My first editor informed me I was a mystery writer and my first mystery conference categorized me as a Southern humorous mystery writer. I didn’t intend to write Southern humorous mysteries but find the world-view of my characters and the world they live in quite comical and southern (my characters and I live in Georgia). I also abhor crime, so the dead bodies that keep appearing in my stories need to be dealt with lightly. I’m happy to be a Wall Street Journal bestselling and international award-winning author with eighteen books and counting in three series, Cherry Tucker Mysteries, Maizie Albright Star Detectives, and Finley Goodhart Crime Capers.
Southern Appalachia is as southern as the Cotton Belt, but the Smokies have a culture as unique as the bayou or the western reaches of Texas. Sharyn McCrumb has a wealth of historical knowledge when it comes to the Blue Ridge Appalachians, but she knows mountain folk's minds and motivations even more. McCrumb’s amateur sleuth Elizabeth MacPherson series’ is satirical and wry, full of wit and grit. Rock solid mysteries mired in history and loaded with character. I love them all, but the last is my favorite. The title alone makes me smile.
Bestselling author Sharyn McCrumb, internationally acclaimed for the "quiet fire"* of her Appalachian Ballad novels, clearly has a dark side--a wicked, sardonic wit that has prompted critics to compare her to Jane Austen and Jonathan Swift.
Readers and reviewers alike also have lauded Ms. McCrumb for her inspired chronicles of forensic anthropologist Elizabeth MacPherson. In her newest tale in the MacPherson saga, McCrumb examines society's fascination with beauty--and the deceptiveness of outer appearances. Elizabeth herself, hospitalized for depression over her missing husband, learns that insanity liberates one from polite hypocrisy, enabling a "crazy lady" to remark: "Anorexia is not a…
At an early age, I became a fan of tightly plotted mysteries that play fair with the reader. This led to my career in mystery games and videos and a dozen books of short mysteries. It also led to my TV career. When the creator of Monkrealized he needed some twisty plots, he visited a bookstore, found my books, and tracked me down. Since then, I’ve been plying my trade on the small screen as well, working with some very talented people, like Steve Martin, who needed a mystery guy to come in and add some structure to their ideas.
A forensic anthropologist tackles three murders, separated by time but united by their theme, the evil that men do – and by men, I mean the male of the species. The outrageous humor and atmospheric southern setting draw you in, and you don’t realize until too late how your expectations have been overturned.
The eighth book in the Elizabeth MacPherson series.
When forensic anthropologist Elizabeth MacPherson becomes the official P.I. for her brother Bill's fledgling Virginia law firm, she quickly takes on two complex cases. Eleanor Royden, a perfect lawyer's wife for twenty years, has shot her ex-husband and his wife in cold blood. And Donna Jean Morgan is implicated in the death of her Bible-thumping bigamist husband.
Bill's feminist firebrand partner, A. P. Hill, does her damnedest for Eleanor, an abused wife in denial, and Bill gallantly defends Donna Jean. Meanwhile, Elizabeth's forensic expertise, including her special knowledge of poisons, gives her the most challenging case of her career. .…
Thrillers that combine cutting-edge forensic science with a dash of wit delivered by a female protagonist are always at the top of my reading list. Kathy Reichs' The Bone Hacker was one of my 2023 highlights.
This book delves into the mind of a ruthless serial killer, whose twisted obsession with hacking their victims' arms adds a chilling layer to the story. The exotic and well-developed settings add a magical touch to the reading experience.
The book's premise, cybercrime, is both current and terrifying, emphasizing how easily modern technology can be abused. The duality of the title, The Bone Hacker, was a brilliant stroke of genius that kept me guessing until the very end.
A writer can tell a story with words, but a forensic anthropologist can solve a murder by studying the victims' bones - and this has always fascinated me.
From Number One Bestselling author Kathy Reichs comes the new high-stakes thriller featuring forensic anthropologist Temperance Brennan.
EVEN ON AN ISLAND PARADISE, DANGER STILL LURKS
Called in to examine what is left of a body struck by lightning, Tempe traces an unusual tattoo to its source and is soon embroiled in a much larger case. Young men - tourists - have been disappearing on the islands of Turks and Caicos for years. Seven years ago, the first victim was found with both hands cut off; the other visitors vanished without a trace. But recently, tantalizing leads have emerged and only…
Like my main character, Annie Hawkins Green, I’m passionate about photojournalism, and we both love to travel the world capturing images that tell our stories. My training as a photographer has led me to write novels that are visual and cinematic, affording readers authentic and immersive experiences in the places Annie takes us—Afghanistan, Milwaukee, wherever. We’re both seriously committed to empowering girls through education and go to great lengths, and some risk, to make that happen. Readers tend to think Annie and I are brave and gutsy and, well, badass. Annie is, for sure—she goes to dangerous places. Okay, I admit that many of her adventures have an autobiographical twist.
In his most atmospheric and suspenseful novel, Anil’s Ghost, Michael Ondaatje transports readers into the middle of the civil war that splintered Sri Lanka. A brilliant forensic anthropologist who was educated abroad, Anil Tissera bravely returns to her homeland determined to unearth evidence to explain the brutal campaign of murders ravaging the country. With each new discovery Anil makes, at great risk to her own safety, I find myself holding my breath. Although the powerful elite are lined up against her, she stands firm, refusing to let the guns and bombs scare her away. Steeped in centuries of culture and tradition, this is truly one of my favorite books ever.
With his first novel since the internationally acclaimed The English Patient, Booker Prize—winning author Michael Ondaatje gives us a work displaying all the richness of imagery and language and the piercing emotional truth that we have come to know as the hallmarks of his writing.
Anil’s Ghost transports us to Sri Lanka, a country steeped in centuries of tradition, now forced into the late twentieth century by the ravages of civil war. Into this maelstrom steps Anil Tissera, a young woman born in Sri Lanka, educated in England and America, who returns to her homeland as a forensic anthropologist sent…
When you write a book, it’s natural to put yourself in it. You’re the avenger, the rookie agent, the hard-drinking detective. But how many of us volunteer to be the corpse? I sit here every day in the cancer unit at a public Thai hospital and smile at folks who won’t be around much longer. I wrote fifteen books in a series about a coroner. I painted the victims colorfully when they were still alive but how much respect did I show them once they were chunks of slowly decaying meat? From now on my treatment of the souls that smile back at me will take on a new life.
I’m cheating here a bit. I know Kathy and I like her a lot. Unlike me, she is a genius. I don’t need to tell any of her readers that. She is a well-respected forensic anthropologist who goes out of her way to uncover the secrets that the remains conceal. She writes about bones with the same affection we usually reserve for loved ones. I would be delighted to have her run her massive intellect over my skeleton when I’m gone.
___________________________________ A gripping Temperance Brennan novel from world-class forensic anthropologist Kathy Reichs, the international no. 1 bestselling crime thriller writer and the inspiration behind the hit TV series Bones.
Three skeletons are found in a Montreal basement.
The building is old, and the homicide detective in charge dismisses the remains as historic. Not his case. Not his concern.
Forensic anthropologist Dr Temperance Brennan is not so sure. Something about the bones of these three young women suggests a different message: murder.
Soon she finds herself drawn ever deeper into a web of evil from which there may be no escape.…
I write historical mysteries, and developed an interest in early forensics when I was a police officer. I have worked in private industry, as a civilian police worker, and in a department connected to the Home Office. Historical mysteries particularly appeal to me as they present a different, and very specific, challenge. There’s no lab to process evidence, and everything needs to be double-checked for anachronisms, even down to the colour of light from gas lamps in different areas. Extensive research acted as the foundation for developing the characters in The Innocents Mystery Series. I like my mysteries twisty, complex, and intricate; through a fog of history and a touch of light humour.
This is exactly the kind of book I find fascinating, with real-life historical mysteries being explored and researched using cutting-edge scientific methodologies. It covers so many aspects of forensics, from facial reconstruction to DNA. If you are the kind of person who loves seeing famous people from history analysed for poisons, seeing mummies facing the same medical problems as we do, and wonder if a skull found in an attic belongs to a king, then this is the book for you.
Did Richard the Lionheart really die from just a crossbow wound, or was there foul play? Who are the two infant children buried in Tutankhamen's tomb? Could a skull found in a tax collector's attic be the long-lost head of Henri IV? In When Science Sheds Light on History, Philippe Charlier, the "Indiana Jones of the graveyards," travels the globe with his forensics team to unravel these and other historic mysteries. To get answers, Charlier looks for clues in medical records, death masks, fingerprints, and bloodstains. He even enlists the help of perfume experts to smell and identify embalming materials.…
In the early 1980s, I fell in love with the Big Island of Hawaiʻi, its people – including my wife’s Native Hawaiian relatives – and its history. My wife and I owned a home on the South Kohala Coast of the Big Island for twenty years, where I assembled a library of Hawaiian history and began reading all things Hawaiian, including detective fiction. Every year, Hawaiʻi inspires so many books, fiction and non-fiction, well-publicized or obscure, that it’s fun to mention some that Hawaiʻi lovers and residents may have missed.
In Hawaiʻi as elsewhere, bodies can end up in shallow graves – or so Hawaiʻi detective fiction would have it.
When skeletal remains turn up, Mimi Charles, forensic anthropologist, sets out to recover them and unlock their secrets for the (naturally) less-expert Big Island police. The author is a forensic anthropologist herself, with plenty of real-world cases in Hawaiʻi and on the mainland to her credit, and she knows that in post mortem-focused mysteries, every forensic detail counts.
She constructs an ingenious plot, in which a rare and boisterous dog plays a key part. Unlike more cautious authors who won’t dare to let their characters speak Hawaiian pidgin, Lasswell Hoff confidently sprinkles in just the right (and intelligible) amount.
There’s a final and unique plot twist that makes the reader stop and marvel: How did the author manage to bring us here?
BONES OF PARADISE - A Big Island Mystery -Even in paradise, people do die. And it’s the job of Mimi Charles, Forensic Anthropologist, to analyze the bodies that aren’t found right away – skeletons, mostly. Mimi and her colleagues at the Medical Examiner’s office are a tightly-knit team that relishes solving the mysteries presented by each case. But outside of the office, their lives in the sweet little town of Hilo, Hawaii, flow in a gentle island rhythm. None of them is prepared for the disappearance of one of their own, right from the building where they work (or the…
I’ve always been fascinated with crime and crime fiction. From my early obsession with the novels of Raymond Chandler to my embarrassingly late discovery of Agatha Christie. I directed epsiodes of Sherlock Holmes with Jeremy Brett for Masterpiece theatre, which was a dream come true. But it frustrates me when television dramas tread roughshod over forensic science, making absurd claims for what can be done, when the truth, as mundane as it often can be, is so much more fascinating. To this end I have just graduated with an Mlitt from the University of Dundee in Crime Fiction and Forensic Investigation. I hope this will lend my books an air of authenticity and dramatic drive.
I was drawn to this book initially because Baroness Sue Black, formerly professor of Anatomy forensic anthropology at Dundee where I did an MLitt degree in crime fiction and forensic investigation.
It was an unexpected pleasure. Not at all macabre or gruesome – alright maybe in bits. But essentially, I loved this book because it’s such a personal reflection of life from someone whose daily business is to deal with the dead. I found her descriptions of how the body works and in the end the processes that happen when we die fascinating.
Humane, compassionate, and thought provoking. A great read.
Book of the Year, Saltire Literary Awards A CrimeReads Best True Crime Book of the Month
For fans of Caitlin Doughty, Mary Roach, Kathy Reichs, and CSI shows, a renowned forensic scientist on death and mortality.
Dame Sue Black is an internationally renowned forensic anthropologist and human anatomist. She has lived her life eye to eye with the Grim Reaper, and she writes vividly about it in this book, which is part primer on the basics of identifying human remains, part frank memoir of a woman whose first paying job as a schoolgirl was to apprentice in a butcher shop,…
When you write a book, it’s natural to put yourself in it. You’re the avenger, the rookie agent, the hard-drinking detective. But how many of us volunteer to be the corpse? I sit here every day in the cancer unit at a public Thai hospital and smile at folks who won’t be around much longer. I wrote fifteen books in a series about a coroner. I painted the victims colorfully when they were still alive but how much respect did I show them once they were chunks of slowly decaying meat? From now on my treatment of the souls that smile back at me will take on a new life.
Nobody does gore with more charm than the British, and Becket loves his blood and guts. His victims are barely recognizable. But I selected this novel mainly for its setting at a body farm. I have a card in my wallet offering my organs when I have no further use for them. But the farm is peopled with volunteer cadavers; those who have agreed to donate their bodies for forensic studies. Offering up a live heart is one thing. But you’d have to sign off ownership of the whole kit and kaboodle to science once that heart stops beating. It’s nice to think my body has some use when I’m done with it.
While I love books that reflect strong family values, I don’t like sugary sweetness to the point of unrealism. I prefer to read about real people who can make fun of themselves and the world. That sarcastic and biting edge seems to tap into a deeper honesty about life while making me roll around on the floor and break all my furniture.
Imagine being in a tour group with the most annoying person in the world, Susan. Every tour group has that one person who talks non-stop about things that don’t matter. The difference here is that the tour guide Rowan Rover is an inept hitman who can’t seem to bump Susan off. An added element of fun is that the group is touring England’s most famous murder sites. When I was learning to write mysteries, I had two prominent influences, Sue Grafton and Sharyn McCrumb. Both taught me how to construct a solid mystery. Sue Grafton opened my eyes to the power of connection created by writing in first person. And Sharyn McCrumb showed me the importance of using humor even when talking about dark subjects like murder.
Edgar Award winner Sharyn McCrumb brings you her sixth Elizabeh MacPherson mystery novel. The unsinkable Elizabeth is on tour of England's most famous murder sites, when Rowan Rover, the group leader, is quietly asked to commit murder. He does, of course, but not without misgivings--not the least of which is having Elizabeth MacPherson, canny observer and all-around murder spoiler, on his tail... "Sharyn McCrunb is definitely a rising star in the New Golden Age of mystery fiction. I look forward to reading her for a long time to come." Elizabeth Peters
