The Book of Skulls

Hutchison (the YA novel Storm Hags) draws on early police forensics in his tightly plotted adult debut. In 1875, pragmatic Afro-British woman Liz Moliette leaves the London orphanage that raised her to attend medical school in Edinburgh, despite the school not allowing women to graduate. She befriends Amulya Patel, the only other female student, and the affable, secretly gay Campbell Preeble. Despite the efforts of male students and professors to thwart them, Liz excels and moves toward her dream of working in forensics by becoming assistant to police surgeon Florian Blyth. When decapitated bodies begin appearing, the police call on Blyth, who has been living as a man in order to practice. After Liz and Amulya help exonerate journalist Hector Findlay, who has been carrying on a relationship with Campbell, police suspect a phrenologist is collecting the skulls of unusual specimens. They continue their investigation, not realizing that Liz is in grave danger because the culprit’s collection has a spot “for the perfect mixed-race female.” Moments of danger and the police’s slow progress provide satisfying tension. This will gratify fans of historic police procedurals with a queer bent. (Self-published)