#37 The Scarecrow by Michael Connelly

This book is rather timely with Jack  from the previous book, The Poet is now losing his job due to the decline in the newspaper business. He is given two weeks to train his replacement and he decides to look into a crime story and make it into a great story. Turns out the kid in jail didn't do it and when Jack's replacement trips over evidence that points to the real killer she is killed in turn. Jack is on the trail of the real killer with the killer right behind him. Of course he gets some help from some old friends and the book just goes flying along. I love Connelly's stuff and the sneak preview into the next book that comes out this fall just whet my appetite for it.

#38 Animal Investigators by Laurel A. Neme

The full title is Animal Investigators: How the World's First Wildlife Forensics Lab Is Catching Poachers, Solving Crimes, and Saving Endangered Species. I had heard an interview with the author and decided to pick this up and give it a try. The book covers a few completely different cases in the US that the lab worked on. They discuss how they came up with different ways to tell how a walrus died in order to show they were killed only for their ivory. the book doesn't get into the hard science that much but it was a rather interesting peek into the world of wildlife protection.