Showboat Medical Examiner Margot Heavner makes it clear that, breaking with her department’s earlier practice ( The Bone Collection, 2016, etc.), she has no intention of calling in Tempe as a consultant and promptly identifies the faceless body herself as that of a young Asian man. The search continues even as Venn ponders recusing himself from a case that hits so close to home.įans missing detective Jimmy Perez (Wild Fire, 2018, etc.) will find a worthy successor in the equally complex Venn, who presides over an excellent mystery in this series kickoff.Īnother sweltering month in Charlotte, another boatload of mysteries past and present for overworked, overstressed forensic anthropologist Temperance Brennan.Ī week after the night she chases but fails to catch a mysterious trespasser outside her town house, some unknown party texts Tempe four images of a corpse that looks as if it’s been chewed by wild hogs, because it has been. Walden had plenty of money, even if they can’t find it, so why was he scrimping on lodgings and transportation? A call from Venn’s mother returns him to the orbit of the Brethren after another member’s daughter with Down syndrome vanishes from the home of sect leader Dennis Salter.

Whenever Walden rode on a bus, he always sat next to Lucy Braddick, a woman with Down syndrome who attended classes at the Centre. Caroline, Gaby, and Walden all worked there, Caroline’s father’s charity is housed there, and her boyfriend, Edward, is a curate who sometimes helps out. To Venn’s dismay, many of the suspects are involved with the Woodyard Centre.

Caroline, who works for her father’s mental health charity, felt sorry for Walden, who was living with crushing guilt from a drunken driving accident that killed a young girl, and offered him a place to stay. DS Jen Rafferty and May find a house owned by Caroline, daughter of Woodyard trustee Christopher Preece, who shares it with Gaby Henry and a short-time lodger whom Gaby identifies as Simon Walden, the body on the beach. It’s been stripped of all ID but an envelope bearing an address in a nearby town. Venn is called from his father’s funeral by PC Ross May to investigate a corpse on the beach near Venn’s home.

When he renounced his religion, he was shunned by his parents and the sect members, became a police officer, and married the love of his life, Jonathan Church, a sunny optimist who manages the Woodyard Centre, a restored factory that’s home to a covey of counseling services, artists, and charitable organizations. A clever police officer in Devon, England, confronts anger and sorrow from his early life.ĭI Matthew Venn was brought up by parents who were members of the Barum Brethren, a small religious sect.

The long call book