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The Bone Vault: A Novel [Abridged, Audiobook] [Audio CD]

Linda Fairstein , Blair Brown
3.4 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (34 customer reviews)

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Book Description

Jan 1 2003

The New York Times bestselling author and renowned former Manhattan prosecutor follows her Nero Award-winning The Deadhouse with a new Alexandra Cooper novel set at the crossroads of big money, high culture, and murder?

Wealthy donors have gathered in the Metropolitan Museum of Art's glorious Temple of Dendur to celebrate a controversial new exhibit. An uneasy mix of scholarship, showbiz, and aggressive marketing, "A Modern Bestiary" has raised fierce opposition from some of New York's museum elite.

Assistant D.A. Alex Cooper observes the developing tensions with bemused interest until Met director Pierre Thibodaux pulls her aside. A twelfth dynasty mummified princess, enclosed for eternity in a huge stone sarcophagus, is about to take a long voyage to Cairo as part of a routine museum exchange. But Cleopatra is missing, and in her place is the not-so-mummified body of a woman many centuries younger than her royal predecessor.

Alex must explore behind the scenes at the elegant but severe Metropolitan, travel uptown to the remote setting of the Cloisters, and on to the massive array of beasts and bones at the Museum of Natural History. Somewhere, deep within the bowels of one of these great cultural centers, a killer may wait.

Atmospheric, chilling, and rich with procedural authenticity, The Bone Vault is a tour de force from one of crime writing's brightest stars.


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From Amazon

One of the special pleasures of this lively series, written by a veteran sex-crimes investigator for the Manhattan district attorney's office, is the unusual glimpse it gives readers into corners of New York no tourist and few residents ever see (The Deadhouse). Here she turns her attention to the city's major cultural edifices--the Metropolitan Museum, the Museum of Natural History, and the Cloisters--and takes us behind their sealed doors to investigate the murder of a museum curator whose mummified body turns up in an ancient sarcophagus just before it's shipped out of the country. Together with her partners, cops Mike Chapman and Mercer Wallace, assistant DA Alexandra Cooper retraces Katrina Grooten's steps from her native South Africa to the discovery of her remains on a New Jersey pier. Along the way, the mysteries of the ancient world get equal billing with the more contemporary whodunit, and Cooper and her pals get a firsthand look at the murderous New York art world, too. Fairstein's thrillers offer an in-depth tour of truly off-the-beaten-path Manhattan as well as solid plotting, well-drawn characters, and snappy dialogue. What the DA's office lost when the author retired to write full-time is the mystery fan's biggest gain! --Jane Adams --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

From Publishers Weekly

Fairstein's 25-year stint as head of the Sex Crimes Unit in the Manhattan DA's office once again makes for an authoritative and fact-filled mystery (her fifth after The Deadhouse) featuring alter-ego assistant DA Alexandra Cooper. "Coop" is an attractive workaholic in her 30s, ambivalent about her current relationship with an always-on-the-road NBC correspondent. While she's attending a reception at the Metropolitan Museum of Art, new Met director Pierre Thibodaux pulls her aside and asks for help with a recent crisis: a customs security dog found that a Met sarcophagus ready for shipment back to Cairo contained the corpse of a young female researcher from the Cloisters, the Met's medieval branch. Coop calls her usual NYPD sidekick detectives, brash Mike Chapman and burly Mercer Wallace, and the trio sets out to search among the museum's bookish staff and rich benefactors for a killer with a motive. In the meantime, Coop and Chapman, who should be a couple but don't know it yet, lecture one another on ancient history and contemporary law, and place bets on Jeopardy questions. Readers also learn about such subjects as Inuit funeral rituals, the average growth rate for human hair, the habits of stalkers and rapists and modern techniques of sadomasochism. Fairstein has a heavy-handed way of working this information into the dialogue, and the plot resolution strains credibility. Yet the quick-witted Cooper is as likable as ever, and fans of Fairstein's other books will find this satisfying-if not standout-fare.
Copyright 2002 Reed Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

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Customer Reviews

Most helpful customer reviews
4.0 out of 5 stars Needs Better Editing Nov 5 2004
By Ez
Format:Hardcover
Assistant District Attorney Alexandra Cooper investigates when museum intern South African Katrina Grooten is found dead in a sarcophagus. This was interesting (especially compared to the author's earlier novels), though some bits could've been left out. (B+)
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4.0 out of 5 stars Interesting, But Needs More Editing Oct 3 2004
By Ez
Format:Mass Market Paperback
Assistant District Attorney Alexandra Cooper investigates when museum intern South African Katrina Grooten is found dead in a sarcophagus. This was interesting (especially compared to the author's earlier novels), though some bits could've been left out. (B+)
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5.0 out of 5 stars spin your head and race you away April 26 2004
By Tin Man
Format:Mass Market Paperback
The glitzy reception at New York's Metropolitan Museum of Art should have been a welcome evening off for Assistant District Attorney Alexandra Cooper. But the announcement of a cooperative exhibition with the American Museum of Natural History is overshadowed by a 'gruesome discovery: in an ancient sarcophagus bound for a show abroad, customs officials have found the body of a young woman.

Katrina Grooten was a quiet, studious, hard-working intern at the Cloisters, the magnificent but foreboding home of the Museum's collection of medieval art. According to its records, Katrina had left her job several months earlier to return to her native South Africa: her eerily preserved body is grisly proof she'd never made it home. And the, whi lines on her fingernails are the telltale sign of her killer's modus operandi: arsenic poisoning.

But why would anyone want Katrina dead? As Alex and NYPD Detective Mike Chapman begin their investigations, they encounter an establishment whose culture is as curious as the exhibits they display, and whose secrets and rivalries are as ancient. And then, in the depths of the museum, they discover a number of mysterious vaults, whose bones hold the clues to Katrina's murder. . .

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Most recent customer reviews
3.0 out of 5 stars Disappointed Reader
I was at first pleased with the book but when it drifted into a political statement on the rights of minorities even to the point of a white woman from South Africa being raped by... Read more
Published on Mar 22 2004
2.0 out of 5 stars An interesting disappointment
"The Bone Vault" could have been a swell 250-page mystery. Unfortunately, it's a 500-page stew of red herrings, dead-end subplots and research, research, research. Read more
Published on Feb 26 2004 by Todd A. Ritter
4.0 out of 5 stars Really enjoyed, but had it's ups and downs
I truly enjoyed this book and it was a page turner for me.
There were points where I got lost with all the characters, leads, museums and vaults, but frankly, I finished it in... Read more
Published on Feb 18 2004
4.0 out of 5 stars Stand-out Novel of Suspense
Fairstein once again draws on her own experiences with protagonist Alexandra Cooper, who works as the head of the Sex Crimes Unit of Manhattan D.A. Read more
Published on Jan 20 2004 by Sheri Melnick
2.0 out of 5 stars Dead Boring
"The Bone Vault" is by far the worst of the heretofore uneven but still enjoyable Alexandra Cooper series. Read more
Published on Nov 3 2003 by Wendy Kaplan
5.0 out of 5 stars N.Y. museum history---fascinating
I am fascinated by the facts that Fairstein includes in her novels. This time it is information about the Metropolitan Museum of Art, Museum of Natural History, and the Cloisters. Read more
Published on Oct 12 2003 by Karen Kirsch
2.0 out of 5 stars Coulda-Mighta-Shoulda
On paper, "The Bone Vault" looks like a sure-fire pleaser: a behind-the-scenes look at the wheeling and dealing of two mighty museums, New York's Metropolitan Museum of... Read more
Published on Sep 7 2003 by sweetmolly
4.0 out of 5 stars Freakish discovery leads to museum caper...
I like Fairstein's books. Great literature they are not, but they are very well-written and very researched. Read more
Published on Aug 5 2003 by K. L Sadler
1.0 out of 5 stars Great setting, poor author
The book had an intriguing premise -- behind-the-scenes chicanery at two large NYC museums -- but the author's writing does not do it justice. Read more
Published on Jun 19 2003
5.0 out of 5 stars Couldn't turn it off
I bought the AudioBook version of The Bone Vault and listened to it on a trip to my parents' house and back (4 hours each way). Read more
Published on Jun 17 2003 by "terresta"
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