Leonard Krishtalka
In the back-biting world of academia, a biological anthropologist studying indigenous genetics is bludgeoned to death. The university chancellor’s son, an Athabascan native and archeology student, is charged with murder. He’d led a violent protest against the genomic studies of the first Americans. PI Harry Przewalski becomes immersed in a tangle of deceit, personal vendettas, unethical research, and archeological fraud.In Native Blood, the fourth installment in the Harry Przewalski Mystery Series, the author delivers a pulsing narrative of sexual betrayal, blackmail, the passions of an illicit affair, and a coverup of an archeological bombshell. A web of treachery surrounds a missing flint spear point that threatens to upend careers and what we knew about the first Americans. Was the anthropologist killed over an explosive theory that the Americas were peopled at least twice from different continents more than 13,000 years ago? The stakes in this race for scientific discovery and fame are murderous. Native Blood tackles the intense conflicts between genetics, archeology, and the Native Americans’ own origin stories. It reveals anthropology’s long entanglement with race and racial theory, and the darkest shadows cast by the unspeakable treatment of indigenous peoples. In the end, Przewalski uncovers a diabolical plot, one in which justice, as a human invention, makes mistakes. With its rich descriptions, driving narrative, and suspenseful plot, Native Blood is a must-read for anthropology and history enthusiasts, readers of detective fiction and psychological suspense, and fans of compelling scientific and human intrigues. Brace yourself for an extraordinary thriller.