Em is in her element at the Association for the Study of American Archeology meeting. The attendees are suitably ensconced in the historical (1880) General Bartlett Hotel during a New Hampshire blizzard, and Emma is doing her thing: giving a tour of an archeological site, greeting friends, presenting papers, supporting her grad students and avoiding an old flame who left her more than a little miffed and emotionally stranded more than twenty years ago. Her enjoyment is interrupted by suspicions that she, or one of her friends, is responsible for the bloody death of an abrasive colleague. Our amateur sleuth runs afoul of both the police and the villain, deducing the solutions to several mysteries before the last guest leaves.

       Ms. Cameron is great at giving you a visual image to convey a feeling. An awkward stranger is a meercat on alert in the crowd; archeology, aka "Back Then," comes to life in the form of a dog leaving a pawprint in an unfired clay pot drying in the sun. If you have ever attended a meeting of a professional society you will recognize the atmosphere and scenery painted in More Bitter Than Death. It is a gathering of strangers, acquaintances, old friends and rivals. You have something in common with every person there but don't necessarily want to share it with the next person who can read your name tag and say, "Hi!"

       The thing that delighted me most is the language of the friends and rivals; a trashy combination of pop culture and classical references smattered with technical terms, twenty-five cent words, and those of the four-letter variety, just as real people communicate and get to know each other.

      I really enjoyed this book and can't wait to dig up the previous four.