
Dr. Temperance Brennan, a forensic anthropologist who works at the Jeffersonian Institution and also writes books, has an impressive ability to read clues from victims' bones. Consequently, law enforcement calls her to assist with investigations when remains are so badly decomposed, burned or destroyed that standard identification methods are useless. Brennan is teamed with Special Agent Seeley Booth, a former Army sniper, who mistrusts science and scientists when it comes to solving crimes but who has developed respect for Brennan, both professionally and personally.

Skeletal remains found at the bottom of a lake turn out to be those of a congressman's former aide.

When Dr. Brennan uncovers the identity of a man killed while driving a car registered to a prominent Middle Eastern man with ties to the U.S. government, she and Booth find themselves tracking a terrorist.

The decaying corpse of the Venezuelan ambassador's son is found hanging from a tree.

Brennan and Booth travel to Washington state to determine how a human arm ended up in the stomach of a black bear.