Meanwhile, there's a heated stoush brewing over the retention by the Smith family of several Australian Aboriginal skulls, other remains and artifacts, that are currently poorly cared for in the museum's basement. Ruth finds herself embroiled both professionally and personally in the fight to have the remains surrendered for repatriation to Australia. In her capacity as a forensic archaeologist, with a particular specialty in bones, she's asked to assess the boxed remains in situ at the museum - the titular “room full of bones”. Meanwhile, charismatic Australian indigenous poet and academic Bob Woonunga has become her new neighbour on the Saltmarsh. Woonunga is associated with Ruth's friend Cathbad and several others in an organisation called the Elginists, who are concerned with the location and return of indigenous artefacts held within the vaults of British museums. A Room Full of Bones also develops ongoing character storylines and relationships, including that between Ruth and DI Nelson, who is the father of her one-year-old daughter, Kate. Nelson's wife, Michelle having become aware of this fact in the closing lines of the previous book has created inevitable complications in Ruth and Harry’s professional and personal relationship. Meanwhile, Cathbad’s covert love affair with married DS Judy Johnson also comes to Ruth's attention for the first time and revelations towards the end of the book indicate fraught times ahead for this couple also. I will admit I’m reading these books for the soap opera like relationship of the main characters above all else. And although I will stress that the focus is much more on the mystery in this book than the other three, Griffiths still blessed us with some romantic moments. I thought the parts about Michelle's reaction to Harry's affair where realistic and sad, it's obvious they both care a lot for each other but perhaps they married too young and have little in common. I'm glad that Harry is going to see Kate now, not seeing her felt very sad. It's great Ruth has someone in her life but I fear for people getting hurt here too. bishop. She is unprepared for the sight before her, however: while the body of the Bishop lies in the coffin on a trestle table, the body of the curator, Neil Topham, lies dead on the floor, his face and body covered in blood.

The dialogues and thoughts of the characters are repetitive, the characters are boring and selfish, the relationships between them shallow and the situations most of the time ridiculous! A ROOM FULL OF BONES is a pleasing read, perhaps tending more to the "cosy" style of crime fiction than earlier instalments in the series, but is certainly exciting and with a more satisfying crime and detection element this time round as the plot is more clever and more robust. I could have done with reading more about Ruth's professional life and slightly less about her motherhood bliss and details of her domestic arrangements, but I am sure that as Kate gets older and more independent, Ruth will have more time for trouble. I look forward to finding out. Nah,’ says Henty. ‘Not his type of thing, is it? There’ll be journalists, the works. You know how the boss hates journos.’As she has done in the other three books, Griffiths also left us on a cliffhanger at the end of the book regarding the Ruth/Nelson relationship. And of course I need to rush out and start the next book because of this. As I said, Griffiths is killing me. Judy Johnson and Dave Clough, who loves the Godfather films and frequently intones 'I'm gonna make you an offer you can't refuse' when alone with a mirror, play larger roles in this book, and Cathbad continues to both intrigue and infuriate Nelson. When Ruth Galloway arrives to supervise the opening of a coffin containing the bones of a medieval bishop, she finds the museum’s curator lying dead on the floor. Soon after, the museum’s wealthy owner is also found dead, in his stables.

As always, Griffiths manages to blend history, religion and mysticism into the storyline. Here, we get origination stories and the importance of snakes in the various cultures. I always feel like I learn a little something. I am hooked on this series. I am finding it like a box of chocolates that I can't put down. I am thinking about creating a new shelf for the Galloway series - "coronavirus escapes," which will include anything I have read since March 2020 that helps me avoid the present reality. A Room Full of Bones is another engrossing instalment in Elly Griffiths' series featuring archaeologist Ruth Galloway. The book opens tantalisingly with the planned opening of a recently unearthed medieval coffin in a Norfolk museum, although before the festivities can get underway an unexpected modern death occurs! I love encountering new words and this book presented me with "murmuration," which is defined as "the phenomenon that results when hundreds, sometimes thousands, of starlings fly in swooping, intricately coordinated patterns through the sky." Beautiful!In this thrilling mystery, “brilliant, feisty, independent” forensic archaeologist Ruth Galloway and DCI Harry Nelson investigate a seemingly cursed collection of Aboriginal skulls that are causing people to die from a mysterious fever—and the next person to fall ill is Nelson himself ( Richmond Times-Dispatch). MY THOUGHTS: I love Ruth! She is intelligent, passionate about her work, and decidedly unglamorous. How refreshing to have a realistic and relatable main character. She mightn't have the most wonderful life skills - like most of us she is just stumbling through - but I love that too. She does things, mostly in her personal life, and I think 'Oh, Ruth!'; but then, I don't know if I would have done any different. This is the fourth book in the series. We revisit old characters and meet some new ones, and the complicated lives and relationships continue to unfold.