The Bone Woman: A Forensic Anthropologist's Search for Truth in the Mass Graves of Rwanda, Bosnia, Croatia, and Kosovo

by Clea Koff

In 1994, Rwanda was the scene of the first acts since World War II to be legally defined as genocide. Two years later, Clea Koff, a twenty-three-year-old forensic anthropologist, left the safe confines of a lab in Berkeley, California, to serve as one of sixteen scientists chosen by the United Nations to unearth the physical evidence of the Rwandan genocide. Over the next four years, Koff’s grueling investigations took her across geography synonymous with some of the worst crimes of the twentieth century.

The Bone Woman is Koff’s unflinching, riveting account of her seven UN missions to Bosnia, Croatia, Kosovo, and Rwanda, as she shares what she saw, how it affected her, who was prosecuted based on evidence she found, and what she learned about the world. Yet even as she recounts the hellish nature of her work and the heartbreak of the survivors, she imbues her story with purpose, humanity, and a sense of justice. A tale of science in service of human rights, The Bone Woman is, even more profoundly, a story of hope and enduring moral principles.

Genres: Nonfiction, Anthropology, History, Africa, Science, Memoir, War

304 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 2001

About the author

Clea Koff, who is mixed-race and Jewish, was born in 1972 to a Tanzanian mother and an American father, both documentary filmmakers focused on human rights issues. Her parents took her and her older brother, Kimera, with them around the world. She spent her childhood in England, Kenya, Tanzania, Somalia, and the United States.

By the time she was a teenager she had decided to study human osteology, which she did first in California. She earned her bachelor’s degree in anthropology from Stanford University. Koff then went on to the master's program in forensic anthropology at the University of Arizona. She completed her masters degree in 1999 at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln, after combining her studies with working for the UN between 1996 and 2000.

As a 23-year-old graduate student studying prehistoric skeletons in California, Koff joined a small team of UN scientists exhuming victims of the genocide in Rwanda. Her job was to find evidence to bring the perpetrators to trial, and to help relatives to identify their loved ones. Koff captured the events in her memoir The Bone Woman, which was published in 2004.

Reviews

[Mike · Rating 3 out of 5]

I enjoyed this book, the concept and the facts were very interesting, it seemed like the author just did a lot of complaining about her situation. She spent so much time talking about her lack of equipment/feuds with co-workers that the original stated purpose of hers, bringing awareness to genocides and helping skeletons speak, at times got lost in the background. I wish she would have focused more on the back stories of the genocides, like she did on the first section of the book. It seems like she didn't have as much interest in her numerous cases in Europe as she did in her African case. The book tailed off towards the end after a very promising beginning in Rwanda. The beginning of the book seemed like it was written with a purpose, the ending sounded like she was satisfying an editors needs by copying parts out of her journal.

[Chrisiant · Rating 4 out of 5]

Koff occasionally gets a little too much of her own personal journey in the pages for my taste, but at other points I find her personal reflections particularly relevant. Mostly when she overshares and gets off on personal meditations, I'm willing to forgive her because the rest of it is so interesting.

The inside view into both the fieldwork and the morgue at a handful of ICT sites in Rwanda and the former Yugoslavia is fascinating. Koff shares the realities of her chosen work, warts and all: the lack of appropriate and functional equipment and timely training on UN and ICT missions, the involved process of unearthing bodies that are jumbled together in mass graves and don't always fit into neat archaeological levels, the numerous methods of physically identifying bodies, the strange pressures of living amongst the relatives of the bodies being unearthed, and the tough physical and emotional demands and the interpersonal effects of sharing tight quarters with co-workers experiencing the same pressures.

I think I most appreciated towards the end when Koff becomes part of the team in charge of a mission, and is able to see some of the effects of her work come full circle: bodies she helped to take out of the ground when she was in the field are returned to their families for reburial. A sense of the general flow of the bodies being exhumed - gender and age breakdowns, couples and families buried together. It's also interesting when she's able to make cross-connections between sites in Rwanda and Bosnia - worth considering the implications of similarities between what might be understood as vastly different events. Do the graves tell similar stories?

I flirted really hard with the idea of pursuing forensic anthropology when I was an anthro and poli sci undergrad. Not sure I should've gone that way, but reading this really makes me itch to be in a plastic suit in a mass grave, bringing out those murdered and helping justice finally be served.

[Mandy · Rating 5 out of 5]

The Bone Woman is an incredibly well-written and poignant book written by the forensic anthropologist Clea Koff. The author talks about her work on mass graves in Rwanda, Bosnia and Kosovo as part of UN International Criminal Tribunal investigations.

It is hard to describe this book - I feel like I have undertaken a very long and exhausting journey. Ms Koff described her surroundings so well I feel as if I actually visited hot, leafy forests in Rwanda and cold, grey landscapes in the Balkans. There were times when I had to put this book down and simply process the information that I was reading.

There is something about the human condition whereby we find it hard to imagine mass murder; we find it hard to comprehend the mechanics of taking the life of hundreds of people in one event; we find it hard to imagine that these were once people, to put a human face to the atrocity. In her book, Clea Koff does this for us - she paints a picture whereby the reader is finally able to comprehend and understand.

[Sam · Rating 5 out of 5]

Such an interesting and important book. I loved getting a perspective from the author emotionally, as I feel like sometimes we read books about horrible events and the people that were working to uncover them but never know what's going on inside of their minds.

[Chris · Rating 2 out of 5]

Some intereesting passages, but mechanically written. The distance that Koff needed to maintain between her job (exhuming mass graves) and her interior self has been preserved in her writing.

[Dana K · Rating 4 out of 5]

Clea is a forensic anthropologist working for the UN on the team tasked with investigating the Rawandan genocide. She describes the process of digging up mass graves to document how the people entombed within them died, using that evidence to prove murder and war crimes rather than deaths in battle. For those interested in science she goes into detail about the excavation, the state of the bodies, the specific analyses of bones and teeth to figure out age and help potentially identify victims. She tells us about "clothing day" where the clothes extracted from the graves are cleaned and laid out to help family members identify the bodies. But most of all she details what it's like to serve as a witness and even confirming graves were even present in places where propaganda convinced the masses otherwise. Following Rwanda, she takes us to her time on digs in Bosnia, Croatia and Kosovo telling us a bit about each conflict and how often the 'ethnic cleansing' is mostly government propaganda to get people to hate each other so the government can get access to the resources and reinforce their power.

I loved the deep dive into the scientific aspects but also the more philosophical exploration of identity and bias. I appreciated hearing both about the cause and effect of war but also what remains for those left behind. I was amazed at the danger these peacekeeping investigators are under, having to worry about being present for conflict or careful of old unexploded mines. I appreciated that Clea explored her own humanity and feelings in the day to day as well as what aspects haunt her when she's home. I also found it funny that she found it easier to deal with bodies and people who had died due to horrible trauma than the nonsense politics of being management and the lack of resources to do proper investigations.

The audiobook is read by the author and I loved the authenticity of that.

Thanks to Dreamscape Media for gifted access to the audiobook via Netgalley. All opinions above are my own.

[Rachel · Rating 5 out of 5]

Koff is an inspiration. Her descriptions of mass graves and mass tragedies were so heartbreaking but through her story she was able to create a space of hope by giving back people their identity. Her work is so important and she shared both the good and the bad that come with the job. People say working with the dead is a depressing job with no contribution to help the world progress but they are wrong. One quote that really stuck out to me was: “you mightn’t think that forensic anthropologists participate in the lives of the living, but by interacting with the dead, we affect the living: we alter their memory and understanding of past events”. This book will speak to the consciousness of anyone. It shines a light on the side of humanity that we don’t want to think about. A side that is necessary to understand because when we do, we can open our eyes to find the good in all that bad.

[Christian · Rating 4 out of 5]

This hovers somewhere between a four and a five. While definitely not a light read by any means, Koff was able to make it an enjoyable read by making it based in anthropology and tying the humanity into it. Some sections dragged, but I felt like I learned a lot about bones and the stories they tell.

[Zrinka · Rating 5 out of 5]

The experiences of a forensic anthropologist working for ICTY and ICTR described in a very personal manner. I felt strangely relieved seeing thah we had both asked ourselves the same question: what if I had been in the middle of all that killing and destruction? (Still wondering about the answer though.) Everyone could benefit by reading this book.

[Anita · Rating 3 out of 5]

Actual Rating: 3.5 Stars

[Belén · Rating 4 out of 5]

When you have completed a case and turned in your paperwork, you may still be thinking about it. But before that thinking takes you to a place where you realize that this case was just like the one you had before and maybe just like one from Kigali, before you notice that the case file says that your last case was the husband of the old woman being analyzed at the next table, and before you think about that or feel the sadness, you are assigned your next case and the pathologist is in a hurry and wants to get it done before lunch. Snap! You are saved from thinking and feeling until later, maybe much later, after you have left the mission and you find yourself crying into your pillow twelve thousand kilometers away, a world away, with your hands that touched and your mind that remembers and that elderly husband and wife are still dead, and you know the finality of that and you are left thinking and feeling indefinitely.

I loved this one! It's so refreshing to read about another woman's experience on the field, especially when it comes to things like feelings, hygiene (*gasp* periods), harassment, and above all dealing with the grief (and sometimes straight up denial) of family members whose loved ones have been brutally massacred. I'm not saying it's the norm, but male anthropologists tend to not give those more "human" aspects the relevance they deserve.

[Miya Gentile · Rating 5 out of 5]

Wow, this book has definitely touched me, as an aspiring forensic anthropologist I wish I could force everyone who has ever said "why anthropology?" to read this book. I hope I get the opportunity to be able to make such an astounding impact on those who have been persecuted as Clea had. She writes such a raw story of excavation and identification in the setting of a mass grave as a recent postgrad. Something that really stuck with me as an anthropologist who wants to give people their voices back, Clea talks about how forensic investigation also has the ability to show those who believe their privilege has allowed them to get away with such atrocities, that the dead can talk, "forensic investigation contributes to this foundation because part of the truth comes from the dead, whose stories are unlocked by forensic anthropologists. Without forensics, mass graves of victims can easily be portrayed as mass graves of combatants."

In present day this line of thinking is more relevant than ever, Clea mentions Palestine and Israel and the truth behind such fighting, power and wealth. As an American we are just as susceptible to such atrocities, another quote: "that is why it could happen anywhere, given the right ingredients: particular people in government, competing with others -or with each other- over natural and wealth creating resources." with new developments such as Alligator Alcatraz, ask yourself who is benefiting from such treatment of other human beings?

Most impactful in the last 5 pages a story of Rwandan children who were forced to give up their classmates based on their ethnicity only for all of them to be killed when they resisted. They understood what most adults can't even begin to comprehend, "the knowledge that they were closer to each other than any "group" of them were to the gunmen"

[Elvin · Rating 5 out of 5]

The Bone Woman, a book by Clea Koff, contains all of the personal accounts by the forensic anthropologist on the first acts of genocide that took place after World War II. In 1994, Rwanda became the site of a vast graveyard that was only followed by many more. Over the course of 4 years, Koff traveled to Bosnia, Croatia, Kosovo, and Rwanda to investigate the truth behind the mass killings. The book is written in the style that a novel would be written. However, something that differentiates it from other novels would be the significant amount of evidence and reports that back up its findings. The term, “Double Vision”, is what Koff describes her view of the body she excavates. For example, while she digs up bodies and makes careful notes of what they are wearing and the items retained, she states “It wasn’t until I’ve seen more of these artifacts that their significance dawned on me” (Koff). This shines light on both the scientific aspect of her findings as well as a moral aspect. I gave this book a five out of five star rating and would highly recommend it to anyone who would like more insight into the unfortunate side of humanity’s history. After all, only learning about history can prevent these tragic events from repeating.

[Sarah · Rating 4 out of 5]

A forensic anthropologist’s account of the grueling conditions she faced while exhuming mass graves brought about from genocide and horrors committed upon people in Rwanda, Kosovo, and Bosnia.

The author mixes bits of her own personal story and past with technical aspects of her work and adds in a great deal of humanity while describing the aftermath of the unspeakable crimes committed against groups of people. I found the book interesting and eye-opening.

[Erin · Rating 4 out of 5]

Het is akelig hoe tegenwoordig dit onderwerp nu nog steeds is.

[Ashley Brock · Rating 4 out of 5]

read for a class, very interesting to learn about forensic archaeology through the first person perspective, it was really sad and hard to read about excavations of genocides though

[G L · Rating 2 out of 5]

The first 20-25% of this book was really interesting. After that, it became less and less so for me. I think it's because of the extreme level of detail, much of which I could see would be professionally interesting to a forensic anthropologist, but was excessive and repetitive for an ordinary historian and reader like me. I appreciate that she sees her job as a witness-bearer to genocide, countering the perpetrator's attempt to expunge a particular group, as well as restoring some dignity to the murdered, and giving their surviving family some certainty about their relative. I think that is part of why she gives so much detail. But for me it was too much. I didn't, for instance, feel a need to know how many times the team had to yell down a shaft to the people working in a disused latrine where bodies had been thrown, and the amount of time spent on these details overwhelmed my ability to perceive any bigger thing that she was saying.

The tone is very clinical. It somewhat reminded me of the very detached tone of Scholastiqe Mukasonga's writing about her experience as a Rwandan Tutsi. Bearing witness is difficult. It's a difficult task emotionally and physically, but it's also hard to find language that can carry the load. Using a lot of adjectives and writing with emotion can actually lessen the impact of the writing. For me, Koff conveys some of the horror of the mass graves she worked in exactly by narrating in excruciating detail the process, the day-to-day struggles of her team, not always having food, water, access to showers; always carrying the stench of decay on their clothes and bodies; the urgency of the work given hot climate, the schedules of other experts, and the size of their site. She also does a good job of conveying how much the situation on the ground in Rwanda and Bosnia was still not stable and safe several years after the events.

However, I'm not sure the detached tone worked as well when it came to her talking about her personal reactions and emotions doing this work. I wonder if she just tried to fit too many things into the book. Genocide is horrible. It is good to bear witness to it. To counter the attempt to erase entire groups. But I think a human mind can only take in a certain amount of horror at a time before it becomes numb. I think the main mistake in this book was trying to cover too many mass graves in a single volume. It brought me to the point where I couldn't take in any more, and the book still was hardly more than half finished.

However much one reads, be sure to read the After section at the end. "Once I began to see hundreds of bodies on two continents telling a single story I started to wonder what was really going on in those conflicts. What is the common denominator that produced a common story? One is being revealed in the tribunal courtrooms. Straightforward government-level decisions to gather and kill selected people and expel the rest, either actively or through the spreading of fear." Why? Koff posits self-interest: basically the theft of land or resources, whatever the rhetoric. "In each of the places I worked the official reasons were in fact rhetoric packaged justifications designed to dilute popular resistance to committing crimes against humanity."

[Ed · Rating 4 out of 5]

An excellent book by an extraordinary young woman who has worked in the remains of the human abattoirs around the world. Rwanda, Kosovo, Croatia, all needed the services of a team of forensic scientists to figure out the identities of the bodies--all decayed, many reduced to piles of bones--and to ascertain if those people died as a result of crimes against humanity. Koff and her associates had to show how these people had died and to make sure they weren't causalities of civil war or revolutionary uprisings.

Even though they lived in primitive conditions--no running water in Rwanda, cold water for in the taps for two hours per day in Bosnia for example--were subject to the strictures of the infamous United Nations bureaucracy and were often in the middle of a hostile population that didn't want them to succeed, Koff and her associates came up with the evidence to try and in most cases convict those who gave the order for mass murder.

Each chapter is a new deployment to areas containing mass graves. Koff begins with a short and even-handed account of the massacres and the events just before them and then gets down to the work itself, uncovering human remains--work that is both exhausting and painstaking. They are scientists digging in the dirt with picks and shovels then brushing away what sticks to the bones with the finest tiny brushes.

Koff herself has quite a background. Her father is English, her mother Tanzanian. They are documentary filmmakers who packed up the family (Clea and her brother) and took them to Africa, the Middle East and South America while they were filming. With an undergrad degree from Stanford and graduate study at Arizona, she was asked to take part in the first forensic mission to Rwanda when she was 23 years old.

She describes how she loses her scientific detachment when she gets what she calls "double vision", seeing beyond the skeleton in front of her to the person that it might once have been--for example a preteen boy who has been shot in the head. One of the most gruesome discoveries in Rwanda happened when they began finding ankle bones with machete slashes. When the killers simply had too much work to do--too many people to kill--they would severe a victim's Achilles tendons so they he couldn't run away and would be there for killing hours or even days later. One mass grave in Croatia was full of the staff and patients from a hospital, some of the patients with plaster casts on limbs or with IV needles still in their arms.

Highly recommended.

[MarkedWoman · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is the second time I have read this book - a book I found enjoyable both times I read it. Many of the reviews have complained it was not professional - however this is exactly the thing I enjoyed about it. The distancing that can occur to produce self preservation is balanced here by Ms. Koff's candor about when those distances are reduced and emotional breakdown occurs.

I would like to have heard more detail about the places they stayed and other members of the crew. Learning more about the local groups would also have been an improvement - but all in all, I enjoyed the book. I don't know that I would read it a third time, but will use it as a teaching tool if the need arises.

[Brittany · Rating 3 out of 5]

2.5 stars.

I hate to give a book with this subject matter such a low rating because I think it's important for us to read and remember the victims of genocides and how capable humans are of cruelty. I also think getting a forensic anthropologist's perspective on various atrocities can provide a unique view on the topic and was hoping to get that perspective here.

However, I was disappointed as the writing was not good. It read like a mix between the author's diary and matter-of-fact reports. Some chapters barely included that chapter's title subject and many passages needed to be edited for clarity.

All that aside though, I was put off most of all by the writer's sheer amount of complaints that filled the pages. More than poignant descriptions of the victims and what they went through, we get whole sections dedicated to peer arguments, condescending remarks made about someone, or a complaint about equipment or general efficiency issues. The author may have had some valid points, but the amount of them given space distracted and annoyed me. I don't care that a new worker on your team dug in the wrong spot - I care about the victims' stories.

(I did enjoy the sections on the Rwandan genocide the most as Koff seemed to be more engaged and interested with this mission than in future ones she wrote about.)

I added an extra .5 star because of the subject matter but overall it was a chore to get through, especially toward the end of the book, and I ended up irritated at the author. If you can find another book on forensic anthropology related to genocide, give that one a go before reading this one.

[Amanda · Rating 3 out of 5]

I was expecting to invalidate a lot of the complaints about Clea Koff's book, but I was more and more disappointed as the book progressed. Gone was the wisdom of her experience, missing was the self-discovery and introspection, only barely existent was her experience of the people around her who had survived the horrors, and the writing that replaced what had begun to glimmer in the first few chapters was that of a hardened, unhappy woman who seemed stressed out and angry at her coworkers.

This does not mean that the book was completely worthless to me, and for that reason I give it three stars. I think it is an extremely important book, one that examines one step of the process by which someone guilty of genocide comes to justice, and one that pays ample tribute to the remains of the people who cry out for justice.

I hope Clea has found more peace, both with her coworkers and with herself, in the four years since the last part of the book. I did feel as though I was there, experiencing every part of it with her, and she did an ample job of keeping the jargon of her profession to a manageable level -- which was something that had worried me prior to reading the book. She really is a wonderful writer on the face of it, but just needed to focus a bit less on the problems that happened within each mission.

[Melanie · Rating 3 out of 5]

This woman, Clea Koff, is a hero. I was continuously amazed at her persistence, optimism, discipline, and most of all, her strong stomach. At times her positivity seemed to border on naivete, but perhaps because of her naivete she was able to rise above even the most harrowing circumstances. She's dug through knee deep mud, surrounded by walls of rotting bodies. She's worked in rooms splattered with the blood of the victims she was exhuming. But with just her conviction to uncover truths to massive crimes, she's gone back over and over again to the same tragic, desperate work. How can she deliberately throw herself into various forms of hell, and still continue to smile about it?

Just knowing that this kind of person actually exists gives me a lot of insight into my own nature. I am too cynical to believe noble virtues such as justice and truths could ever prevent government entities from oppressing and massacring civilians. As forensics advance, methods of deception and control would also advance. But if everyone thought like me I can see that the world would be worse off. The Bone Woman is an amazing memoir. I've learned much about the evils in the world, of greed, hatred and cruelty befitting fiction. But I also saw that destruction through the eyes of a resolute optimist, who would so readily suffer for the sake of the dead. It was a poetic dichotomy.

[Sarah · Rating 4 out of 5]

Clea Koff shares her personal journey as a forensic anthropologist in her powerful memoir The Bone Woman. Koff became interested in forensic anthropology as a tool for human rights investigations as a graduate student. Her inspiration for such work was born out of reading Witnesses from the Grave: The Stories Bones Tell (7, 259). She spends a great deal of time describing the picturesque surroundings of her mission sites and the essence of beauty that shell-shocked burnt out homes and hotels still possess. The beauty of the countryside and the fantasy of what those old buildings must have been like are sharply contrasted with the macabre descriptions of her work in the field and the technical descriptions of her work in the makeshift morgues. Koff may be trying to draw the readers’ attention to her assertion that these crimes against humanity can and at some level do happen anywhere in the world (264). The buildings also become stand ins for the missing, they bare the same marks as the dead and are left behind as a reminder that the unimaginable happened against the backdrop of beauty. Koff also reminds us through her descriptions of survivors’ everyday lives that people go on living....

[Maysze · Rating 4 out of 5]

I bought this book back after my trip in Rwanda about 7 years ago. Rwanda has caught my heart every since. Hence, when I saw the subtitle of the book 'among the dead in Rowanda, Bosnia, Croatia and Kosovo', I knew back then it is the book I want to read. Koff did not disappoint me at all. I'm very grateful for her honest encounter in all those unfortunate places. Certainly, her heartbreaking stories touch my heart the most. I can echo what she saw and experienced emotionally. I think we all agree that forensic anthropology has its power in the international count, but Koff didn't just displayed its power. But she displayed her heart and belief in forensic anthropology, which is the true starting point of her work, her life, her passion and this book. All the stories that she shared are from her heart and belief. I appreciate that.
This book doesn't go all details in forensic anthropology. But there are information for you and I to understand how it works and subsequently how difficult to gather the evidence in those places. I'm thankful to Koff for her heart and the honesty she shared in this book.

[Melissa Kidd · Rating 3 out of 5]

This was an interesting book. It was the winner of a vote students in my department choose as the book our Anthropology Club would read this semester. I’m interested in forensics already so I wasn’t worried that I wouldn’t like the book. And I did find it interesting. But I didn’t get much more out of it either. There were tidbits of life in a profession like this that I found very usual, but I already knew the forensic facts. The book was much more about her experiences and emotions, which was, again, interesting but not eye opening, at least for me. I do think it was an excellent book choice for an Anthropology Book Club. And for beginners readers of this type of material/profession, it was very easy to read; not a lot of jargon to bog you down.

[MaryG2E · Rating 2 out of 5]

The stories told by Cleo Koff about the terrible genocides in places like Bosnia were informative and sobering. I was particularly touched by her analysis of the Rwandan massacre that she worked on, where innocent people were struck down brutally, and those who sheltered in a church compound were targeted. My main reservation about this book is that, while Ms Koff may be a brilliant scientist, she is not a good writer. The stories were let down by her lack of literary style, which diminished my enthusiasm to keep reading. Despite this nit-picking on my part, this is a worthwhile book to read.

[Sofi · Rating 5 out of 5]

I had to read this book for a class, but I'm really glad that I had to. It's about the author's work as a forensic anthropologist. She digs up graves in other countries to bring justice to the people who were targeted in genocides and other crimes against humanity. I really like her way of writing, it's really informative while still having a feeling as if she is speaking one on one with the reader. Reading some parts actually made me feel nauseous. She is completely honest and really descriptive. If you have an interest in history or forensics, I would definitely recommend this wonderful book.

[Lauren Thornberg · Rating 3 out of 5]

A fairly good book with an interesting topic! Very informative. However, a large portion of the book just seems like complaining about working conditions and bureaucracy, which are very valid things to complain about, I just feel like it distracted from the main point of the narrative - to give voice to victims of genocides.

[Namrirru · Rating 5 out of 5]

Extremely graphic account of a forensic anthropologist's life and hardships while digging mass graves in recent sites of genocide. The humanity of the writer starkly contrasts with the inhumanity of her work. It's a good book, but not for the squeamish.

[Anna · Rating 3 out of 5]

the topic itself is interesting and makes the book– basically Koff's unique job, the history, & the discoveries. however the writing style was a bummer. the author is self-centered; it seemed like a book about herself more than the cause.