Title: Monday Mourning
Author: Kathy Reichs
Series: Temperance Brennan #7
Rating Out of 5: 5 (I will read this again and again and again)
My Bookshelves:Anthropology, Science, Crime, Strong women
Pace: Fast
Format: Novel
Publisher: Arrow Books
Year: 2004
5th sentence, 74th page: Grabbing a lab coat from my office, I headed to the morgue.

Three skeletons are discovered in a Montreal basement.

The building is old, and the homicide detective in charge dismisses the reamins as historic. Not his case. Not his concern.

Forensic anthropologist Dr Temperance Brennan is not so sure. Something about the bones of these three young women suggests a different message: murder.

Soon she finds herself drawn ever deeper into a web of evil from which there may be no escape. Three women have disappeared, never to return. Will Tempe be next?

Mondays suck. And I love that this was highlighted not only in Reichs’ title for this novel, but also in the fact that every important moment in this story came on a Monday. Each revelation and spinning of the spider’s web happens on that horrible day, and ultimately, the climax and kind of horrible ending (in the best sense possible) also occurs on a Monday. Like I said, Mondays suck.

From the first discovery, it was obvious that this story was going to be kind of horrible. Three skeletons of young girls found in a basement – it doesn’t take much to realise that this is going to go places that you don’t necessarily want to go. The fact that it then leads to the villain of the story eventually escaping (and being an unexpected one at that)… well, when I finished this tale, I had goosebumps. I actually made sure that I didn’t read this story unless I knew my partner was going to be home for dark. The young women being the victims just hit a little too close to home.

As always, I love the level of science and detail that Reichs manages to bring to her work. By using expose to explain the science behind each discovery, you not only get swept away by the story, but you learn a lot. Good science is hard to come by in literature (at least in my experience), so having a series that not only manages to get my blood pumping, but also brings to life an area of my life that I love is the perfect way to spend a few spine-chilling nights curled up under a blanket.

<- Bare Bones

Cross Bones ->

Image source: Penguin Books Australia