Morgue ─ A Life in Death

In this clear-eyed, gritty, and enthralling narrative, Dr. Vincent Di Maio and veteran crime writer Ron Franscell guide us behind the morgue doors to tell a fascinating life story through the cases that have made Di Maio famous-from the exhumation of assassin Lee Harvey Oswald to the complex issues in the shooting of Florida teenager Trayvon Martin.

Beginning with his street-smart Italian origins in Brooklyn, the book spans 40 years of work and more than 9,000 autopsies, and Di Maio's eventual rise into the pantheon of forensic scientists. One of the country's most methodical and intuitive criminal pathologists will dissect himself, maintaining a nearly continuous flow of suspenseful stories, revealing anecdotes, and enough macabre insider details to rivet the most fervent crime fans.

VINCENT DI MAIO, MD, is an American pathologist and an internationally renowned expert on gunshot wounds. Now a private consultant who's performed more than 9,000 autopsies, he's played pivotal roles in some of the most provocative trials and death investigations of the past 40 years. Di Maio was chief medical examiner of San Antonio, Texas, until 2006. He is editor-in-chief of The American Journal of Forensic Medicine and Pathology, and has been awarded many honors. In 2014, he was appointed to the U.S. Department of Justice's first-ever National Commission on Forensic Science to help develop uniform federal codes in death investigations.

RON FRANSCELL is the bestselling crime author of The Darkest Night and Delivered from Evil. He has been praised by Ann Rule, Vincent Bugliosi and other true-crime heavyweights as one of the most provocative new voices in narrative nonfiction. His work regularly appears in publications such as the Washington Post, Chicago Sun-Times, San Francisco Chronicle, Denver Post, San Jose Mercury-News, St. Louis Post-Dispatch, and Milwaukee Journal-Sentinel. He is also a novelist whose books include Angel Fire and The Deadline. He now lives in Texas.