Bones / Jan Burke

Bones by Jan Burke
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

2020 Summer Clearance Special

I vividly remember the first time I read this novel—I was on vacation with a cousin and while she slept, I huddled in the next bed in our hotel room, unable to set the book down. Even when I finished reading, I was jumpy for several days afterwards.

This was one of the first books that got me reading again after my mother was killed in a car accident. She was my reading buddy, we were a book club of two, and I quit reading fiction for years when I was unable to discuss it with her any more. Along with Patricia Cornwell's first novels, Bones was my entrée into the whole serial killer mystery genre. Perhaps because of that, I still retain a fondness for this novel.

It is rapidly becoming a period piece. Cell phones were a new and expensive option. Newspapers were still influential and lucrative. The papers themselves were still being printed by presses. Perhaps because of Irene's profession, she seems surrounded by a whole battalion of men: her husband, his cop friends, her cousin, her neighbour, their friends, male anthropologists, and so on. I'm always mystified by writers' use of this formula, since it would be my female posse that I would want around and, unlike Irene, I would be spilling my guts to them, probably more than they would care to hear. So I don't know how realistic Irene's personal life is, but I guess I can see how it works better for the dramatic tension.

By this time, several rereads later, this book is still a four star experience for me. Part of my Summer Clearance Special is an attempt to weed my bookshelves. I had anticipated reading Bones one last time and then disposing of it. I've emerged from this reading unsure whether that's what I really want to do. I guess there's no harm in letting it linger a while longer.


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