The Bone Vault

Acknowledgments

The two institutions that form the backdrop for Alexandra Cooper’s investigation are among the most extraordinary museums in the world. They have contributed immeasurably to the culture of our country for more than a century.

In addition to the many pleasure-filled hours I have spent inside their walls, there are wonderful books that reveal their histories and the range of their treasures. Among those I found most helpful were:Stuffed Animals and Pickled Heads by Stephen Asma;Give Me My Father’s Body by Kenn Harper;Making the Mummies Dance by Thomas Hoving;Dinosaurs in the Attic by Douglas Preston;The Mummy Congress by Heather Pringle;Merchants and Masterpieces by Calvin Tompkins; andA Gathering of Wonders by Joseph Wallace. As always, the archives ofThe New York Times had a splendid assortment of facts and features.

The usual suspects sustained me throughout the long process of writing the story. Robert Morgenthau, the great District Attorney of New York County, and my devoted colleagues in the Sex Crimes Prosecution Unit of that office, and in the Special Victims Unit of the NYPD, will always be the best in the business. Nothing makes me prouder than the thirty years I spent working shoulder to shoulder with each of them. The men and women of the Office of the Chief Medical Examiner of New York, pathologists and serologists, were my heroes before September 11, 2001, and will be forever.

I am grateful to everyone at Scribner and Pocket Books, and to Esther Newberg at ICM, for standing beside me patiently every step of the way and supporting me so enthusiastically.

The booksellers, librarians, and loyal readers who hold me in their hands have all my thanks.

Friends and family make everything possible, over and over again. And my adored husband, Justin Feldman, who is cheerleader and critic, believed in me from the beginning, which is the greatest gift.