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Not Top Notch

by Toni Osborne

• Top Book Reviewer

5 years ago

The discovery of a young skeleton in Acadia is for Temperance Brennan (forensic anthropologist) more to her than another assignment. Tempe believes the bones could be her childhood friend Evangeline Landry, who disappeared three decades ago without a trace. Looking back Tempe vaguely remembers being told to forget Evangeline ever lived. --------------Could this New Brunswick skeleton be part of a series of cold cases Temp and Andrew Ryan have been investigating? Flooded with memories and armed with the latest techniques in forensics, Temp penetrates the past while the hunt is on to find the serial killer. Set in Canada, Ms Reichs gives us an insight into the Acadians living in New Brunswick and the “Chiac” dialect spoken there. The fast-paced story line is action-packed, as expected. The subplots are interesting; Ryan plays a big part in the book. Temp’s totally irritating and over the top sister Harry shoes up playing Nancy Drew. There is a fair amount of mystery and suspense converging into an interesting conclusion. As usual with Reichs, the science is superb. The author details human decomposition, with specifics about the processes of putrefaction, mummification, and saponification. Great if you can stomach the details. This novel is not one I would describe as top notch but it is better than average……