Gideon Oliver, the “Skeleton Detective”, is on vacation again; this time he’s staying on a family cattle ranch in Hawaii. The bones of the Torkelsson pa­ter­fa­mil­ias who dis­ap­peared ten years ago have just been found. When Gideon formally identifies them, the Torkelsson survivors get more than they bargained for.

Elkins works in the cozy mystery vein and, despite the anatomical detail, the deaths and murders in his books always feel detached and un­threat­en­ing.