Title: The Lost Tomb: And Other Real-Life Stories of Bones, Burials, and Murder
Author: Douglas Preston
Publication Date: December 5, 2023 by Grand Central Publishing
Genres: Nonfiction, History
Protagonist Gender: N/A
Douglas Preston is not only one of my favorite thriller authors (if you haven't discovered Agent Pendergast, get reading ASAP!) but also the man behind The Lost City of the Monkey God, one of the most exciting real-life adventures I've read in recent memory. To say my expectations for The Lost Tomb were high would be an understatement, but even if it wasn't quite what I was expecting (I'll get to that in a moment), I still found it to be a fascinating read.
Preston could have been a total stranger and I'd still have bought this for Chapter 6, The Mystery of Oak Island, alone - but that's where I had to reset expectations. I'd hoped this would be a new article, a walk-through of the site and the recent discoveries, but it's actually a reprint from way back in 1988, a full 8 years before Rick and Marty Lagina got involved. It's still a good read, but (a) it's old news and (b) it's more history and research than first-person observation. It does have a short afterword that updates the facts of the story, as do all the other reprints, so no matter how familiar you may be with the stories, there's something new to explore.
With my expectations set regarding reprints and research, I flipped back to the beginning and enjoyed this from cover to cover, exploring stories I knew, was vaguely familiar with, or knew nothing about.
The Monster of Florence (the Italian serial killer) and Trial by Fury (Amanda Knox) were two of the most chilling entries, not so much for the murders themselves, but because of the media circus, social media insanity, and police corruption surrounding them. A common theme of the book is how we define (and redefine) history, and to whom it belongs, with these being stunning examples of how we do the same to current events.
Nearly half of the stories are about skeletons, their discoveries, and the mysteries surrounding them. Contained within those stories are fascinating elements of anthropology, archaeology, multiple branches of science, and even politics. It's amazing (and sometimes unsettling) the way one advancement or discovery can cast so much doubt on existing theories, but it's wonderful to see how the truth of the stories comes together.
The Mystery of Hell Creek was one of the more science-heavy stories, and definitely one of my favorites, looking at the theories surrounding the end of the dinosaurs. The Clovis Point Con was another interesting story, and a rare case of deliberate forgery and manipulation of the science being used to create a story. The book closes with The Lost Tomb, which is exactly the kind of story I was craving, one where Preston does get his hands dirty participating in the excavation of the Valley of the Kings, and that's a story I'd love to see get The Lost City of the Monkey God treatment - hopefully without the near-death experiences.
Rating: ♀ ♀ ♀ ♀
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