Bones of Betrayal: A Body Farm Novel: 4 - Softcover

Bass, Jefferson

4.09

6,300 ratings by Goodreads

9780062277398: Bones of Betrayal: A Body Farm Novel: 4

Softcover

ISBN 10: 0062277391 ISBN 13: 9780062277398

Publisher: Harper, 2013

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Forged in the crucible of World War II, Oak Ridge, Tennessee, was a top-secret military installation--the linchpin of the Manhattan Project. Brilliant careers were born and dark secrets buried in the desperate race to build the Bomb. Those secrets begin to emerge when the body of a renowned physicist is discovered facedown in a frozen swimming pool.

Forensic anthropologist Bill Brockton, founder of the Body Farm, is shocked when an autopsy reveals the cause of Dr. Leonard Novak's death: a deadly radioactive pellet inside the elderly scientist's body. Who would commit such a horrific crime? Is it related to Novak's role in creating America's deadliest weapon? The answers may lie with the victim's aging ex-wife, Beatrice, a captivating yet utterly unreliable storyteller. Careening between history and fantasy, dementia and lucidity, Beatrice draws Brockton into a maze of memories, leading him to darker truths than he could have imagined.

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Review:

"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

"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"

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"

From the Back Cover:

The first three Body Farm novels—Carved in Bone, Flesh and Bone, and The Devil's Bones—took readers deep into the backwoods of East Tennessee, where fascinating forensic science mixed with extraordinary characters, including the Farm's charismatic founder. Now, in the latest installment of the New York Times bestselling series Kathy Reichs calls "the real deal," truth, lies, war, and history intertwine in a story that reaches new heights of suspense. This is Jefferson Bass's most ambitious and enthralling book yet.
Bones of Betrayal

Dr. Bill Brockton is in the middle of a nuclear-terrorism disaster drill when he receives an urgent call from the nearby town of Oak Ridge—better known as Atomic City, home of the Bomb, and the key site for the Manhattan Project during World War II. Although more than sixty years have passed, could repercussions from that dangerous time still be felt today?

With his graduate assistant Miranda Lovelady, Brockton hastens to the death scene, where they find a body frozen facedown in a swimming pool behind a historic, crumbling hotel. The forensic detectives identify the victim as Dr. Leonard Novak, a renowned physicist and designer of a plutonium reactor integral to the Manhattan Project. They also discover that he didn't drown: he died from a searing dose of radioactivity.

As that same peril threatens the medical examiner and even Miranda, Brockton enlists the help of a beautiful, enigmatic librarian to peel back the layers of Novak's life to the secret at its core. The physicist's house and personal life yield few clues beyond a faded roll of undeveloped film, but everything changes when Brockton chances upon Novak's ninety-year-old ex-wife, Beatrice. Charming and utterly unreliable, she takes him on a trip back into Oak Ridge's wartime past, deep into the shadows of the nuclear race where things were not quite as they seemed.

As Beatrice drifts between lucidity and dementia, Brockton wonders if her stories are fact or fancy, history or myth. But he knows one thing—that she holds the key to a mystery that is becoming increasingly labyrinthine. For as the radiation count steadily rises, and the race to find the truth intensifies, the old woman's tales hint at something far darker and more complex than the forensic anthropologist himself could have ever imagined.

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