Reviews for The Skeleton Crew
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"In her brilliant book The Skeleton Crew, Deborah Halber explains why local law enforcement often fails to investigate [John and Jane Doe] deaths … While the population of the anonymous dead receives only scant attention from the police or the media, it has given rise to a macabre subculture of Internet sleuthing. Ms. Halber chronicles with lucidity and wit how amateur investigators troll websites … and check online databases looking for matches between the reported missing and the unidentified dead."
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"A lively study that’s part whodunit, part sociological study. . . . The result is eminently entertaining and will be devoured by armchair detectives."
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"Halber weaves together a half-dozen cold cases, and delivers brief profiles of scores of tangential characters. She’s an engaging, artful writer, which helps as the narrative threads start to get tangled.”
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"A fascinating look at the crossroads of information availability, serious dedication, and the spark of human intuition that no machine could replicate."
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"An interesting, easy to read book that will inspire my fellow writers for sure, written by a true crime writer that Vance Custer would look up to."
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"The book is written so compellingly, I couldn’t put it down, so be warned and realize that you may want to carve out some serious time for this one."
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"The Skeleton Crew is a carefully crafted account of an intriguing new opportunity for arm chair sleuths. Thanks to the Internet, anyone with a computer, curiosity, patience, and a passion for justice can enter the dark world of missing persons and unsolved homicides. It’s fascinating to learn how such matches are made and heartening to witness the growing cooperation between law enforcement and ordinary citizens whose persistence can sometimes crack the code in cold cases that have languished unresolved for years. I loved it."
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"In all of the cold cases I deal with, the victims are identified. …I never once thought about a case where someone stumbles upon a pile of human bones in their backyard and the victim needs to be identified. The book opened up a new world to me, someone who thought they had seen it all. I look forward to more from Deborah Halber."
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"Kudos to Deborah Halber for the insightful, interesting The Skeleton Crew!"
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"Here’s a book that will tickle the fancy of amateur crime solvers everywhere."
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"If you like tales of discovered body parts, heads in concrete in buckets, corpses whose hands have been cut off, decomposition, decay and death, then this fascinating, riveting book is for you."
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"Halber writes vividly and engagingly about long-ago crimes and the modern-day detectives who breathe new life into closed cases. . . . With Halber they have found a loving home, where they are portrayed as larger than life characters and lauded as heroes."
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"Deborah Halber replaces the classic whodunit with what you might call a whosolvesit."
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"Halber follows stories of other volunteers through a handful of exceptional cases, most still unsolved. Many of the details are gruesome and the search for justice inconclusive, but the journey is fascinating. Mystery and true crime readers will especially enjoy this book."
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"As a first-time author, Halber has produced a masterpiece in the odd and sometimes macabre world of online sleuthing."
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"[Halber’s] bang-on descriptions and recondite details are riveting."
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"The Skeleton Crew: How a motley band of amateurs solves cold cases online."
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"I couldn’t put it down. It’s one of those books that gets under your skin. …I know of no better guide for navigating this multifaceted world than Halber’s book."
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"As promised by its subtitle, [The Skeleton Crew] is all about ‘how amateur sleuths are solving America’s coldest cases.’ It’s about the internet and obsession and the incredible feats of crime-solving that everyday people have pulled off with a little help from Google. And it’s so great! You needn’t be into the cold case thing to find these people and stories utterly fascinating."
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"From home-computer screens to a new national database, join The Skeleton Crew for a page-turning behind-the-scenes look at the world of Internet sleuths who give names to the men and women who have died without identity. For the first time ever, readers are brought the real-life cases of missing persons, the unidentified dead, and the network of people that gives them their names . . . proving once again what I said at the conclusion of every episode of America’s Most Wanted: ‘One person can make a difference.’"
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"This isn’t the most pleasant book to read, but not because it isn’t well written. It’s the subject matter; it brought tears to my eyes."
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"A compelling glimpse into a little-known subculture inhabited by a colorful cast of the idiosyncratic, the quirky, and the downright weird."
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"Both charming and disturbing…"
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"In this highly addictive story-within-a-story narrative, Deborah Halber skillfully exposes the complex Internet subculture of amateur sleuths. The people who obsess over the fates and identities of Jane and John Does are puzzles in themselves, which adds a fascinating layer to this captivating book. The Skeleton Crew will likely inspire many more case resolutions."
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"Exploring the world of amateur sleuths, Halber proves to be the perfect guide: unflinching, perceptive, wry. I was hooked from page one."
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"An integral component of NamUs is the group of responsible, dedicated volunteers who scour case details in an effort to match long-term missing persons to unidentified decedents. In The Skeleton Crew, Deborah Halber follows the journey of some of these volunteers who have made it their mission to assist criminal justice professionals in resolving those cases."