Devil Bones

First, my apologies to both Scribner and Mini Book Expo. The delay in posting this review should not have happened. However, I must plead extenuating circumstances as I found myself without an internet connection for the past three weeks.

That said, let us move on to the book, a much more interesting story.


Devil Bones by Kathy Reichs

Author Information: (taken from her website credentials)

Kathy Reichs's first novel Déjà Dead catapulted her to fame when it became a New York Times bestseller and won the 1997 Ellis Award for Best First Novel. Her other Temperance Brennan novels include Death du Jour, Deadly Décisions, Fatal Voyage, Grave Secrets, Bare Bones, Monday Mourning, Cross Bones, Break No Bones, Bones to Ashes, and Devil Bones(August 28, 2008).

From teaching FBI agents how to detect and recover human remains, to separating and identifying commingled body parts in her Montreal lab, as a forensic anthropologist Kathy Reichs has brought her own dramatic work experience to her mesmerizing forensic thrillers. For years she consulted to the Office of the Chief Medical Examiner in North Carolina, and continues to do so for the Laboratoire de Sciences Judiciaires et de Médecine Légale for the province of Québec. Dr. Reichs has traveled to Rwanda to testify at the UN Tribunal on Genocide, and helped exhume a mass grave in Guatemala. As part of her work at JPAC (formerly CILHI) she aided in the identification of war dead from World War II, Korea, and Southeast Asia.

Dr. Reichs is one of only seventy-seven forensic anthropologists ever certified by the American Board of Forensic Anthropology. She served on the Board of Directors and as Vice President of the American Academy of Forensic Sciences, and is currently a member of the National Police Services Advisory Board in Canada. She is a Professor in the Department of Anthropology at the University of North Carolina-Charlotte.

Dr. Reichs is a native of Chicago, where she received her Ph.D. at Northwestern. She now divides her time between Charlotte, NC and Montreal, Quebec.

Plot Summary: (taken from the back of the book)

In a house under renovation, a plumber uncovers a cellar no one knew about, and makes a rather grisly discovery -- a decapitated chicken, animal bones, and cauldrons containing beads, feathers, and other relics of religious ceremonies. In the center of the shrine, there is the skull of a teenage girl. Meanwhile, on a nearby lakeshore, the headless body of a teenage boy is found by a man walking his dog.

Nothing is clear -- neither when the deaths occurred, nor where. Was the skull brought to the cellar or was the girl murdered there? Why is the boy's body remarkably well preserved? Led by a preacher turned politician, citizen vigilantes blame devil worshippers and Wiccans. They begin a witch hunt, intent on seeking revenge.

Forensic anthropologist Temperance Brennan -- "five-five, feisty, and forty-plus" -- is called in to investigate, and a complex and gripping tale unfolds in this, Kathy Reichs's eleventh taut, always surprising, scientifically fascinating mystery.

Format:

This is a 304-page novel, divided into 39 chapters. Chapter length varies from 5 to 9 pages each. The narration is first person The ISBN-13 of this book is 978-0-7432-9438-6 and the ISBN-10 of this book is 0-7432-9438-6. Scribner, an imprint of Simon & Shuster, publishes this book.

Analysis:

I have been a happy reader of Kathy Reichs since I read her first novel, Déjà Dead. The characters are complex, well rounded, and just flawed enough to make them interesting. Her plot lines flow and the science is a fascinating glimpse inside a number of disciplines.

Devil Bones is a great Halloween tale. It has all the necessary elements of voodoo ceremonies, cauldrons, beads, feathers, and bones, skulls and even a headless torso. There are devil worshippers and Wiccans, Christians and politicians.

As always, Kathy Reichs’ writing flows smoothly and makes for an easy read. As always, her characters are complex and varied. Altogether, a decent book … decent but not great. In fact, the book seemed a bit choppy. Truth is, I could see this as a movie or maybe a TV show.

And that’s the problem with this book, in a nutshell. It would be a great TV show script. The scenes do not flow together as they should in a book; they take time out for commercial breaks. The characters and situations are a little too contrived for reading but would make for gripping scenes. All told, it would have been an excellent Halloween episode on Bones.

Conclusion

Kathy Reichs is currently working hard at producing that TV show. Bones is enjoying great success and not surprising as she brings the same brilliant story telling to the show as she has to her books.

That said, this book suffers for her TV success. The characters show no new development. The story is a little too contrived and the wrap-up too neat and tidy. So for me, a decent read, just not great. But, yes, it would be a great episode of Bones.