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It's a summer of sizzling heat in Charlotte where Dr. Temperance Brennan, forensic anthropologist for the North Carolina medical examiner, looks forward to her first vacation in years. A romantic vacation. She's almost out the door when the bones start appearing.
A newborn's charred remains turn up in a woodstove. The mother, Tamela Banks, hardly more than a child herself, has disappeared. Did she kill her infant, or is an innocent teenager also about to become a victim?
A small plane crashes in a North Carolina cornfield on a sunny afternoon. Both pilot and passenger are burned beyond recognition. Was it pilot error? Something more sinister? And what is the mysterious black substance covering the bodies?
Most puzzling of all are the bones discovered at a remote farm outside Charlotte. What has Tempe's dog, Boyd, unearthed? The remains seem to be of animal origin, but Tempe is shocked when she gets them to her lab.
With help from a special detective friend, Tempe must investigate a poignant and terrifying case that comes at the worst possible moment. Daughter Katy has a new boyfriend who Tempe fears may have something to hide. And important personal decisions face Tempe. Is it time for emotional commitment? Will she have the chance to find out?
Everything must wait on the bones. What story do they tell? Why are the X rays and DNA so perplexing? Who is trying to keep Tempe from the answers? Someone is following her. Someone is following Katy. That someone must be stopped before it's too late.
With the riveting authenticity that only world-class forensic anthropologist Kathy Reichs can bring to her fiction, Bare Bones asks important questions and thrills us to its pulsating end. Fresh from the success of Grave Secrets, Reichs proves once again that she is the consummate crime-writing star.
Reichs mulled over those experiences for about seven years before deciding to apply her ideas to fiction. Out came Déjà Dead in 1997, introducing mystery fans to a new but, more likely than not, recognizable heroine: forensics expert Temperance Brennan, a fortyish, recovering alcoholic on the run from a wobbling marriage. Brennan—a sort of mix between Nancy Drew and Quincy—is also something of a hothead, prone to marching off on her own when she runs afoul of a sexist male cop. This is the kind of woman who would sit down to brunch with Vic Warshawski, Kay Scarpetta, or Jane Tennison, if any of them did brunch.
As a forensic anthropologist for the state of North Carolina, as well as the province of Québec, Reichs draws heavily from her own experiences standing over the autopsy table. Her novels—Death du Jour, Deadly Decisions, Grave Secrets and the like—are packed with the kind of well informed clinical details that make critics take notice. "The doctor clearly knows a hawk from a handsaw," wrote The New York Times about one of her books.
She also built some parallels to her own biography when creating Tempe Brennan. Both women are forensic anthropologists with the unlikely dual addresses of North Carolina and Canada. But Reichs rolls her eyes when asked about the comparisons. "Personally, she's completely her own person," Reichs told USA Today in 1997. "She gets physically involved. She takes risks I've never been tempted to take."
Reichs was editing forensics textbooks when she began toying with writing a novel. The initial result, she said, was a dud: slow, boring, and in the third person. But it picked up steam when she came up with the Brennan character. Inspired by friend and medical examiner Bill Maples, author of Dead Men Do Tell Tales, she sat down to write, meticulously drafting an outline of her story and getting up early to write before teaching classes at the University of North Carolina. It took her two years.
The effort paid off when her manuscript made the rounds of the Frankfurt Book Fair. A heated auction won Reichs a million-dollar, two-book deal.
Critics and readers alike loved Tempe. Wrote the Library Journal, "Despite her ability to work among fetid, putrefying smells that 'leap out and grab' and her 'go-to-hell attitude' with seasoned cops, Tempe is as vulnerable as a soft Carolina morning." And People magazine said, "Reichs not only serves up a delicious plot, she also brings a new recipe to hard-boiled cop talk."
Over chicken salad lunches with newspaper reporters, Reichs will casually talk about dismembered bodies, maggots, and concerns for her children's security in light of some of the unsavory characters she'd testified against. But then she'll confess her true idea of a waking nightmare. "[My] idea of horror would be to sit in a little gray office all day and add up columns of numbers," she told USA Today. "I say to people, 'How do you do that?"'
One of the reasons she is Québec's forensics anthropologist is because she is one of the few in the profession who is fluent in French.
Among her favorite books are the science fiction series the Hitchhiker's Guide Douglas Adams. "It's one of the few things I re-read because it's just nothing to do with anything I do," she has said.
She avoided college literature courses to concentrate on science.
In 2005, Fox TV launched Bones, a forensics/police procedural inspired by Reichs's life and writing. In a neat twist, the main character, Temperance Brennan, is a forensic anthropologist who, as a sideline, writes thrillers about a fictional anthropologist named Kathy Reichs!
Kathy's daughter, Kerry Reichs, made her literary debut in 2008 with the romantic comedy The Best Day of Someone Else's Life.
As I was packaging what remained of the dead baby, the man I would kill was burning pavement north toward Charlotte.
I didn't know that at the time. I'd never heard the man's name, knew nothing of the grisly game in which he was a player.
At that moment I was focused on what I would say to Gideon Banks. How would I break the news that his grandchild was dead, his youngest daughter on the run?
My brain cells had been bickering all morning. You're a forensic anthropologist, the logic guys would say. Visiting the family is not your responsibility. The medical examiner will report your findings. The homicide detective will deliver the news. A phone call.
All valid points, the conscience guys would counter. But this case is different. You know Gideon Banks.
I felt a deep sadness as I tucked the tiny bundle of bones into its container, fastened the lid, and wrote a file number across the plastic. So little to examine. Such a short life.
As I secured the tub in an evidence locker, the memory cells floated an image of Gideon Banks. Wrinkled brown face, fuzzy gray hair, voice like ripping duct tape.
Expand the image.
A small man in a plaid flannel shirt arcing a string mop across a tile floor.
The memory cells had been offering the same image all morning. Though I'd tried to conjure up others, this one kept reappearing.
Gideon Banks and I had worked together at the University of North Carolina at Charlotte for almost two decades until his retirement three years back. I'd periodically thanked him for keeping my office and lab clean, given him birthday cards and a small gift each Christmas. I knew he was conscientious, polite, deeply religious, and devoted to his kids.
And he kept the corridors spotless.
That was it. Beyond the workplace, our lives did not connect.
Until Tamela Banks placed her newborn in a woodstove and vanished.
Crossing to my office, I booted up my laptop and spread my notes across the desktop. I'd barely begun my report when a form filled the open doorway.
"A home visit really is above and beyond."
I hit "save" and looked up.
The Mecklenburg County medical examiner was wearing green surgical scrubs. A stain on his right shoulder mimicked the shape of Massachusetts in dull red.
"I don't mind." Like I didn't mind suppurating boils on my buttocks.
"I'll be glad to speak to him."
Tim Larabee might have been handsome were it not for his addiction to running. The daily marathon training had wizened his body, thinned his hair, and leatherized his face. The perpetual tan seemed to gather in the hollows of his cheeks, and to pool around eyes set way too deep. Eyes that were now crimped with concern.
"Next to God and the Baptist church, family has been the cornerstone of Gideon Banks's life," I said. "This will shake him."
"Perhaps it's not as bad as it seems."
I gave Larabee the Look. We'd had this conversation an hour earlier.
"All right." He raised a sinewy hand. "It seems bad. I'm sure Mr. Banks will appreciate the personal input. Who's driving you?"
"Skinny Slidell."
"Your lucky day."
"I wanted to go alone, but Slidell refused to take no for an answer."
"Not Skinny?" Mock surprise.
"I think Skinny's hoping for some kind of lifetime achievement award."
"I think Skinny's hoping to get laid."
I pegged a pen at him. He batted it down.
"Watch yourself."
Larabee withdrew. I heard the autopsy room door click open, then shut.
I checked my watch. Three forty-two. Slidell would be here in twenty minutes. The brain cells did a collective cringe. On Skinny there was cerebral agreement.
I shut the computer down and leaned back in my chair.
What would I say to Gideon Banks?
Bad luck, Mr. Banks. Looks like your youngest gave birth, wrapped the tyke in a blanket, and used him as kindling.
Good, Brennan.
Wham-o! The visual cells sent up a new mental image. Banks pulling a Kodak print from a cracked leather wallet. Six brown faces. Close haircuts for the boys, pigtails for the girls. All with teeth too big for the smiles.
Zoom out.
The old man beaming over the photo, adamant that each child would go to college.
Did they?
No idea.
I slipped off my lab coat and hung it on the hook behind my door.
If the Banks kids had attended UNC-Charlotte while I was on the faculty, they'd shown little interest in anthropology. I'd met only one. Reggie, a son midrange in the offspring chronology, had taken my human evolution course.
The memory cells offered a gangly kid in a baseball cap, brim low over razor-blade brows. Last row in the lecture hall. A intellect, C+ effort.
How long ago? Fifteen years? Eighteen?
I'd worked with a lot of students back then. In those days my research focused on the ancient dead, and I'd taught several undergraduate classes. Bioarchaeology. Osteology. Primate ecology.
One morning an anthro grad showed up at my lab. A homicide detective with the Charlotte-Mecklenburg PD, she'd brought bones recovered from a shallow grave. Could her former prof determine if the remains were those of a missing child?
I could. They were.
That case was my first encounter with coroner work. Today the only seminar I teach is in forensic anthropology, and I commute between Charlotte and Montreal serving as forensic anthropologist to each jurisdiction.
The geography had been difficult when I'd taught full-time, requiring complex choreography within the academic calendar. Now, save for the duration of that single seminar, I shift as needed. A few weeks north, a few weeks south, longer when casework or court testimony requires.
North Carolina and Quebec? Long story.
My academic colleagues call what I do "applied." Using my knowledge of bones, I tease details from cadavers and skeletons, or parts thereof, too compromised for autopsy. I give names to the skeletal, the decomposed, the mummified, the burned, and the mutilated, who might otherwise go to anonymous graves. For some, I determine the manner and time of their passing.
With Tamela's baby there'd been but a cup of charred fragments. A newborn is chump change to a woodstove.
Mr. Banks, I'm so sorry to have to tell you, but --
My cell phone sounded.
"Yo, Doc. I'm parked out front." Skinny Slidell. Of the twenty-four detectives in the Charlotte-Mecklenburg PD Felony Investigative Bureau/Homicide Unit, perhaps my least favorite.
"Be right there."
I'd been in Charlotte several weeks when an informant's tip led to the shocking discovery in the woodstove. The bones had come to me. Slidell and his partner had caught the case as a homicide. They'd tossed the scene, tracked down witnesses, taken statements. Everything led to Tamela Banks.
I shouldered my purse and laptop and headed out. In passing, I stuck my head into the autopsy room. Larabee looked up from his gunshot victim and waggled a gloved finger in warning.
My reply was an exaggerated eye roll.
The Mecklenburg County Medical Examiner facility occupies one end of a featureless brick shoebox that entered life as a Sears Garden Center. The other end of the shoebox houses satellite offices of the Charlotte-Mecklenburg Police Department. Devoid of architectural charm save a slight rounding of the edges, the building is surrounded by enough asphalt to pave Rhode Island.
As I exited the double glass doors, my nostrils drank in an olfactory cocktail of exhaust, smog, and hot pavement. Heat radiated from the building walls, and from the brick steps connecting it to a small tentacle of the parking lot.
Hot town. Summer in the city.
A black woman sat in the vacant lot across College Street, back to a sycamore, elephant legs stretched full length on the grass. The woman was fanning herself with a newspaper, animatedly arguing some point with a nonexistent adversary.
A man in a Hornets jersey was muscling a shopping cart up the sidewalk in the direction of the county services building. He stopped just past the woman, wiped his forehead with the crook of his arm, and checked his cargo of plastic bags.
Noticing my gaze, the cart man waved. I waved back.
Slidell's Ford Taurus idled at the bottom of the stairs, AC blasting, tinted windows full up. Descending, I opened the back door, shoved aside file folders, a pair of golf shoes stuffed with audiotapes, two Burger King bags, and a squeeze tube of suntan lotion, and wedged my computer into the newly created space.
Erskine "Skinny" Slidell undoubtedly thought of himself as "old school," though God alone knew what institution would claim him. With his knockoff Ray-Bans, Camel breath, and four-letter speech, Slidell was an unwittingly self-created caricature of a Hollywood cop. People told me he was good at his job. I found it hard to believe.
At the moment of my approach Dirty Harry was checking his lower incisors in the rearview mirror, lips curled back in a monkey-fear grimace.
Hearing the rear door open, Slidell jumped, and his hand shot to the mirror. As I slid into the passenger seat, he was fine-tuning the rearview with the diligence of an astronaut adjusting Hubble.
"Doc." Slidell kept his faux Ray-Bans pointed at the mirror.
"Detective." I nodded, placed my purse at my feet, and closed the door.
At last satisfied with the angle of reflection, Slidell abandoned the mirror, shifted into gear, crossed the lot, and shot across College onto Phifer.
We rode in silence. Though the temperature in the car was thirty degrees lower than that outside, the air was thick with its own blend of odors. Old Whoppers and fries. Sweat. Bain de Soleil. The bamboo mat on which Slidell parked his ample backside.
Skinny Slidell himself. The man smelled and looked like an "after" shot for an antismoking poster. During the decade and a half I'd been consulting for the Mecklenburg County ME, I'd had the pleasure of working with Slidell on several occasions. Each had been a trip to Aggravation Row. This case promised to be another.
The Bankses' home was in the Cherry neighborhood, just southeast of I-277, Charlotte's version of an inner beltway. Cherry, unlike many inner-city quartiers, had not enjoyed the renaissance experienced in recent years by Dilworth and Elizabeth to the west and north. While those neighborhoods had integrated and yuppified, Cherry's fortunes had headed south. But the community held true to its ethnic roots. It started out black and remained so today.
Within minutes Slidell passed an Autobell car wash, turned left off Independence Boulevard onto a narrow street, then right onto another. Oaks and magnolias thirty, forty, a hundred years old threw shadows onto modest frame and brick houses. Laundry hung limp on clotheslines. Sprinklers ticked and whirred, or lay silent at the ends of garden hoses. Bicycles and Big Wheels dotted yards and walkways.
Slidell pulled to the curb halfway up the block, and jabbed a thumb at a small bungalow with dormer windows jutting from the roof. The siding was brown, the trim white.
"Beats the hell outta that rat's nest where the kid got fried. Thought I'd catch scabies tossing that dump."
"Scabies is caused by mites." My voice was chillier than the car interior.
"Exactly. You wouldn't have believed that shithole."
"You should have worn gloves."
"You got that right. And a respirator. These people -- "
"What people would that be, Detective?"
"Some folks live like pigs."
"Gideon Banks is a hardworking, decent man who raised six children largely on his own."
"Wife beat feet?"
"Melba Banks died of breast cancer ten years ago." There. I did know something about my coworker.
"Bum luck."
The radio crackled some message that was lost on me.
"Still don't excuse kids dropping their shorts with no regard for consequences. Get jammed up? No-o-o-o problem. Have an abortion."
Slidell killed the engine and turned the Ray-Bans on me.
"Or worse."
"There may be some explanation for Tamela Banks's actions."
I didn't really believe that, had spent all morning taking the opposite position with Tim Larabee. But Slidell was so irritating I found myself playing devil's advocate.
"Right. And the chamber of commerce will probably name her mother of the year."
"Have you met Tamela?" I asked, forcing my voice level.
"No. Have you?"
No. I ignored Slidell's question.
"Have you met any of the Banks family?"
"No, but I took statements from folks who were snorting lines in the next room while Tamela incinerated her kid." Slidell pocketed the keys. "Excusez-moi if I haven't dropped in for tea with the lady and her relations."
"You've never had to deal with any of the Banks kids because they were raised with good, solid values. Gideon Banks is as straitlaced as -- "
"The mutt Tamela's screwing ain't close to straight up."
"The baby's father?"
"Unless Miss Hot Pants was entertaining while Daddy was dealing."
Easy! The man is a cockroach.
"Who is he?"
"His name is Darryl Tyree. Tamela was shacking up in Tyree's little piece of heaven out on South Tryon."
"Tyree sells drugs?"
"And we're not talking the Eckerd's pharmacy." Slidell hit the door handle and got out.
I bit back a response. One hour. It's over.
A stab of guilt. Over for me, but what about Gideon Banks? What about Tamela and her dead baby?
I joined Slidell on the sidewalk.
"Je-zus. It's hot enough to burn a polar bear's butt."
"It's August."
"I should be at the beach."
Yes, I thought. Under four tons of sand.
I followed Slidell up a narrow walk littered with fresh-mown grass to a small cement stoop. He pressed a thumb to a rusted button beside the front door, dug a hanky from his back pocket, and wiped his face.
No response.
Slidell knocked on a wooden portion of the screen door.
Nothing.
Slidell knocked again. His forehead glistened and his hair was separating into wet clumps.
"Police, Mr. Banks."
Slidell banged with the heel of his hand. The screen door rattled in its frame.
"Gideon Banks!"
Condensation dripped from a window AC to the left of the door. A lawn mower whined in the distance. Hip-hop drifted from somewhere up the block.
Slidell banged again. A dark crescent winked from his gray polyester armpit.
"Anyone home?"
The AC's compressor kicked on. A dog barked.
Slidell yanked the screen.
Whrrrrp!
Pounded on the wooden door.
Bam! Bam! Bam!
Released the screen. Barked his demand.
"Police! Anyone there?"
Across the street, a curtain flicked, dropped back into place.
Had I imagined it?
A drop of perspiration rolled down my back to join the others soaking my bra and waistband.
At that moment my cell phone rang.
I answered.
That call swept me into a vortex of events that ultimately led to my taking a life.
Copyright © 2003 by Temperance Brennan, L.P.
eaw62995
Posted January 30, 2010
I Also Recommend:
This book was very good from start to finish and had an amazing plot. I would definately read this books again and I reccommend it to those people who are fans of murder and mystery and even those CSi TV shows.
2 out of 2 people found this review helpful.
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Posted October 27, 2009
I Also Recommend:
This book was interesting! But REALLY like cute. She obviously LOVES Ryan. I love how Boyd (Hooch) is almost like the hero in here. He seems like a loyal and great dog. I absolutley thought this book was amazing! But at atleast 1 point I got a tad confused, but that happens to me alot.
1 out of 1 people found this review helpful.
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Posted February 5, 2006
Illegal wildlife trade, romance, and many suspicious deaths make for a complex but interesting plot. I always appreciate the authenticity and complexity of Reichs' characters. Bare Bones continues the trend. Bare Bones evidences Reichs' expertise in forensic anthropology, and an impressive level of research into the illegal wildlife market. It's not your average murder mystery. Bare Bones also demonstrates Reichs' excellent ability to craft dialogue, her sense of humor, and a compelling romance. An excellent read.
1 out of 1 people found this review helpful.
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Posted May 21, 2012
Another good book in the series.
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Posted March 19, 2012
I really enjoy kathy Reich's style.
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Posted February 27, 2012
Always keeps you going. Unusual sequence Love it! Have read other books by this author and enjoyed them I would say her books are for those who like something unusual. Gripping tales!
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Posted December 20, 2011
Moderately dynamic, its not a one night read, but it is quite entertaining.
Was this review helpful? Yes NoThank you for your feedback. Report this reviewThank you, this review has been flagged.As an avid reader, and a huge fan of the television drama, Bones, I was anxcious to start reading the book series. It was just a little bit disappointing. None of the charactors fron the T.V. show are in the book, accept for Temperance Brennan, and she is totally different than her show version. She has a grown daughter, and works out of Canada, not the Smithonian. Theren is no "Booth",or any of her series co-workers. I purchased three different books, and I'm not too sure I'll order more. I gave it three stars, because the story was not bad, bjut not Bones either.
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Posted August 21, 2011
I recommend starting with Deja Dead and reading right on through! You won't regret it!
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Posted July 24, 2011
This was the first book i have read about her and i was hooked from the first to the last page of this book two thumbs up hope to read more of her books
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Posted May 27, 2011
No text was provided for this review.
Anonymous
Posted May 22, 2007
i love this book. i read almost most all brennan novels than i found out that there's a shwo based on the books. It's called BONES and it's great. it's on fox and if you love teh books you should watch the show. Note: the seson finale was last week.
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Posted August 17, 2005
There was really just too much going on in this story. It was an exhausting read. Ornithology, forensics, drug smuggling details, bear poaching details, headless bodies, ancestral traits, a suicidal teen and a dead baby. And are all of the Black people in the Carolinas fat? I'm sure they're not, but you wouldn't know it from this book.
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Posted November 21, 2004
I loved Dr. Brennan and Detective Andrew Ryan as well as tough guy cop Erskine, 'Skinny' Slidell! Dr. Reichs did an excellent job creating human and animal characters and using the dog, Boyd, in sniffing out both danger and the bones she examines. BARE BONES was a fascinating tale of drug smuggling interwoven with poaching and profit in animals for medicinal uses. Their mistreatment at the hands of humans saddens me. Her study of various human populations and genetic disorders were also of interest. I liked the rant at the end; it showed Dr. Brennan's heart and facts about endangered animals.
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Posted January 29, 2004
After being introduced to Reichs recently by a colleague, I read all but two of her books. I am very impressed and hooked on the series. The writing is first rate and although in the same genre as Patricia Cornwell, is much more detailed, believable and human. However, I am disappointed by the fact that in each book, as the plot thickens and reaches its peak, Tempe Brennan predictably finds herself attacked by the guilty party. That predictability made this a 4 star read rather than 5 stars. Nonetheless, I anxiously await the next installment.
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Posted September 27, 2003
I love Kathy Reichs and her books. I love the main character Tempe Brennan and the situations she gets in. Bare Bones is about bear poaching, drugs, a headless body and a baby's charred remains found in a stove. This book began well and had me hooked right up until the end. The way it ended stunned me - it happened so quickly and was almost an anticlimax. Then Tempe goes off on this long rant, with statistics and figures, about people who poach and/or smuggle animals that are used for medicinal purposes or because they are rare. The rant should have been left out - it was totally out of character for Tempe and I get the distinct feeling this was more of an issue to Reichs. She should have written that part as an afterword. Other than that, I loved this book and can't wait for the next one. I hope Reichs cuts down on the preaching and ratchets up the action!
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Posted August 12, 2003
I love Kathy Reichs' books and I highly recommend all of her previous novels. Bare Bones was disappointing for me. The dialogue was clipped and the language was too course for Tempe. The storyline lacked the careful foundation for her plots that she has always laid out in her other novels. I would have enjoyed this book more had she not intertwined the three plots, but simultaneously worked three investigations and only connected two of them. Ms. Reichs does not need to compete with Patricia Cornwell, her writing is far superior and her storylines more believable. I still recommend Bare Bones as a fast and good summer read. I can't wait for her next book.
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Posted August 17, 2003
This author improves with each novel. Bare Bones moves so quickly you can 'barely' stand to put it down. An intelligent read that still entertains.
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Posted July 2, 2003
i've been waiting patiently for this book and the release of 'bare bones' couldn't have come a better time. kathy reichs' never insults her reader's intelligence, but manages to explain the science and the forensics involved in her difficult field so smoothly and logically that the reader feels a part of the investigation and a part of tempe's life. i'm hooked!!
Was this review helpful? Yes NoThank you for your feedback. Report this reviewThank you, this review has been flagged.Tempe Brennan shuttles between Charlotte, North Caroline and Quebec serving as a forensic anthropologist as needed. Currently she is in Charlotte, informing someone she knows that his granddaughter was burned to death in a wood stove and the police want to question his daughter. After she performs that grim duty, she, her daughter and their dog attend a barbecue party.
When the canine behaves like he did once before when he found a body, Tempe looks and finds bones. Her initial determination is that they are bear remains, which leaves her happy that no one was murdered and she and her Canadian boyfriend can go on a vacation. Just hours before she is to pick him up, she is called to the site of a plane crash where the bodies of two men were burned beyond recognition. While examining the bones for clues to the identity, Tempe relooks the bear remains and finds a human bone. This discovery leads to a series of events that force Tempe to either take a life or forfeit her own.
Kathy Reichs gets better with each book she writes. Considering the stratospheric level she started at that is quite an accomplishment. Her protagonist has made life-altering decisions and acts upon them so that the character stays fresh. BARE BONES is a thriller that fans of Patricia Cornwell and Linda Fairstein will enjoy. The novel contains just enough forensic data to make the story line understandable but not enough to overwhelm the reader. It is easy to predict that this book will be a New York Times best seller.
Harriet Klausner
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Overview
From number one internationally bestselling author Kathy Reichs comes a masterful new novel of cutting-edge forensics and gripping suspense.
It's a summer of sizzling heat in Charlotte where Dr. Temperance Brennan, forensic anthropologist for the North Carolina medical examiner, looks forward to her first vacation in years. A romantic vacation. She's almost out the door when the bones start appearing.
A newborn's charred remains turn up in a woodstove. The mother, Tamela Banks, hardly more than a child herself, has disappeared. Did she kill her infant, or is an innocent teenager also ...