Unnatural Selection by Aaron Elkins

From the Publisher

When Gideon Oliver's wife Julie attends a conservation forum on the emerald Isles of Scilly, Gideon tags along, expecting a holiday. To amuse himself, he explores the Neolithic sites there. But instead of ancient ruins, he finds evidence of a very recent murder.

Publishers Weekly

Forensic sleuth Gideon Oliver accompanies his second wife, Julie, to an unusual gathering of conservation experts in the Scilly Isles in Edgar-winner Elkins's engaging 13th whodunit to feature the man known as the "Bone Detective" (after 2005's Where There's a Will). Frustrated by his passive role and forced to bite his tongue when opinions are voiced that strike him as lacking intellectual rigor, Oliver leaps at a chance to examine some human remains stored at the local museum. His casual look becomes something more when he determines that one humerus bone is a recent relic, leading to his rousing the sleepy local constabulary to a murder probe. When the victim turns out to have belonged to the conservation group, the circle of suspects centers on the surviving members. Elkins excels in making his hero's skills plausible and accessible to a lay audience, though some readers might wish for more depth of characterization. (June) Copyright 2006 Reed Business Information.

Kirkus Reviews

While his park-ranger wife Julie is wined and dined at a consortium on England's Isles of Scilly, forensic anthropologist Gideon Oliver (Where There's a Will, 2005, etc.) plans to tag along out of the limelight. As if. A cloud hangs over this year's Consortium of the Scillies. Shortly after eccentric millionaire Vasily Kozlov brought a diverse group of researchers together two years ago, cordially disliked Edgar Villarreal, who'd pulled out of the group and relinquished $50,000 in funding after he was attacked for his outspoken defense of grizzly bears who killed humans, was eaten by a bear himself in the wilds of Alaska. And he's not the only one haunting the returning members. Pete Williams, the provocative environmental biographer, dropped out of sight shortly after a heated confrontation with Villarreal. Even old-seeming bones offer no relief. While he's touring the local Isles of Scilly Museum, Gideon sees a tibia whose characteristics he tells director Madeleine Goodfellow he can establish. His examination soon leads to the discovery of a lot of other bones and an accusation of murder. Which of Julie's fellow Fellows-holistic ecologist Victor Waldo, hunting advocate Donald Pinckney, garbageologist Liz Petra or Gideon's old friend Rudy Walker, an anthropologist-turned-snowmobile advocate-is the killer?Though the Skeleton Detective seems more interested in the quick than the dead, the neat mystery is spiced by a great scene of Gideon excusing himself from an autopsy because he can't deal with soft tissue.

Product Details

• ISBN: 0641894996
  
• ISBN-13: 9780641894992
• Format: Hardcover, 288pp
• Publisher: Penguin Group (USA)
• Pub. Date: June 2006
• Edition Description: Bargain
• Sales Rank: 6,791
• Series: Gideon Oliver Series, #13

• Table of Contents

Table of Contents