A Fly for the Prosecution

This book is not for the squeamish. The introduction launches into a description of the discovery of a rotting corpse in considerable detail: 'her head was almost completely stripped of flesh, and the exposed skull had been polished by the scraping mandibles of beetle larvae... ' Enough. Why all this grisly detail? The topic is forensic entomology, the investigation of violent crime through the scientific investigation and analysis of insect activity. This work ranges from investigation of time of death by analysing the decay of a corpse in context of the insects found with - within very often - it, to more simply using knowledge of insects to trap a killer. One example, and one conviction, turns on the perpetrator having the leg of a grasshopper in his trouser turnup. It matched the rest of the insect found tangled in the victim's clothes right down to the break where it had torn from the rest of the grasshopper's body. Despite the gory detail this is, perhaps surprisingly, an interesting read. The author pioneered the techniques he describes, and writes with the tone of an enthusiast and one who knows what he does is important and changes things. As well as describing the work and its impact on a number of cases, he charts the growing use of such techniques and the added certainty that they are able to bring to ensuring that justice is done. The detail and thoroughness with which knowledge of insects can be applied to criminal investigations is impressive and ultimately intriguing. (Kirkus UK)