I got this hardcover from Barnes and Noble. I love to read true-crime and forensic-science books, and this one has an unusual twist - the author's a forensic ecologist, rather than anthropologist, focusing on the plants and insects and other environmental factors that often feature in trace evidence in crime scenes or missing-person identifications.

The author refers to herself in the text as a palynologist - a "studier of dust" - referring to the accumulation of pollen grains, spores, microscopic creatures, and other things that form the dust all around us. Her work includes educating crime-scene responders in the best way to allow different specialists access, so that each new level of evidence-gathering can be done without muddying the waters for others.

She describes several cases here, sometimes finding ways to verify that an accused suspect was at the scene of the crime and sometimes helping to home in on the likely location of a body. The often-tedious process of gathering evidence and then sifting through it microscopically sounds like Extreme Jigsaw Puzzle solving (or worse), but her efforts pay off!

The book is also a memoir, with incidents from her childhood and student days helping nudge her into her chosen career.

I left this book in this Little Free Library before attending a BookCrossing meetup in the Porter Square Panera. Hope someone enjoys the book!

[See other recent releases in MA here.]

*** Released for the 2019 The The Release Challenge. ***