A pioneer of modern forensic anthropology reveals secrets of the world's first-and only-laboratory devoted to death.

Forensic science and murder investigations are among the most fascinating topics of our time. Dominating television and print media every season, both as fiction and nonfiction, the subject could not be hotter. As one of the world's leading forensic anthropologists, Dr. Bill Bass is the premier guide to this unusual world.

Nowhere is there another lab like Dr. Bass's: on a hillside in Tennessee, human bodies decompose in the open air, aided by insects, bacteria, and birds, unhindered by coffins or mausoleums. At the "Body Farm," nature takes its course with corpses buried in shallow graves, submerged in water, locked in trunks of cars. As scientific stand-ins for murder victims, they serve the needs of science-and the cause of justice.

For thirty years, Dr. Bass's research has revolutionized the field of forensic science, particularly by pinpointing "time since death" in murder cases. In his riveting book, he investigates real cases and leads readers on an unprecedented journey behind the locked gates of the "Body Farm." A master scientist and engaging storyteller, Bass shares his most intriguing cases: his revisit of the Lindbergh kidnapping and murder fifty years later; the mystery of a headless corpse, whose identity astonished police; the telltale bugs that finally sent a murderous grandfather to death row-and many more.

比尔·巴斯，法医科学界的传奇，曾经参与数百案件，从小镇镇长办公室到美国联邦调查局。他创建了世界上第一个也是唯一一个专门研究尸体腐烂的实验室：田纳西州大学人类学研究所，并由于帕特丽夏·康威尔的畅销书《人体农场》而永垂不朽，比尔·巴斯博士曾经写作或者与他人合写两百多部科学著作，很多都是基于自己在破解谋杀案中的亲身经历。由于在教育方面的贡献，他已经理事会任命为年度国家教授（National professor of the year），比尔·巴斯博士目前居住在诺克斯维尔。