Dead Dry

Forensic geologist Em Hansen is living in Salt Lake City, Utah, and working for the Utah Geological Survey when she is called in to help with a murder. A body has been found buried in a gravel pit and a wall of gravel has fallen on it. Unfortunately, Em recognizes a tattoo on the body (not much else is recognizable) and it is someone she knows: a well-known geologist from Colorado, Afton McWain. Em knew both Afton and his geologist wife, Julia. Michelle Aldrich, the sheriff's deputy in charge of the case, asks for her help in notifying McWain's now ex-wife in Denver. Em flies to Denver with her pilot friend Fritz Calder, and then becomes enmeshed in the investigation. McWain owned a ranch in the Castle Rock/Sedalia area south west of Denver, and was involved in helping some anti-development people in the area stop more houses and golf courses being built. One of the possible developments was the ranch right next to his, and they needed McWain's ranch for an easement. McWain had been an expert and made a lot of money in oil exploration. He was retired, but interested in ground-water research. Wells for both homes and ranches in the area were drying up; the water table was getting lower and lower, and the finite water resources were being used up at a prodigious rate. There are many possible suspects in McWain's death: an attorney, a developer, a banker, and Gilda, the strange woman he had lived with on the ranch since he divorced Julia. Andrews is known for her fascinating explanations of geology, and this book does not disappoint. Her description of the area around Denver and the water problems the area faces is riveting. She is a professional geologist and a licensed pilot, in addition to being an award-winning author. My favorite earlier titles are Earth Colors, about pigment analysis of a Frederick Remington painting; and Fault Lines, a story of a possible murder during an earthquake. Armchair Interviews says: This is the tenth Em Hansen mystery and will again thrill her fans.

First her neighbor Fritz Calder comes to get forensic geologist Em Hansen to accompany him for breakfast when Salt Lake City Police Detective Thomas "Ray" Raymond arrives to have Em look at a nearby corpse. Though the victim is buried under gravel from a collapsed quarry wall with only a leg is sticking out. Everyone of the workers has been accounted for so no one knows who the victim could be and why he was there. Though the fingerprints are gone and his visage battered beyond recognition, Em recognizes a tattoo that enables her to identify the deceased as Colorado staunch environmentalist Afton McWain. Fritz flies her to Colorado to inform McWain's former spouse and her current female partner, who both deem they earned his ranch while development vultures circle the battling females coveting McWain's land. All the while Em digs into the dirt to find that trace of evidence that ties a Colorado killer to a Utah homicide. The tenth Em Hansen, Utah's only forensic geologist, is a terrific who-done-it that keeps the audience following the heroine's delightful scientific explanations of the clues she finds that no one else understands. Her "romance" with Fritz still sputters, but that adds to the overall fun of observing this consummate professional in the field struggle with affairs of the heart. Though some sidebars are unneeded cul-de sacs, fans will appreciate Em's latest digging in the dirt gem. Harriet Klausner