Investigating A Suspicious Death
Book review: The Coroner by Jennifer Graeser Dornbush
Stories that intrigue me the most are those dealing with anything medical or legal. My favorite books are those that combined those two — police investigations where a medical examiner helps to solve the crime, such as books by Patricia Cornwell, one of my favorite authors.
While browsing through books on Audible, my eye fell on this title — The Coroner — and I was instantly hooked when I started to listen, because of my love for these kinds of books.
Jennifer Graeser Dornbush, the author
Jennifer Dornbush grew up in the forensic world. Her father was a small town medical examiner and had his office in their home. She investigated her first fatality, an airplane crash, when she was only eight years old. Her father simply saw it as an anatomy lesson while she picked up pieces of skull with him. That was the first of many coroner lessons she experiences over two decades.
I grew up around death.
~ Jennifer Dornbush
Jennifer Dornbush specializes in suspense, thriller, true crime, small town mystery, and forensic procedurals with strong female protagonists for film, HETV, novel and non-fiction.
She’s a screenwriter, author, international speaker and forensic specialist.
After a dab in journalism and high school teaching, Jennifer wanted to connect her coroner world to her writing. She got a degree at the Forensic Science Academy in Los Angeles to gain more forensic training, and built unique relationships with LA’s top crime scene investigators, fingerprint specialists, DNA scientists and detectives.
She focused on screenwriting, but also wrote a top selling non-fiction book, Forensic Speak, which is used by show-runners and writers, as well as crime investigators and law enforcement.
Her first book in a series called The Coroner’s Daughter is The Coroner (2018) and the second is Secret Remains (2020). Jennifer Dornbush is developing the series for television.
This author wrote the film and novel, God Bless the Broken Road, and she has developed a TV crime drama series with Echo Lake and Hoplite Entertainment. She frequently consults with TV writers on several shows, such as Bull, Conviction, Hawaii Five-O, Leverage, Suits and Rectify, and is a member of the Writers’ Guild of America, Sisters in Crime, Mystery Writers of America and FBI Citizen’s Academy Alumni.
The plot resembles Jennifer’s personal story
When reading more about the author, and how she grew up, I knew she based part of the story of The Coroner on her personal history.
The story starts with Emily studying for a surgery she has to do, but when she gets to the hospital, she’s sent to do an emergency appendectomy. During the surgery, she does something remarkable, which she only knows how to do because of all the autopsies she has done with her father from her thirteenth year.
She’s in love with Brandon, also a doctor, and right after the surgery, he asks her to marry her. She says yes, but then she gets the call about her father’s heart attack, and for the first time in over a decade, Emily Hartford returns to Freeport in Michigan.
She races home, skips a red light, and the sheriff pulls her over. Nick Larson has been Emily’s high school love, and now he is the one bringing Emily to a stop in the early hours of the morning. He escorts her to the hospital, where Emily finds her father in denial of the seriousness of his condition, and allows Nick and her father to convince her to help with the autopsy of the teen daughter of the senator.
Emily reluctantly agrees and finds they have a murder on their hands. Before long she’s involved in the investigation, and cannot let go, much to the dismay of Brandon, who pushes her to get their wedding planned.
While in Freeport, Emily rekindles friendships, unravels secrets and lets go of things that don’t serve her anymore.
A well-paced story
I liked the pace of the story, the mix of present and past, and the portrayal of the opposites between a small town and the city life.
Emily, Nick and her father have things of the past that need to be resolved. Emily needs to know how her mother really died. Nick is still in love with Emily and wants to find out why she has just disappeared all those years ago. Her father needs to find the will to live.
While Nick and Emily investigate the crime, the back story unfolds.
The crime is a mystery, and just when I thought I knew who the murderer was, the author proved me wrong again.
After listening to the book, I wondered why the senator didn’t feature more, but then realized it would have added nothing to the story. The only point of critique I have is the mention of Emily’s sister towards the end of the book. This was the first mention of it, and I wondered where I had missed something. Upon looking at other reviews, I saw I wasn’t the only one who thought the same.
While the story revolves around a crime, it is also a love story, and a most enjoyable book!
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