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RUMOR OF BONES, A by Beverly Connor Cumberland House, March 2001 320 pages $7.99 ISBN: 1581821999

Lindsay Chamberlain is spending her summer at an archaeological dig in Georgia; as a forensic anthropologist, it is her job to analyze the human and animal bones found in this former Indian settlement. By studying the bones, Lindsay can learn the sex and age of the person they belonged to, and she may also be able to figure out how the person died. Lindsay's skills also make her valuable to the nearby community of Merry Claymoore, where several skeletons of small children have turned up. At the sheriff's request, Lindsay identifies the bodies; she is upset to see that the deaths occurred recently, and that the girls' bones indicate that the children had been molested. To top it off, another relatively recent burial has turned up at the archaeological site. Lindsay's determination to find the children's killer and to identify the body found on the site means that this will be no ordinary dig.

This is Beverly Connor's first book in a series of novels about Lindsay, and I enjoyed the forensic anthropology element. Lindsay, with her skill in identifying bones and determining what the person looked like when they were alive, is ideally suited to the amateur sleuth role. It makes sense that she would be interested in the bones that were discovered, and yet she is also believably upset about the fates of the girls and hates having to tell their parents that their remains have been found. I would have liked even more information about the methods Lindsay used in studying the bones, though. Connor gives an overview of how Lindsay determines the age of the recent burial found on the site, for instance, but I thought she could have gone into more detail without scaring off the reader.

Although I plan to look for the rest of the books in the series, this first effort shows room for improvement. The dialogue seemed stilted and unnatural at times; all the characters spoke in an overly formal fashion. I also thought that a few plot elements were not resolved, especially with regard to the murders of the girls. The other major problem with the book was the constant typos, including omitted letters and words that were strung together. There were a few instances of the wrong word being used as well, with the most notable example being "waddle and daub" instead of "wattle and daub" to describe the buildings on the site. I only took one semester of anthropology in college and that mistake jumped off the page at me, so I have a hard time believing that Connor, herself trained in anthropology, would make such an error. Nevertheless, the book remains an entertaining read.

Editor's Note: This is a review of the hardcover edition, which may be out of print. The purchasing information is for the paperback.

Reviewed by Kathleen Chappell, May 2002

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