Flesh and Bone by Jefferson Bass

From the Amazon product description: Dr. Bill Brockton, the founder of the world-famous Body Farm, is hard at work on a troubling new case. A young man's battered body has been found in nearby Chattanooga, and it's up to the talented Dr. Brockton to assemble the pieces of the forensic puzzle. Brockton is brought into the case by the rising star of the state's mechanical examiners, Jess Carter.

Just as they're on the verge of breaking the case open, events take a terrifying turn. Brockton has re-created the Chattanooga death scene at the Body Farm, but a killer tampers with it in a shocking way: placing another corpse at the setting, confusing authorities and putting Brockton's career and life in jeopardy. Soon Brockton himself is accused of the horrific new crime, and the once-beloved professor becomes an outcast. As the net around him tightens, Brockton must use all of his forensic skills to prove his own innocence . . . before he ends up behind bars with some of the very killers he's helped to convict.

Ahhh... creepy. That is the only word that can describe the concept of The Body Farm. The body farm is a research facility that uses corpses to simulate crime scenes and studies the way they decompose in order to determine things like time of death. There's lots of boiling bones, cutting up body parts, and checking rotting flesh. This book certainly captured my attention and held it throughout. That was despite the fact that the narrator was maybe a little bit flat. He did a nice job with the variety of characters that he needed to give voices to but the main character was a very low-key, quiet scientific type so it could have gotten dull quickly if the story itself wasn't good.

As is my habit, I have started a series with the second book. (I am failing the 1st in a Series challenge and now am tempted to start a "2nd in a Series" challenge because I think I would have that one wrapped up!) Starting in the middle didn't hinder my enjoyment of this book. There is some history between a few of the main characters that we don't know the details of but enough background is given to keep this story on track.

I've finished up the audio book challenge but I'm adding the extras as I finish them.