The Dead Speak

In this empathetic and darkly funny memoir, Thomas Coyle pulls back the police tape and walks us straight into the crime scenes. With sharp detail, he reveals how the tiniest fragment of evidence can expose a suspect, prove a motive or confirm an identity. Sometimes, all at once. But crime scenes are only part of his story. The Dead Speak also plunges us into the world of disaster victim identification - a discipline where time, science and compassion collide. Where forensic experts are flung into a race against time to identify bodies in makeshift morgues as desperate families wait for news of their loved ones. Taking us from meticulous casework at New Scotland Yard to the chaos of the Boxing Day tsunami in Thailand and the devastation of the 2011 Christchurch earthquake, The Dead Speak is both a gripping insider's account of the evolution of forensic science and an unflinching portrait of humanity at its best and worst. Fair warning, though: it's not for the faint-hearted.