The Outcast Dead

What's in this book, at a glance — five things readers want to know before they start.

What this book is about

The sixth Ruth Galloway mystery finds the Norfolk forensic archaeologist asked to examine bones believed to be those of Martha Jex, a Victorian woman convicted of murdering multiple children in her care. Meanwhile, a contemporary case—a mother accused of killing her children—dominates the news. The two threads illuminate each other as Griffiths explores Victorian attitudes to child death, modern media hysteria, and the intersection of justice, gender, and power across the centuries. Ruth's professional and personal lives continue their complex development in Griffiths's most thematically ambitious entry to this point.