Research
secrets
Crime writer Simon Beckett has written a series of novels about forensic
anthropologist David Hunter. Here he tells Anita Loughrey how he was inspired
by a visit to the Anthropology Research Facility in Tennessee – the ‘Body Farm’
I
find research fascinating.
Before writing novels, I used
to write for the Daily Telegraph
Magazine. In 2002, I went to
Knoxville, Tennessee, to do an
article on the outdoor Anthro-
pology Research Facility, more
commonly known as the Body
Farm. They run a National
Forensic Academy there, offer-
ing intensive – and exceptionally
realistic – forensic training for US
police officers and crime scene
investigators.
In fact, there is no other
research facility in the world
where you can excavate human
remains. They have training
courses with staged crime scenes plot. I like to find out the general
using real bodies. The bodies are I watched students put through principles of the crime so I do not
donated, either by the individu-
als themselves or their families.
their paces with crime scenes
come across any pitfalls where
it would not be able to work
The training and research under-
recreated using human remains
out like that. Each book works
taken has revealed a lot about out differently. I enjoy talking to
body decomposition, the time it people and this often leads to a
takes for hair to slough off a body, theory is that the more lifelike the there, I watched the students put re-jiggle in terms of plot.
the role of insects on decomposi- recreations, the better prepared through their paces with a vari- My novels are mainly about fic-
tion, even the differing effects the students will be when they ety of simulated crime scenes, all titious places based on reality. My
that light and shade will have on encounter the genuine thing. recreated as closely as possible first novel, The Chemistry of Death,
the process of decay. This infor- It was a great privilege to be using actual human remains. was set in Norfolk but the actual
mation has proved invaluable for allowed in and I was hugely One day I was cheerfully told location I made up. The same for
determining the time of death. impressed. I think it is a shame to put down my notepad and my second book, Written in Bone,
The academy goes to extreme there is nothing similar in Western tape recorder and help with based in the Outer Hebrides: the
lengths to ensure that their Europe, as soil, vegetation and recovering the two bodies that the remote island of Runa is entirely
re constructions are realistic. The light can be very different in dif- students were carefully unearth- fictitious. You can’t get criticised
ferent countries. ing from a woodland grave. for details if a place is imaginary
During the five days I spent Sweating in the heat and dirt but it is still important to me to
as the skeletal remains slowly make it as real as possible.
emerged was a sobering, yet fas- If you are talking about real
cinating experience. people and places it is impor-
But, what started off as a one- tant to find out about them. For
off piece of journalism took on Written in Bone, I needed to know
an entirely different aspect. Back what the weather was like in the
in the UK, I was taken up by the Hebridean Islands, so I got in
idea of a novel based around touch with someone in the Met
what I’d seen and experienced in Office to find out about storms
Tennessee. Gradually, the concept in the area and how severe they
for Dr David Hunter took shape: would be. I also spoke to a police
a British forensic anthropologist officer who grew up there and he
schooled in the techniques and helped a lot with pronunciation
science being developed at the and I got inside information from
Body Farm. locals. All this information helps
The research is everything to make the story more real.
in my books as there is loads of My research is very ad hoc. I
scientific background behind the have this technique of scattering
16 Writers
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FORUM #99
WF99JAN16.indd 1 26/11/2009 11:43:49
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