The Bone Woman

A Forensic Anthropologist's Search for Truth in the Mass Graves of Rwanda, Bosnia, Croatia, and Kosovo

In 1994, Rwanda was the scene of the first acts since World War II to be legally defined as genocide. Two years later, Clea Koff, a twenty-three-year-old forensic anthropologist, left the safe confines of a lab in Berkeley, California, to serve as one of sixteen scientists chosen by the United Nations to unearth the physical evidence of the Rwandan genocide. Over the next four years, Koff’s grueling investigations took her across geography synonymous with some of the worst crimes of the twentieth century.

The Bone Woman is Koff’s unflinching, riveting account of her seven UN missions to Bosnia, Croatia, Kosovo, and Rwanda, as she shares what she saw, how it affected her, who was prosecuted based on evidence she found, and what she learned about the world. Yet even as she recounts the hellish nature of her work and the heartbreak of the survivors, she imbues her story with purpose, humanity, and a sense of justice. A tale of science in service of human rights, The Bone Woman is, even more profoundly, a story of hope and enduring moral principles.

©2007 Clea Koff (P)2023 Dreamscape Media

The observations of the author

Well explained description of a forensic anthropologist at sites of mass killing. Thoughtful observations on this type of work.

Fascinating!

Interesting, sobering, sad, hopeful are just a few of the words I would use to describe this fascinating look into the world of forensic anthropology.

The narrator/author, Clea, does a great job recounting her journey to different parts of the world, while doing the very difficult job of trying to identify victims of genocide, in order to bring closure to the victims families and to bring the ones responsible to justice.

This is a very important book and definitely worth a read/listen.