BONES OF BETRAYAL

by Jefferson Bass



"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?" (From the book jacket)

And my fluff reading jag continues with Bones of Betrayal, the fourth Body Farm novel. It is much like the others in that the story is engaging, but it's not a book you can't put down. The humor still feels a bit forced, but I didn't find myself rolling my eyes at the jokes quite as often as in the previous books. This one was more straight-up mystery than forensics, but it was a great book to help me pass my day in the hospital waiting room.

Some of the characters in Bones of Betrayal find themselves wrestling with their feelings regarding the U.S. decision to use the bombs code-named Little Boy and Fat Man, and that will probably be the aspect of this book that sticks with me the most. I'm not familiar with the deeper stories of the building of the nuclear weapons used on Hiroshima and Nagasaki, so learning about things like the Manhattan Project and the beginnings of the town of Oak Ridge, Tennessee was what really held my attention. I was inspired to pick up Hiroshima by John Hersey to continue my exploration into that side of WWII.