The Bone Thief

Syd Walker Book 2

Vanessa Lillie

Berkley Pub

October 28^th, 2025

The Bone Thief by Vanessa Lillie blends history with fiction. 

In the hours before dawn at a local summer camp, Bureau of Indian Affairs archaeologist Syd Walker receives an alarming call: newly discovered skeletal remains have been stolen. Not only have bones gone missing, but a Native teen girl has disappeared near the camp, and law enforcement dismisses her family’s fears.

As Syd investigates both crimes, she’s drawn into a world of privileged campers and their wealthy parents, most of them members of the Founders Society, an exclusive club whose members trace their lineage to the first colonists. They claim ancestral rights to the land, despite fierce objections from the local tribal community. 

The deeper Syd digs, the more she realizes these aren’t isolated incidents. A pattern of disappearances stretches back generations, all leading to the Founders Society’s doorstep. But exposing the truth means confronting not just the town’s most powerful families, but also a legacy of violence that refuses to stay buried.

This story is multi-layered and intertwines culture, history, and suspense.

Elise Cooper: Idea for the story?

Vanessa Lillie: I moved to Rhode Island in 2011 which is the setting of this book.  The first book in the series, Blood Sisters, was set where I am originally from, Oklahoma. I made friends with those in this tribe and attended a Pow Wow, the oldest continuing Pow Wow in the country. There is a lot of history of here.  I am Cherokee but did think about the history of the Narragansett Tribe. It is interesting of a writer to come in with my own Cherokee background and look at this tribe through my own lens. I have Syd Walker, my main character, an archeologist, sent there to investigate the remains found that were tied to the Great Swamp Massacre. She also finds that a Narragansett teenage girl is missing. It will all come together.

EC: What was the role of the Warden Journal?

VL: There are a lot of journals and texts from colonial days.  I studied about the Massacre. The journal to me represented the historical perspective of the period and draw the reader back to those days.  

EC: Why the opening quote?

VL: Maria Pearson was one of the first people who questioned why the remains are dug out and put on shelves and not treated with the same respect as white people. I decided this quote resonated with the story. Archeology has deep roots in colonialism. Family members buried their dead in the ground with the intention that is where they would stay. People who do not even understand the life they lived, dug them up and put them on a shelf with no context. There are a lot of remains that are in a museum and have not been returned to the tribes.

EC: Has Luna from the first book changed since she achieved freedom?

VL: Yes.  In this book she has a chance of having freedom, joy, and hope.  She is no longer captive but does have a lot of traumas from it.  In this book she is trying to find purpose. Her background story is how she is trying to fit in a world that she has not really been a part of for a long time. Her narrative is to connect with her daughter and Syd.  I wanted to make it realistic, so I did not make it an easy road for her. She realizes she is good at investigating and surviving. 

EC: Is it true that Indigenous children were taken out of their community?

VL: Yes.  There was a law that was enacted, ICWA (the Indian and Child Welfare Act). Religious people were taking the children out and giving them to white families to adopt. I have friends on that journey where they are trying to reconnect.

EC: Was Bud a good person or a bad person?

VL: Everyone is grey in my books.  He is a man of his times. He thought working with the Founder’s Society and the children at the camp was his job. Syd is the next generation of archeologists in BIA who sees her job as being more engaged with the tribal community. Bud saw his job to be engaged with the white communities. By the end he did try to redeem himself and pushed back.

EC: Next book?

VL: Hopefully there will be more.  I am also working on a stand-alone thriller set in Oklahoma. 

THANK YOU!!

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