{"id":27071,"date":"2026-05-20T20:18:11","date_gmt":"2026-05-21T00:18:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/klishis.com\/reading\/?p=27071"},"modified":"2026-06-02T16:22:50","modified_gmt":"2026-06-02T20:22:50","slug":"the-skeleton-paints-a-picture","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/klishis.com\/reading\/archives\/27071","title":{"rendered":"The Skeleton Paints a Picture"},"content":{"rendered":"

The Skeleton Paints a Picture<\/em><\/a> (2017) Leigh Perry<\/a> (Family Skeleton Mystery #4)<\/p>\n

\"The<\/a>This premise of this series is a little silly–one of the two main characters is an animated skeleton. But once you accept that, it’s a fun cozy mystery.<\/p>\n

Georgia Thackery is an adjunct professor, seeking the magical grail of a tenured position.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhy don\u2019t colleges hire all permanent professors?\u201d <\/p>\n

\u201cUsing adjuncts is cheaper. Colleges pay us per course taught and don\u2019t have to pony up for insurance and vacation and all that.\u201d <\/p>\n

\u201cAnd they can get away with working you full time without giving you benefits?\u201d <\/p>\n

\u201cThe thing is, I only teach three classes at FAD, which puts me under the legal limit for full-time work.”<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

And her best friend just happens to be a skeleton.<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019ve got nothing to hide, Sid, other than you.\u201d And technically, I didn\u2019t even have to hide him\u2014it was completely legal to have a human skeleton.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Her current position is at an art school, where she isn’t teaching literature, as much as making sure the students can write clearly about their art.<\/p>\n

And even in art schools there are still snobs.<\/p>\n

She didn\u2019t know comics, and we got together so I could explain enough of the common tropes for her to work with my students. I recommended some stuff for her to read, but though she didn\u2019t come out and say so, I could tell she thought sequential art was a waste of time and talent.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

When a car ends up off the road and embedded in an embankment near her house, Georgia discovers it was her coworker–the woman in charge of the writing lab–and the death seems a little suspicious.<\/p>\n

In addition to snobbery about comics and other “non-serious” forms of art, the faculty members end up discussing the grammar of queerness.<\/p>\n

\u201cIf they were to become singular, what would we use for plural?\u201d Dahna said with a tinge of horror in her voice. <\/p>\n

I hoped that meant she was really expressing an opinion as opposed to echoing Professor Waldron’s thoughts to get ahead in the tenure race. \u201cYou is both plural and singular,\u201d I pointed out. <\/p>\n

\u201cExcept when y\u2019all are in my part of the country,\u201d Caroline said with a grin.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

And one of the students has the WORSE roommate ever.<\/p>\n

\u201cOkay, Marissa, you\u2019ve been rooming with her. Do you think she\u2019d steal from other artists?\u201d <\/p>\n

\u201cIn a heartbeat. She stole my pads!\u201d Then she colored and looked away from Indigo. \u201cYou know, my sanitary pads. She never even told me, so when I needed some, there were none left.”<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

What I particularly liked is these points were part of the story: anyone with a uterus knows how vile stealing someone’s sanitary supplies and not replacing them is, so that tells you not just how terrible Bad Bobbie is, but also the misery of menstrual supplies being an additional expense women have to bear.<\/p>\n

And the skeleton was entertaining–especially his excitement about snow blowers and snow plows.<\/p>\n

This is the fourth book in the series, and I didn’t feel I was missing anything by jumping in here (which is one of the nice things about cozy mysteries), so another sign of good story-telling.<\/p>\n

Characters<\/strong>: Sid, Ms. Georgia Thackery, Mr. Perkins, Professor Martha Waldron, Caroline Craig, Owen Deen, Renee Turner, Dahna Kaleka, Officer Ginny Buchanan, Kelly Griffith, Indigo Williamson, Marissa Esqueleto, Bobbie Fitzpatrick\/Bad Bobbie, Lucas Silva, Ashwin Inamdar, Jacqueline Lewis, Greg Azzopardi, Jeremy Nolan<\/p>\n

Publisher: Diversion Books<\/p>\n

Rating: 8\/10<\/strong><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The Skeleton Paints a Picture (2017) Leigh Perry (Family Skeleton Mystery #4) This premise of this series is a little silly–one of the two main characters is an animated skeleton. But once you accept that, it’s a fun cozy mystery. Georgia Thackery is an adjunct professor, seeking the magical grail of a tenured position. \u201cWhy […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_feature_clip_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2},"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[12,897,190,292,2,204,8],"tags":[955,956,957],"class_list":["post-27071","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-8-10","category-contemporary","category-cozy","category-ebook","category-fantasy","category-good","category-mystery","tag-family-skeleton-mystery","tag-leigh-perry","tag-toni-l-p-kelner"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/piQkW-72D","jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":27093,"url":"https:\/\/klishis.com\/reading\/archives\/27093","url_meta":{"origin":27071,"position":0},"title":"The Skeleton Stuffs a Stocking","author":"Michelle","date":"May 24, 2026","format":false,"excerpt":"The Skeleton Stuffs a Stocking (2019) Leigh Perry (The Family Skeleton #6) This seems to be the last Skeleton mystery, although I did see a listing for an anthology of short stories. Georgia is back living at home, and working as an adjunct at the other university in town (the\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "8\/10"","block_context":{"text":"8\/10","link":"https:\/\/klishis.com\/reading\/archives\/category\/8-10"},"img":{"alt_text":"The Skeleton Stuffs a Stocking","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/klishis.com\/reading\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/05\/the-skeleton-stuffs-a-stocking.jpg?resize=350%2C200&ssl=1","width":350,"height":200,"srcset":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/klishis.com\/reading\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/05\/the-skeleton-stuffs-a-stocking.jpg?resize=350%2C200&ssl=1 1x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/klishis.com\/reading\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/05\/the-skeleton-stuffs-a-stocking.jpg?resize=525%2C300&ssl=1 1.5x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/klishis.com\/reading\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/05\/the-skeleton-stuffs-a-stocking.jpg?resize=700%2C400&ssl=1 2x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/klishis.com\/reading\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/05\/the-skeleton-stuffs-a-stocking.jpg?resize=1050%2C600&ssl=1 3x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/klishis.com\/reading\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/05\/the-skeleton-stuffs-a-stocking.jpg?resize=1400%2C800&ssl=1 4x"},"classes":[]},{"id":27074,"url":"https:\/\/klishis.com\/reading\/archives\/27074","url_meta":{"origin":27071,"position":1},"title":"The Skeleton Makes a Friend","author":"Michelle","date":"May 22, 2026","format":false,"excerpt":"The Skeleton Makes a Friend (2018) Leigh Perry (Family Skeleton Mystery #5) Another semester, another college, but this time Georgia is teaching at a summer program for high school students. If I\u2019d been able to afford it, I would have tried to talk Madison into signing up for the program.\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "8\/10"","block_context":{"text":"8\/10","link":"https:\/\/klishis.com\/reading\/archives\/category\/8-10"},"img":{"alt_text":"The Skeleton Makes a Friend","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/klishis.com\/reading\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/05\/The-Skeleton-Makes-a-Friend.jpg?resize=350%2C200&ssl=1","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]},{"id":23353,"url":"https:\/\/klishis.com\/reading\/archives\/23353","url_meta":{"origin":27071,"position":2},"title":"Cold Clay","author":"Michelle","date":"March 2, 2024","format":false,"excerpt":"Cold Clay (2017) Juneau Black (A Shady Hollow Mystery) Things have been returning to normal in Shadow Hollow--until a skeleton is discovered in Cold Clay Orchards during harvest. Vera Vixen manages to be there to catch all the details. \u201cWhatever it is, Vera, remember that I\u2019m the one they called.\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "8.5\/10"","block_context":{"text":"8.5\/10","link":"https:\/\/klishis.com\/reading\/archives\/category\/8-5-10"},"img":{"alt_text":"Cold Clay","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/klishis.com\/reading\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/03\/Cold-Clay.jpg?resize=350%2C200&ssl=1","width":350,"height":200,"srcset":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/klishis.com\/reading\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/03\/Cold-Clay.jpg?resize=350%2C200&ssl=1 1x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/klishis.com\/reading\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/03\/Cold-Clay.jpg?resize=525%2C300&ssl=1 1.5x"},"classes":[]},{"id":8727,"url":"https:\/\/klishis.com\/reading\/archives\/8727","url_meta":{"origin":27071,"position":3},"title":"The Draining Lake","author":"Michelle","date":"February 12, 2017","format":false,"excerpt":"The Draining Lake (2004\/2007) Arnaldur Indridason translated by Bernard Scudder A skeleton has been found in Lake Kleifarvatn--a skeleton with a hole in its skull and a rope tied to a piece of defunct Soviet spying equipment around its waist. The story shifts back and forth between the present-day search\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "9\/10"","block_context":{"text":"9\/10","link":"https:\/\/klishis.com\/reading\/archives\/category\/9-10"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/klishis.com\/reading\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/06\/The-Draining-Lake.jpg?resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]},{"id":2497,"url":"https:\/\/klishis.com\/reading\/archives\/2497","url_meta":{"origin":27071,"position":4},"title":"Set in Darkness","author":"Michelle","date":"August 28, 2011","format":false,"excerpt":"Set in Darkness (2000) Ian Rankin Detective Chief Superintendent Watson has just months left until retirement, and wants to keep Rebus out of trouble until that time passes, so Rebus is put on the committee looking at the new Parliament building\/old hospital. But as nothing goes smoothly with Rebus around,\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "British"","block_context":{"text":"British","link":"https:\/\/klishis.com\/reading\/archives\/category\/british"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/klishis.com\/reading\/wp-content\/uploads\/2011\/08\/Set-Darkness.jpg?resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]},{"id":8714,"url":"https:\/\/klishis.com\/reading\/archives\/8714","url_meta":{"origin":27071,"position":5},"title":"Silence of the Grave","author":"Michelle","date":"January 31, 2017","format":false,"excerpt":"Silence of the Grave (2003\/2006) Arnaldur Indridason translated by Bernard Scudder The second Inspector Erlendur book finds Erlendur, Sigurdur \u00d3li, and El\u00ednborg called to a construction site, where a boy has found a human bone. A quick inspection discovers more bones--a skeleton dating back to probably WWII. 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