Leonard Krishtalka is the author of award-winning essays and the acclaimed book DINOSAUR PLOTS. As a paleontologist, he has worked on expeditions throughout the fossil-rich badlands of the American and Canadian west, Patagonia, China, Ethiopia and Kenya.
His novels feature private investigator Harry Przewalski who, after a bruta.... more
Leonard Krishtalka is the author of award-winning essays and the acclaimed book DINOSAUR PLOTS. As a paleontologist, he has worked on expeditions throughout the fossil-rich badlands of the American and Canadian west, Patagonia, China, Ethiopia and Kenya.
His novels feature private investigator Harry Przewalski who, after a brutal personal tragedy, fled his life to a desert war and came back as a private eye with a gun and a license to detect. Now he excavates the dirty underbelly of people's lives, unearthing sexual betrayal, treachery, fraud and murder buried beneath the science of petrified shards, skin and bones.
In his first case, THE BONE FIELD, Przewalski chases a missing paleontologist across 80 million years of intrigue and death, from a bone field of petrified skeletons to the bone rooms of the museum. In the sequel, DEATH SPOKE, Przewalski seeks the killer of a renowned archaeologist and expert on prehistoric cave art from a Kansas motel to the deepest recesses of a cavern in southern France. In the third novel, THE CAMEL DRIVER, the vandalism of a world-famous museum diorama immerses Przewalski in plundered graves for human exhibits, a lurid sexual trial, the mysterious remains of a child, and an archaeological bombshell worth killing for.
In DEATH SPOKE, the murder of Joyce Fulbright, a university dean, renowned archaeologist, and expert on prehistoric cave paintings, reveals webs of sexual blackmail, academic treachery, and archaeological fraud surrounding the most famous cave art in France. Her lover, James Porter, the chair of the Anthropology Department, is charged with her murder, implicated by semen, hair and fingerprints. Police think the case is closed. His lawyer thinks he’s guilty. Porter hires PI Harry Przewalski to find the killer and clear him.
As dean, Fulbright’s ruthless academic politics brought power and deadly enemies. As an archaeologist, she and her academic adversaries are engaged in a bitter fight over the sudden appearance of magnificent cave art across southern France and Spain 32,000 years ago. Who were the artists? Why did they paint horses, mammoths, bison and deer on the cave walls? Was the art in one of the caves forged to create tourism? Przewalski meets Ruby, a former student of Fulbright’s and victim of academic prejudice. They discover a horrific atrocity committed during WWII and a deadly, diabolical plot hatched in the deepest recesses of the caves.
Listen to the recent interview on KPR Conversations
http://kansaspublicradio.org/blog/dan-skinner/conversations-leonard-kris-krishtalka-current-and-future-novels
In THE CAMEL DRIVER a historic museum diorama is vandalized in the middle of the night. It depicts two lions attacking a Bedouin courier on a camel crossing the Sahara. The camel's belly has been sliced open and a bundle extracted, shedding bits of flesh from a child and fiber from a cloth used to wrap cadavers.
In his third case, the museum hires PI Harry Przewalski to uncover the macabre history of the Arab courier exhibit. Who is the camel driver—his skull, skeleton and skin were mounted under his clothing? Who is the child? Why was its mummified hand sewn into the camel’s belly 150 years ago? Is the vandalism tied to the apparent suicide of the museum's archaeologist?
In Cape Town, Harry uncovers the exhibit's grisly past: a lurid trial of seduction, betrayal, revenge, and an unwanted child; and graves plundered for human dioramas. In a Paris museum, a dead archaeologist, a bloodstained journal, and the theft of a Neandertal child's skull lead Harry to the stolen bundle––a bombshell worth killing for in a murderous race for scientific fame.
Leonard Krishtalka's Projects
In DEATH SPOKE, Harry Przewalski investigates the murder of a renowned archaeologist, an expert o... more
A biological anthropologist at a university studying indigenous genetics is bludgeoned to death i... more