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Bare Bones

by Kathy Reichs

Didn't think I'd be all that interested in this book, but found I couldn't put it down once I got into it. Kathy Reichs has written Bare Bones from the viewpoint of a female forensic anthropologist, Dr. Temperance Brennan, known as Tempe, who works with the North Carolina medical examiner. Ms. Reichs is herself a forensic anthropologist working with both North Carolina and the Province of Quebec, and her knowledge and expertise is made clear in this novel.

A baby's charred bones are discovered in a woodstove, and the mother has disappeared. The mother, Tamela Banks, is only an adolescent herself, so the immediate question is whether or not she simply didn't want the child, using this rather cruel way to get rid of it. Then Dr. Temperance is called to a plane crash where the plane inexplicably went into a rock face by a cornfield, and the resulting fireball has burned both pilot and passenger beyond recognition. Still again, Tempe's dog uncovers some bones buried outside Charlotte on a remote farm. Most of the latter bones are from animals, but there are a few human bones among them. As if this wasn't bad enough, the missing Tamela's driver's license is also found under a bed in that farmhouse.

Are all these separate incidents related? With the assistance of the Doctor's special detective friend Ryan, Temperance Brennan takes on a case of smuggling - not of drugs alone, but something almost as lucrative, and decidedly just as harmful. Then Tempe finds some very unusual lesions in the X-Rays of the plane passenger. That passenger, it turns out, wasn't suffering from AIDS, or even leprosy, but something much worse.

A subplot, which eventually forms part of the investigation, involves Tempe's daughter Kathy, who has a new boyfriend. The boyfriend might just be hiding more than he wants Tempe to know...

Part of the problem is that two Field and Wildlife agents have gone missing - Brian Aiker and Charlotte Cobb. Tempe is attempting to identify one set of bones as Brian's. Then Tamela shows up at Tempe's house with her older sister, Geneva, and tells about the baby in the woodstove. Both are trying to hide from Tamela's boyfriend, so Tempe takes them in. Gradually all the incidents come together, related in odd ways - and the head of the operation is uncovered - in a funeral home!

The murderer locks Tempe in the cellar of the funeral home - no lights, no way out. And when he comes to her, he's carrying a sack with live death in it. Tempe manages to get the murderer out of the way, but is left with non-human death in the dark. She's finally rescued (of course!) but not until she's on the verge of death herself.

How Tempe's rescuers avoid - or catch - or kill the contents of the sack isn't explained; all of which was the one item that left me hanging. However, the growing fascination with this story overcame that, and it has a very satisfactory ending. The two wildlife agents are identified at last, and the ring broken. Bare Bones shows us exactly how bad the unauthorized, senseless killing of wildlife can be, and how profitable. Combined with drug trafficking, it obviously offers opportunities of undreamed-of wealth.

Kathy Reichs makes forensic anthropology interesting as hell - not a minor accomplishment! Ms. Reich's work as a forensic anthropologist is internationally recognized. She's done her job in Rwanda, testifying at the UN Tribunal on Genocide, ID'd people from the mass graves in Guatamala and bodies from World War II as well as at Gound Zero in New York City. Certified by the American Board of Forensic Anthropology, and only one of fifty who are, Ms. Reichs is also a professor of anthropology at Charlotte's University of North Carolina. Kathy Reich's very first book, 'Deja Dead', won her the 1997 Ellis Award for Best First Novel and was on the New York Times bestseller
list. Using her work as a background for her fictional heroine has proven to be the wisest choice Kathy Reichs could have made. No information is available on he personal life, but Ms. Reichs spends most of her time between working for the office of the chief medical examiner in North Carolina and the Laboratoire des Sciences Judiciaries in Quebec.

Alan Paul Curtis

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