Zombies of the Gene Pool

In the 1950s, a group of young science fiction writers, dreaming of literary immortality and calling themselves the Lanthanides, buried a time capsule with their stories and relics from the time. Now, in the 1990s, when several of them have become famous, the surviving Lanthanides are getting together at a special convention to dig up the capsule and open it. But the convention is startled by the appearance of a writer who was supposed to have died thirty years ago. Then murder materializes to throw the agenda further into chaos. Now, Jay Omega, author of Bimbos of the Death Sun, and his significant other, Dr. Marion Farley, must separate science fact from fiction -- and unearth a killer with a story of his own to tell.

Sharyn McCrumb is an internationally acclaimed New York Times bestselling author whose work has been honored with all five of the major awards in crime fiction (Edgar, Agatha, Anthony, Macavity, and Nero)—with two Best Appalachian Novel awards. She is the creator of the Ballad series, which began with If Ever I Return, Pretty Peggy-O; and her satirical mystery series featuring forensic anthropologist Elizabeth MacPherson. McCrumb lives in the Virginia Blue Ridge Mountains, less than a hundred miles from the Smoky Mountain valley where her ancestors settled in 1790.