From Canada’s foremost graveyard historian comes the first-ever collection of Canadian epitaphs.

Strange as it is to say, graveyards are historical documents; they have a lot to say about who we were—and who we are.

From the strange and humorous to the majestic and moving, the baldly factual (Horses ran away) to the possibly fantastical (Milicent Milroy, A. M. M. M. / Wife of Edward VIII / Duke of Windsor / 1894–1972), the wildly famous to the completely anonymous, The Final Word chronicles the little-travelled terrain of Canadian grave words with wit, grace, humour, and a fine sense of what a bittersweet thing it is to be mortal.