lower East Side crack house. This episode was believed to have been triggered by the death of her mother, having never reconciled with her.

Donna committed to sobriety after her release from McLean Psychiatric Hospital and her marriage ended in divorce. She moved to New Haven, Connecticut and began to attend twelve-step meetings to sustain her sobriety. She soon reconnected with her father and the two reconciled. She soon moved in with him in Middlebury, Vermont where he continued to practice medicine with no intent to retire. Though Donna, now working as he father's assistant, declined Preston's requests to interview her, Preston learned that Donna was studying to become a nurse practitioner.

Possessing an above-genius IQ, Gersten Hayward was a musical prodigy, performing at numerous concert venues in the region throughout her teen years. She also excelled academically, taking college-level courses during her freshman year of high school and graduating at age sixteen, all while being offered several scholarships from prestigious universities. She attended Stanford University but left during her second semester after suffering a nervous breakdown.

Gersten entered a Bay Area psychiatric hospital, where she was treated for six weeks before she returned to Twin Peaks. Her health improved with the help of psychiatric care, but she soon became dependent on street drugs, soon exacerbated by the death of her mother. This began a string of numerous chaotic love affairs, the most torrid of them an on-and-off again relationship with Steven Burnett, her drug dealer and the husband of Bobby and Shelly's daughter Becky.

Preston learns that arrest warrants are active for Steven Burnett and Richard Horne. She finds that Gersten has not been heard from in quite some time and is believed to have left town.

Ben and Audrey Horne[]

Preston examines the fate of the Horne family, beginning with the divorce of Benjamin and Sylvia two years after the breakdown of the Haywards' union. Benjamin remained at the Horne family home while Sylvia and their son Johnny moved to a "McMansion" in an upscale neighborhood.

Three weeks after the bank bombing, Audrey woke from her coma. Her recovery went smoothly until her father's sale of 350 acres of Ghostwood – a sale she had been protesting at the bank – and the discovery that she was pregnant. She refused financial help from her family, moved into a small apartment, and dropped out of school to focus on her child, Richard, who was born after her nineteenth birthday. Over the next two years, she completed her GED, then studied economics and business administration at a local community college. She subsequently opened a salon and never publicly discussed the identity of Richard's father.

When her son was ten, Audrey married her longtime accountant, though it was speculated to be a union of financial convenience rather than love, as several townsfolk reported the marriage to be dysfunctional, with Audrey allegedly engaging in sexual infidelity. The couple sought marital counseling and Audrey consulted a mental health care professional, but Preston could not access any further details. As of Preston's report, Audrey suddenly closed her salon four years ago and disappeared from public life, leading to speculation that she had developed agoraphobia or that she was admitted to a private care facility. A spokesperson for the Horne family declined Preston's questions on the matter.

Benjamin Horne has remained active in his businesses, spending most of his time at the Great Northern Hotel, where his brother Jerry lives in his own private wing. Preston notes that Benjamin has adopted more ethical business methods since the Ghostwood sale and has grown distasteful of the Ghostwood Correctional Facility, a private prison that was built upon the land. Preston notes that the prison has been blamed for a rise in crime in Twin Peaks.

Horne granted an interview to Preston, after which she notes his profound sense of regret and perceived responsibility for the state of his family. Preston believes that these feelings and Horne's desire to become more spiritual and connected to nature are his attempts to atone for his wrongdoings.

Preston shares her own negative feelings on the Ghostwood Correctional Facility, citing its uncaring attitude toward both employees and inmates. She also states she is investigating rumors that the prison as colluded with local law enforcement to increase arrest rates and prison sentences. Preston ultimately deems that the activities of the prison deserve national attention.

Jerry Horne[]

Within the ten years preceding Preston's report, Jerry Horne focused his business ventures to the newly-legalized marijuana industry, having indulged in the drug since his college days in the late 1960s. After it was legalized in Washington in 2012, he became involved in the state's most successful marijuana production company, whose product stemmed from his own private growth experiments. Preston notes that, as of her writing, Jerry has plans to extend his business to a chain of retail stores.

In free time, Jerry often keeps to himself, spending much of his time in nature and listening to his extensive record collection.

The Double R[]

Annie Blackburn[]

Windom Earle[]

Back in Twin Peaks[]

Miss Twin Peaks[]

Dr. Lawrence Jacoby[]

Margaret Coulson[]

Sheriff Harry Truman[]

Major Briggs[]

Phillip Jeffries[]

Judy[]

Ray Monroe[]

Today[]

A few weeks into her investigation in Twin Peaks, Agent Tamara Preston writes about a bizarre situation that happened that very day. An issue of the Twin Peaks Post, reporting on Dale Cooper's disappearance in 1989, makes reference to "the disappearance, still unsolved, of local teenage beauty queen Laura Palmer." All other issues now reflect that Laura disappeared without a trace on February 23, 1989, the case apparently remaining unsolved. When she asked about Laura at the sheriff's station, the employees got a dazed expression and apparently struggled to remember the exact events, but soon agreed that it was indeed as the papers reported. Ronette Pulaski was abducted and taken to the woods and found wandering across a railroad bridge, but testified that Laura had never appeared on the night in question. A few stories appeared in the Post reporting that Agent Cooper briefly visited town to investigate the disappearance, but were short on details. One year to the day after Laura went missing, her father Leland Palmer committed suicide by shooting himself in his car near White Tail Falls.

With no other leads, Preston investigates Sarah Palmer (née Novack), Laura's only living relative, and finds records of a bizarre incident that took place while she was living in Los Alamos as a child. Two employees at a nearby radio station were brutally murdered by assailants who left no traces, while over a dozen people listening to the broadcast that night experienced severe medical distress, many losing consciousness. Sarah was apparently among this number, but after a visit to an emergency room there appeared to be nothing wrong with her.

After Laura's disappearance and her husband's suicide, Sarah slipped into depression and drug abuse. In the past year, however, she apparently witnessed the bizarre sudden death by evisceration of a trucker at a local bar.

Preston reports that her own thoughts and memories are growing fuzzy and indistinct with every passing second, and immediately books a flight back to Philadelphia.

Final Thoughts[]

Audiobook[]

The audiobook version of The Final Dossier was narrated by Annie Wersching, with a runtime of three hours. An exclusive clip was posted by the fansite Welcome to Twin Peaks.

Release[]

A signing and presentation of the book by Mark Frost was held at Vroman's Bookstore in Pasadena, CA.

On October 24, 2017, preview pages of the novel were released on iTunes.

Continuity[]

  • The Final Dossier establishes that the third season takes place in September and October 2016.

Errors and inconsistencies[]

  • Agent Preston states that she will return to the matter of Bobby and Shelly Briggs in a later file, but neither are mentioned after the "Shelly Johnson" case file. Mark Frost attributes this to Preston abandoning her research after discovering the changed timeline.[2]
    • Both are mentioned in regards to Becky's legal issues as a result of Steven's arrest warrant at the end of the "Donna Hayward" case file but no details are given to the dissolution of their marriage. Red is not mentioned in the book once, despite the details provided of his drug-dealing network being dismantled.
  • The fight between Ben Horne and Will Hayward in "Episode 29" is stated to have taken place on the same day as the Twin Peaks Savings and Loan explosion, whereas in the episode it appears to have been the night before.
  • Donna Hayward is said to have moved to New York in 1992 after turning eighteen, but her split from her parents in the series occurred in 1989, at which time she was already a senior in high school.
  • Preston states that Johnny Horne is in his "early forties" at the time of writing, whereas his age given in the original series would put him in his mid-fifties.
  • Preston indicates that Audrey Horne has successfully managed her beauty salon "ever since" its founding, and describes the photograph of Agent Cooper hanging on her office wall. Later in the chapter, it is stated that Audrey suddenly closed the salon four years prior to her writing.
  • In "Episode 15", Jerry Horne is said to have graduated from Gonzaga University in 1974, whereas The Final Dossier states that he graduated in 1968.
  • Annie Blackburn is stated to have been born in 1973, but subsequently she is stated to have been in her early 20s when she moved to Twin Peaks in March 1989; a 1973 birth would have made her fifteen or sixteen years old at that time. In addition, more than five years are stated to pass between Marty Lindstrom's death in 1985 and her return to town. Frost confirmed, possibly in jest, that this inconsistency can be attributed to an error on Preston's part.[3]
  • The sequence of events places Vivian Smythe and Ernie Niles' wedding at least "a few years" before the events of Twin Peaks, when in the series they were newlyweds on honeymoon.
  • Hank Jennings is stated to have been arrested after the Dead Dog Farm operation, when it was actually after he assaulted Ed Hurley in his home.
  • Caroline Earle's maiden name is given as Wickam, contradicting dialogue in "Episode 22" that establishes it as Powell.
  • Consistent with The Autobiography of F.B.I. Special Agent Dale Cooper: My Life, My Tapes, Caroline Earle's death is placed ten years prior to the original series, contradicting dialogue in "Episode 17" that places it four years prior.
  • There is no mention of Diane Evans' altered appearance at the Twin Peaks Sheriff's Department. In addition, she is missing from Gordon Cole's account of visiting the Great Northern Hotel basement with Dale Cooper, and instead Preston writes that she disappeared shortly after the lights went out in Frank Truman's office.
  • Garland Briggs' dossier (the subject of The Secret History of Twin Peaks) is said to have been recovered from a storage locker in the basement of Ruth Davenport's building "weeks" after her body was discovered, contradicting both the stated time frame of that novel and Agent Preston's claim that she has no knowledge of Cooper or Briggs' ultimate fate when researching the first dossier. If this were the case, Preston would necessarily have only researched Briggs' document after the events of the new series.
  • It is erroneously stated that Ronette Pulaski went to the abandoned train car with Jacques Renault and Leo Johnson, when it was actually Jacques' cabin. When asked about it, Mark Frost retorted that Leo and Jacques were both extremely stupid and impulsive.[3]

Appearances[]

References[]

  1. [1]
  2. Mark Frost (November 8, 2017). "I'm Mark Frost, co-creator of Twin Peaks and author". Reddit. Retrieved November 8, 2017. 
  3. 3.0 3.1 Mark Frost (November 8, 2017). "I'm Mark Frost, co-creator of Twin Peaks and author". Reddit. Retrieved November 8, 2017. 
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