The forensic scientist's work forms a fascinating part of crime drama, with the pathologist playing a big supporting role in many police procedurals, while some shows such as the various CSI series , Silent Witness, Bones, Waking the Dead  drive the action from the forensics. It's not surprising, then, that Sanjukta Mondal makes good use of this TV introduction to this science both to introduce real concepts, but also to point out where the fictional versions get it wrong. It's also essential to cover, as she does, the reality that forensic work has itself slipped up. The book's introduction finishes with a reference to the key phrase 'every contact leaves a trace' becoming a guiding principle, but then tells us 'Does that mean forensic science is foolproof? The answer is no. It comes with its own set of pitfalls.' And these pitfalls will form a significant part of telling the story of the development of forensic science as a discipline. Although TV show...

The pedants amongst us have to start by raising an eyebrow at the subtitle (supertitle?) 'how plants solve crimes'. Plants do not solve crimes - people solve crimes. What was intended was more 'how plants are used by forensic scientists to help them solve crimes' - but I suppose that's not so snappy. In theory, this should be a page turner as a book as it combines science with real-life drama. We're told a fair number of true crime stories where plants have been used as vital evidence. But, unfortunately, David Gibson does not have a flair for storytelling and it all comes across as rather flat. It doesn't help that there's such a focus on US law, with only passing references to Europe/UK - and most puzzling of all, on a regular basis a story will start with something like 'In 1997, Merle and Nicky Merlaue (not their real names) bought waterfront property...' Why don't we get their real names? Presumably the court cases are a matter of public...

As someone who writes a lot about quantum physics, where systems can be in more than one state at a time, I want to give this book a superposition of star ratings: it's a beautiful book, excellently researched and painstakingly detailed, which gets it a solid four stars, but the nature of the contents makes it more like a mini-encyclopedia, rather than something that reads well from end to end, hence the three stars. The book has a lot of promise to hit the spot. If, like me, you are interested in both science and crime writing, a study of the poisons used in Agatha Christie's books seems a natural fascinator. Kathryn Harkup takes us through a whole range, from familiar favourites (as it were) like arsenic and strychnine to more unusual possibilities like nicotine, phosphorous and ricin. Each poison has its own section, where we learn how Christie used it, how the poison works, what's an antidote (if anything), real life examples of using the poison and then return to C...

The cover of this book shouts ‘historical true crime,’ so I didn’t expect to be reviewing it here. True crime is a genre I generally feel uncomfortable about – at least, as long as it’s in living memory. Somehow, Victorian true crime is rather entertaining, with that Sherlock Holmesian feel to it. I assumed then, that the Killer of Little Shepherds would be another Slaughter on a Snow Morn, a book I found fascinating when reviewing for my blog. I was half right. Around half the book is the story on the man described as ‘the French Ripper’, though in fact he killed significantly more people than Jack the Ripper. It is a fascinating tale of the way a tramp could wander round France, killing with impunity thanks to considerable cunning in his approach, plus the ability to be considered ‘one of us’ almost by the police because he was ex-military. I’d never heard of Joseph Vâcher, but his story makes great reading. However, the reason the book is here is that interwoven with Vâcher...

This article on the amazing use of deadly arsenic in Victorian wallpapers first appeared in Spectroscopy Europe and is reproduced with permission. Aniline dyes, developed by William Perkin in the 1850s, were the beginning of the end for a host of mineral pigments widely used in interior décor. Chromium, cadmium, mercury, lead, cyanide, antimony and arsenic salts were once commonplace as paint, wallpaper, food and fabric pigments. The arsenic pigments Scheele’s green and Emerald green, the mercurial vermilion, green lead chromate, cadmium yellow, arsenical Naples ’s yellow, the cyanide salt Prussian blue, were the staple colours used to brighten up the Georgian and Victorian home. Whites were often lead white or arsenic trioxide. In the early days aniline dyes were far from safe with arsenious acid, used as a reductant in the dye manufac- ture,often present in high concentrations. What were the health consequences of these metal pigments? There is little direct systematic evidence ...