Blue Moon Mystery Saloon

Cut to the Bone

A Body Farm Mystery by Jefferson Bass, William Morrow, September 2013.

*An ARC was provided by Harper Collins/William Morrow and Edelweiss for an honest review.

CUT TO THE BONE  is a suspenseful, entertaining prequel to the successful BODY FARM MYSTERY SERIES written by Dr. Bill Bass and Jon Jefferson. Bass is the real-life forensic anthropologist, Anthropology Department chairman, and Body Farm director upon whom the book's protagonist, Dr. Bill Brockton, is based. CUT TO THE BONE tells a fictional story of the vision and development of the real Body Farm at the University of Tennessee (UT) and parallels a suspenseful serial murder mystery. Though the story is told in several points of views, chapter and segment headings make the story easy to follow and assists in building suspense.

The mystery involves a serial murderer to whom the reader is introduced early in the story. Reading in the killer's point of view gives the reader insight into why he kills, how he picks his murder weapons, and who he chooses as his victims, and the FBI profiler characters help Brockton understand what kind of killer he's facing.

If learning a little about forensic anthropology is a draw, loads of body identification techniques and scene forensics are explained in the story. Brockton describes to local authorities how studying a body's bones can uncover the skeleton's gender, age and possible trauma suffered before death and what to look for in time-of-death and post-death trauma. The story also describes the specific and sometimes boring research needed to build a strong, fact-based database which can be accessed by medical and law officials to help solve crimes.

Humor, a common emotional release for forensic anthropologists and anyone else mired in the business of death, is scattered throughout the book. The bantering and conversations between Brockton and his grad assistant are totally believable, and several of their interactions with local rural county officials are funny and pretty authentic. I particularly enjoy Brockton's phone calls with his new, already beleaguered secretary and with the chatty dispatcher at the Morgan County sheriff's office.

I also like that the settings' details pull the reader right into the scenes and that the authors made sure to include other senses (touch, sound, smell and taste) to enhance the visual descriptions. I have a slight advantage in imagining where the story takes place, as I grew up in Knoxville. I also spent a lot of time in the Anthropology Department as an undergrad and for a short time as a grad student during Bass's tenure as department chair. I remember the room layout in Neyland Stadium and the unpleasant odors that bombarded me when opening the door to the department's hallway. But CUT TO THE BONE 's detailed descriptions also bring up memories of good times in the labs and classrooms there.

All in all, I would recommend CUT TO THE BONE to anyone who enjoys suspenseful murder mysteries, forensic science, anthropology and archaeology, or just good, entertaining storytelling. The book is fine as a stand-alone, but if this is your first time reading a Body Farm Mystery, then CUT TO THE BONE is definitely a good place to start if you want to continue this interesting series. Just make sure to take a big chunk of time to read. If you're like me, you'll want to read this story at one sitting.

If You Like This, You May Also Like ---   Other BODY FARM MYSTERIES by Jefferson Bass,  DEATH'S ACRE and BEYOND THE BODY FARM (both nonfiction, related to the real Body Farm) by Dr. Bill Bass and Jon Jefferson, TEMPERANCE BRENNAN MYSTERIES by Kathy Reichs, SCARPETTA MYSTERIES by Patricia Cornwell, DIANE FALLON FORENSIC MYSTERIES by Beverly Connor

Beautiful Sacrifice

A Novel by Elizabeth Lowell, William Morrow, May 2012. 

Dr. Lina Taylor is a professor of Mayan culture and curator at Houston's Museum of the Maya. The museum's major funder is her family, the Reyes Balams, and many of the artifacts on display are from her family's estate in the Yucatan. Hunter Johnston is a former Immigration and Customs Enforcement agent who is helping a former ICE colleague track down significant religious Mayan artifacts stolen from ICE office. In the few days leading up to the Turning of the Wheel on December 21, 2012, they work together to identify who may have the stolen cache and how the artifacts relate to the end of the Mayan Calendar.

Engrossing passages filled with interesting action and compelling dialogue were few and far between in the first 200 or so pages of the story. The major characters seemed two-dimensional, their sexual chemistry lacked pizazz or tension, and I particularly tired of their silly sex-related banter. The constant change in point of view, sometimes from one paragraph to the next, was disconcerting and, at times, hard to follow.

Despite these downfalls, I discovered the last third of the book to be faster paced and more engaging, I learned something about traditional Mexican and Yucatan foods, and though the villain's identity didn't surprise me, I enjoyed how the reveal and the events leading up to and following it were written.

All in all, I would recommend Beautiful Sacrifice to beachgoers who are fascinated with the Mayan culture and archaeology (and don't mind that the story's Kawail'l culture and artifacts are straight from the author's imagination) and those who are looking for light suspense. Readers who prefer quick-paced, totally engaging and on-the-edge-of-your-seat suspense might want to look elsewhere for a good summer read.

PROTAGONIST: A single, Latino woman who is a professor of and expert in Mayan culture & a single, gringo who was once an agent for Immigration and Customs Enforcement

ACTION: Parking garage ambush, religious rituals in the Yucatan

LOVE INTEREST: Between Lina and Hunter

ROMANCE: Minor sexual tension, silly sex-related banter, minimal consensual sex

INTERESTING TIDBITS: Info about US Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE); traditional Yucatan and Mexican foods; and, Yucatan landscape

FUN FACTOR: More of a suspense story but some lighthearted moments

IF YOU LIKE THIS, YOU MAY LIKE: Innocent as Sin by Elizabeth Lowell, A Skeleton in God's Closet by Paul L. Maier, Excavation by James Rollins, The Third Secret by Steve Berry, Empire of Gold by Andy McDermott

 

The Inquisitor's Key

A Body Farm Novel, by Jefferson Bass, William Morrow, May 2012.

*Note:  I received this book from the publisher for review. I also was a student of one of the authors (Dr. Bill Bass) when he was head of UT-Knoxville's Anthropology Department.

Dr. Bill Brockton, forensic anthropologist and founder of the University of Tennessee's anthropology research center known as The Body Farm, flies to Avignon, France to help unravel the mystery of an ancient skeleton found underneath the Palace of the Popes. His research assistant, Miranda Lovelady, and French archaeologist, Stefan Beauvoir, have discovered a stone ossuary with carvings of a lamb and a cross on the outside and a full skeleton showing evidence of crucifiction inside. They need Bill's expertise and discretion to determine if the bones could be those of Jesus of Nazareth. During their research, Bill and Miranda see similarities between the ossuary's skeleton and the Shroud of Turin, confusing their findings even more. When carbon-14 dating determines the bones are around 2000 years old and Stefan is killed, the identity of the ossuary's skeleton becomes less important than the identity of his murderer.

Moving back and forth between the present day and the early 1300's, the authors present a theory about the basis for the illustration on the Shroud of Turin and fictionalize interactions between the White Cardinal, Jacques Fournier (who became Pope Benedict XII) and Johannes Eckhart, a prominent Dominican theologian and mystic, and other players in the early years of the papacy at Avignon. I thought the backstory was unnecessary to the mystery part of the story, but it did help explain how hypocritical the pope and the popes' followers were while in Avignon.

Tripping in and out of different centuries failed to move the story along. I found it quite slow, with very little action and not a lot of tension, And while I was disappointed in the abrupt ending, I did appreciate the twist near the end. It was a complete surprise and done very well.

All in all, The Inquisitor's Key isn't as suspenseful and might not hold the reader's interest as other books in the Body Farm series. However, intertwining information on Avignon and its papacy years throughout the story should make it a worthwhile read for history enthusiasts.  

****

PROTAGONIST: A fit, 50-ish, forensic anthropologist and supervisor of the Body Farm at UT-Knoxville

ACTION: Car chase in France and Italy, running from a possible murderer

POTENTIAL LOVE INTEREST: The protagonist's 26-year-old female graduate student

INTERESTING TIDBITS: History of the papacy in Avignon, France; theory on how illustration was made on Shroud of Turin; info on artist Simone Martini and poet/philosopher Francesco Petrarch

IF YOU LIKE THIS, YOU MAY LIKE: The DaVinci Code by Dan Brown, Angels and Demons by Dan Brown, The Paris Vendetta by Steve Berry, Map of Bones by James Rollins, The Sacred Vault by Andy McDermott