There's a supply-chain disruption story for this book, which I waited nearly a year to get from my local library (which was not their fault!) but the wait was definitely worth it. Like the other two books in the series which I reviewed this time last year, this non-fiction book about…bones … is written in short chapters with lots of photos and text boxes with interesting facts to keep even the most reluctant reader glued to the page.
But let's face it. Who's not going to be glued to the page reading this?
There are nine chapters and the author starts with the finding of King Richard III's (of Shakespeare's famous play) body beneath the remains of an English church and the search for DNA from living relatives to confirm their ancestral King's identity.
She then moves on to my favorite-of-all-time volcanic eruption, Krakatoa, and how on the African coast of Tanzania / Zanzibar in 1884 people discovered pieces of human skeletons on the beaches. They were the unfortunate victims of Krakatoa's eruption 5,500 miles, an entire ocean, and 11 months earlier!
Similarly in 1815, Mount Tambora erupted and killed about 117,000 people, most of whose remains are still buried, but a few have been excavated to tell their final tales.
The author then moves on to examine my favorite fatal Arctic expedition, the Franklin Expedition, which left behind a trail of bones as the men fled the ship and struck out across the frozen tundra -- and either died or ate each other.
Cannibalism is a recurring theme, as the next chapter tackles Jamestown in 1609 and the Chilean soccer team whose plane crash landed in the Andes in 1972, although some survivors followed their strong Catholic faith and refused to partake. I can honestly say, I've taught all of these incidents to students in 7th/8th grades and they do tend to keep the kids riveted. Talk about high-interest reading.
The author then examines the highly-offensive 19th century practice of robbing graves for bodies for sale to medical schools, which had more medical students who needed to learn dissection techniques than they had a supply of donated-to-science cadavers to work on. She examines the remains found in several hallowed medical establishments, including Benjamin Franklin's basement.
Near the end of the book, she lays to rest the fiction that Anastasia, the Russian Tsar's youngest daughter, could've survived the Bolshevik Revolution's massacre of the rest of her family, by confirming her remains were found and identified.
This is an excellent non-fiction read!
Mr. Bones says, "Enjoy!"
