The Bone Yard - (Body Farm Novel) Large Print by Jefferson Bass (Paperback)

About the Book

"[Bass is] the real deal."--Kathy Reichs

The sixth electrifying forensic mystery by author Jefferson Bass ("a fresh voice in the crime novel arena" --Seattle Post-Intelligencer), The Bone Yard is the most gripping installment yet in the New York Times bestselling Body Farm series. Called away from Tennessee's renowned Body Farm (the real life human decomposition laboratory around which these remarkable thrillers are based), Dr. Bill Brockton discovers the dark side of the Sunshine state when he's called in to investigate human remains found on the grounds of a Florida boys' reform school. Rich in authentic forensic detail and featuring a protagonist as involving as crime fiction's most popular medical examiners--including Patricia Cornwell's Kay Scarpetta, Karin Slaughter's Sara Linton, and Kathy Reichs's star forensic anthropologist Temperance Brennan--The Bone Yard is unassailable evidence that this series "just keeps getting better" (Booklist).

Book Synopsis

"[Bass is] the real deal."
--Kathy Reichs

The sixth electrifying forensic mystery by author Jefferson Bass ("a fresh voice in the crime novel arena" --Seattle Post-Intelligencer), The Bone Yard is the most gripping installment yet in the New York Times bestselling Body Farm series. Called away from Tennessee's renowned Body Farm (the real life human decomposition laboratory around which these remarkable thrillers are based), Dr. Bill Brockton discovers the dark side of the Sunshine state when he's called in to investigate human remains found on the grounds of a Florida boys' reform school. Rich in authentic forensic detail and featuring a protagonist as involving as crime fiction's most popular medical examiners--including Patricia Cornwell's Kay Scarpetta, Karin Slaughter's Sara Linton, and Kathy Reichs's star forensic anthropologist Temperance Brennan--The Bone Yard is unassailable evidence that this series "just keeps getting better" (Booklist).

From the Back Cover

The onset of summer brings steamy weather to East Tennessee and the Body Farm, Dr. Bill Brockton's human-decomposition research facility at the University of Tennessee. But even Brockton is about to get more heat than he's bargained for when a former student asks him to help prove that her sister's death was not suicide, but murder.

Brockton's quick consulting trip takes a long, harrowing detour to the Florida panhandle and the ruins of the North Florida Boys' Reformatory, a notorious juvenile detention facility that met a fiery end more than forty years ago. Guided by the discovery of a diary kept by one of the school's young "students," he finds a cluster of shallow graves, all of them containing the bones of boys who met violent deaths. As Brockton and his team close in on the truth, they find skeletons in some surprisingly prominent closets . . . and they learn that the ghosts of the past pose perilous consequences in the present.

Review Quotes

"The forensic thriller meets a formidable slice of history in Jefferson Bass's impressive new novel....In addition to being a riveting mystery with an intricately emotional conclusion, Bones of Betrayal bears witness to the past with great respect for the long shadow it casts." - Washington Post
"Bones of Betrayal has more than its share of twists, turns, and red herrings....Wartime Oak Ridge proves nearly as atmospheric a crime scene as Sam Spade's San Francisco or Philip Marlowe's L.A." - Wilmington Star News
"This series . . . just keeps getting better. [Bones of Betrayal] features both the most compelling story and the best portrayal yet of Brockton, who has completed the transition from fictional representation of coauthor Bass to fully realized protagonist." - Booklist
"Move over, Kathy Reichs. The Sherlock Holmes for bones has arrived." - Katherine Ramsland, Author of The Forensic Science of C.S.I.
"The finest forensic thriller we have reviewed this year." - Mystery Tribune