First of all thank you so much for the opportunity to read this before the release date. Reading what science and technology is capable of in todays capacity was mind blowing. I highlighted a lot of interesting facts and had to take a few breaks to reread what I had just read. The journey to find the identity of single head was a journey that I won’t forget. I my wish for the book would be that the parts in the book I wanted to skip would have been more interesting.

An exceptional true crime novel about a cold case. The amount of lessons in this book about forensic methods makes this book a good mine. Not to mention the care, empathy, and dedication the author/investigator put forth.

This was a phenomenal book on true crime, it definitely was an enjoyable read. It felt highly researched and was very informative. Definitely recommend for any true crime junkie out there.

4/5 stars

Loved how the author shows how much she cares for the John and Jane does while talking about their cases , and how DNA as will as the new sciences we are coming up with can also help solve and bring back their names .

I honestly can say that I wish there were more people like Norton who truly got into the crime scene technology because they wanted to make a difference. Wanted to help solve those crimes that some thought were unsolvable. As a Dr I can tell you that forensic pathology is how we speak to the dead. How we find clues that no one else could see because they are not always trained to see it. I loved doing my time in the morgue although now I am a trauma surgeon who listens to books instead of music while in the OR, that does not always go so well btw. I unfortunately am not familiar with her podcast, but will certainly look for it now, I had no idea what I was going to read with this book. I knew the subject matter but was not sure if the chapters were going to be told in a podcast type of way or as someone who knew more about the forensics side of the murders/mysteries. Each chapter brought a new case and the information the reader learned was more than just what someone could look up online to get. I was fully invested by the first page and really love the writing ability from this author.

5 out of 5 stars


Thank you to NetGalley as well as the author /publisher for giving me the opportunity to read this book in exchange for my unbiased and honest review.

This was a really good book on true crime. Each chapter told a different case. The book was well researched. Highly recommend if you enjoy reading true crime.

I’ve recently become obsessed with true crime and podcasts about true crime. I loved learning about this cold case and the forensics behind these type of things. It was very interesting and insightful.

An intriguing look at cold cases and the methods used to solve them. Many crime-related books tend to be sensationalized and "back burner" the victims, but this is an empathetic exception. A must for any true crime aficionado's bookshelf.

Thank you to NetGalley and the publisher for the ARC that I received in exchange for an honest review.

"At the risk of sounding like an absolute twenty-first-century cliché...it all started with a podcast." (loc. 68*)

Norton got involved in true crime by accident: a writer and professor by training and trade, she started a podcast as preparation for a course she was teaching...and it took on a life of its own. Into the world of true crime and cold cases Norton went. In "Lay Them to Rest", she describes an effort between various true-crime nonprofessionals, police, and scientists to uncover the identity of "Ina Jane Doe", a woman whose partial remains were found in 1993 in Illinois and had never been identified.

"This is not an episode of Bones. Not unless Dr. Temperance Brennan is willing to spend an entire episode taking tiny measurements in a quiet lab, with the cliffhanger coming just before she begins to fill out her paperwork." (loc. 1440)

We're used to 45-minute episodes wrapping things up easily—those hours and hours of measurements and tests and applying precisely sized eraser bits to skulls summed up in a montage—but this was a case that would take months and years. The advent of genealogical DNA research has made it possible to solve cases that might previously have been unsolvable, but it's not as easy as chucking all the unsolved cases into a database and letting the computer do its thing. Remains need to have usable DNA, and to have enough of it in good shape for the right kinds of tests, and for enough relatives of sufficient closeness to have put their own DNA into the right databases. And it takes money—money that most departments can't afford to spend on decades-old cold cases.

"There are so many ways to tell [her story], and all of them are important. But each way paints a very different picture and leads down a different road." (loc. 4581)

I'd actually heard of Ina Jane Doe before (on a true crime YouTube channel), so I was somewhat familiar with the case. (The YouTube channel, perhaps predictably, gave the case a pretty cursory overview.) What is most fascinating to me here are the forensic sketches and reconstructions—if the book sounds interesting to you, hold off on Googling until you've read it—which are part science and part art and the sort of thing that...that can help or hinder a case, let's say. But Norton gives some really helpful context and perspective on those reconstructions, and I'm left wondering where the future of such forensic sketches might go.

This is one for true-crime aficionados, but it also reminds me a lot of Andrea Lankford's "Trail of the Lost"—while "Lay Them to Rest" is about non-professionals helping to solve a Jane Doe case, "Trail of the Lost" is about non-professionals trying to solve several known missing-persons cases. In both cases, slow—agonizingly so for the families—but sustained efforts to put the pieces together, to answer some of the many questions that remain.

Thanks to the author and publisher for providing a review copy through NetGalley.

*Quotations are taken from an ARC and may not be final.

“Lay Them to Rest” has been on my radar since I am familiar with the author’s podcast The Fall Line. Laurah Norton has written a fascinating narrative non-fiction account of the forensic processes used to identify Jane and John Does. New developments in this area (especially genetic genealogy) have changed the field dramatically in recent years.

We follow Norton’s life during the investigation of one particular case: “Ina Jane Doe.” Norton, a writer and researcher, weaves the methodology and history of these forensic investigations with her own story of collaborating with scientists, researchers and law enforcement, to solve this case.

From the smallest DNA molecule to the larger scope of societal racism and sexism, Norton explains the background of the different steps that must be taken in order to increase the chance of identifying these people. Not only that, she also discusses what could be changed in order to improve future investigations. The grisly details are difficult to read but necessary to understand how this research is done. There was just a tad too much day-to-day details of Norton’s life, which distracted from the focus of the book, and some scientific details became a bit overwhelming at times, but otherwise, this is a very good memoir and true crime readers will be very interested in reading it.

Thank you to NetGalley and the publisher for an arc in exchange for an honest review.

This was one of my most anticipated 2023 books, and I’m happy to say it did not disappoint! This book is a true crime memoir by Laurah Norton, host of the Fall Line podcast. Laurah ended up becoming fascinated by the story of Ina Jane Doe, a woman whose partial remains were found in 1993 and never identified. Laurah and a forensic anthropologist named Amy Micheal teamed up to identify Ina Jane Doe, consulting with other forensics experts along the way. Along with chronicling the journey to identity Ina Jane Doe’s remains, the author also discussed other cases of unidentified remains, and interviewed forensic and civilian experts who work on these cases. I loved how Norton balanced her own memories and life experiences with the true crime aspect of this book. It felt like a perfect balance. I also loved how she addressed some of the issues with unidentified remains, such as the concept of the missing missing, the idea that marginalized people are more likely to stay unidentified. She also discussed the issues with using sex/gender and race to identify remains. One thing I didn’t enjoy was that some of the sections where the science used to identify remains, like odontology, were discussed, felt like they dragged. The author inserted a lot of long, verbatim quotes from experts into these sections. I understand the intent was to get readers to understand the science behind these processes, but to me, it bogged the writing down, and a simpler explanation would have worked much better rather than a huge quote. Overall though, I really enjoyed this book. I would definitely recommend for true crime fans.

Always interested in reading about cold cases and the methods behind everything as well. Interesting book, easy to read and didn't feel like it took me any time to get through at all.