If you haven’t read Vanessa Lillie’s “Blood Sisters,” you should before diving into her latest, “The Bone Thief.”
Bureau of Indian Affairs (BIA) archaeologist Syd Walker is back, as is her wife, Mal, and a handful of other characters who are integral to the previous book. Yep, “The Bone Thief” is littered with “Blood Sisters” spoilers.
Maybe you don’t care about spoilers (I do — so very, very much). If that’s the case, dive in, but don’t say you weren’t warned because you’re going to want to circle back. Lillie knows how to spin a yarn, and you’ll be compelled to read more from her.
In “Blood Sisters,” Syd, who is Cherokee, is drawn into searching for her missing sister, who struggles with drug addiction and is known to go off on benders. This time feels different, her family says, so Syd leaves her home in Rhode Island and returns to where she grew up, Picher, Okla., even though every fiber of her being would prefer steering clear. Through it all, Syd carries a lot of guilt about a murderous assault that occurred when she, her sister and their friend Luna were teens.
Guilt is a theme in “The Bone Thief,” too, as is the search for a missing Indigenous woman — this time, she’s a one-time BIA intern with whom Syd didn’t get along and she’s from the Narragansett tribe.
Three months have passed since the events of “Blood Sisters,” which is set in 2008, to coincide with a real-life environmental catastrophe in Picher that forced the relocation of its residents. Syd is back in Rhode Island. Life, however, is anything but routine. A phone call brings her out in the middle of the night to ostensibly break into Camp Quahog, where remains have been found.
“A familiar feeling has arrived,” Syd thinks, “as if these bones are in crisis, forced to reach toward me for help.”
Lillie sets the hook in the initial pages, beginning with the book’s first sentence — “Someone is hunting me” — which foreshadows a clever juxtaposition in the final chapter. What falls between those chapters is an involving mystery injected with insights into the disposition of Native artifacts or, more appropriately, “belongings.”
