ROANOKE TIMES
Copyright (c) 1997, Roanoke Times
DATE: Monday, March 31, 1997 TAG: 9704010003
SECTION: EXTRA PAGE: 1 EDITION: METRO
DATELINE: NEW YORK
SOURCE: MARY CAMPBELL ASSOCIATED PRESS
Former anthropology professor Aaron Elkins has turned his love of bones into a successful second career as an award-winning mystery writer.
Aaron Elkins, anthropologist-cum-mystery writer, finds it amusing that when he was a mere college professor he was never invited to address his peers.
Now, as creator of the ``skeleton detective'' Gideon Oliver, he's sometimes a featured speaker at forensic anthropology seminars, just as Raymond Burr, who played Perry Mason on TV, entertained bar associations.
Whether teaching or writing about them, bones are Elkins' business, and his character Gideon Oliver is like himself, he says - ``on my best days.''
``I put myself in his place,'' Elkins says. ``What would I do if I were quite a bit smarter, wittier and more knowledgeable?'' In writing, he says, he has the advantage of being able to look something up in a book or the time to think of a clever bon mot.
Elkins, 61, who holds master's degrees in anthropology and psychology and a doctorate in education, taught anthropology at several universities in the United States and for the University of Maryland in Europe.
His 1987 book ``Old Bones,'' set in France, won an Edgar Award (named for Edgar Allan Poe) from the Mystery Writers of America.
Elkins recently visited Mysterious Press, publisher of his new novel, ``Twenty Blue Devils,'' a mystery set on a coffee plantation in Tahiti. He brought along some old bones for ``show-and-tell.''
He points to leg bones, the skull of an Australian male aborigine - ``late 30s when he died'' - and a replica of the Piltdown Man skull, which in 1912 was thought to be the missing link. It turned out, in 1953, to be a modern human skull combined with an orangutan jaw, stained chemically.
But Elkins has had to give away most of his collection of bones. His wife, Charlotte, doesn't like them in the house.
Elkins and his wife have collaborated on three mysteries about rookie pro golfer Lee Ofsted. Charlotte has the ideas and writes the first draft. Her husband writes the second draft, then she does the third.
Elkins also has written mysteries about art curator Chris Norgren. But the ``skeleton detective'' has become the public's favorite and currently occupies most of Elkins' time.
Anyway, bones delight Elkins.
``What interests me most are behavioral or occupational indicators,'' he says. ``Any action you repeat over a long period of time is going to leave a mark on bone. I can recall one real case where an anthropologist assisting police in trying to identify a body noticed the man had spent a lot of time with his arms lifted but not lifting anything very heavy. He was a barber.''
Another time, Elkins says, an anthropologist told police a dead man had grown up on a farm. He knew because a person milking a cow by hand usually puts his head against the cow's flank. That marks bones in a way that nothing else does.
``I really find that fascinating,'' Elkins says. ``And thank goodness a lot of readers do too.''
Cultural anthropologists study people as they live now, Elkins says. Archaeologists go to digs. Much of the work in physical anthropology, which Elkins trained in and taught, involves studies in early man and skeletons.
``It has been less than 30 years that police have figured out this is a group of people who can help them,'' he says.
``A farmer digs up something. Is this human? You would think doctors would know. They don't. And an anthropologist can tell the difference between rat gnawings and knife marks on bones.
``For me, the bone stuff is more interesting than the murder stuff in the books and more fun to write about.''
A couple of authors have started mystery series about forensic pathologists, who study soft tissue, Elkins says. ``As far as I know, nobody else is doing bones.''
The author says everything Gideon Oliver does is based on something that he or a colleague experienced.
Sometimes he gets a kind of revenge in the books.
``I had one professor who made my life miserable for years,'' he says. ``I've killed him three different ways now. One anthropologist figured it out. `This was Dr. Blank you bumped off, wasn't it?'''
The only time bones got Elkins in trouble was when he and his wife were driving from France to Spain and were stopped at the border with the skeleton of a gorilla in the car. He had left California to teach anatomy for the University of Maryland on American military bases in Western Europe.
But Elkins showed enough identification to the border guards to allay suspicion of murder and cannibalism.
Elkins started writing mysteries because, after teaching in Europe from 1976 to 1978, he returned home at a time colleges weren't hiring. His wife suggested he write a book.
``It never occurred to me to be a writer until I was 47 years old and then somebody else had to suggest it,'' he says.
For ``The Dark Place'' in 1983, Elkins says, ``I needed to be able to hide an Indian tribe for 100 years. I wanted to hide them in Paleolithic caves in France. I couldn't afford to go there that year. I came up with a setting on the Olympic Peninsula. We were living in San Francisco then.
``When I needed bones to come out of a glacier, I set `Icy Clutches' in Glacier Bay in Alaska. Places are part of the books.''
The ocean-loving Elkinses recently moved from Washington state to Rhode Island. Elkins thinks Gideon Oliver will still live in the Pacific Northwest.
``It sounds like an affectation, but you decide what your character is going to do and he doesn't always want to do it,'' he says. ``I don't think this guy wants to move to the East.''
LENGTH: Long : 104 lines ILLUSTRATION: PHOTO: AP. Aaron Elkins, anthropologist turned writer, findsby CNBbones fascinating. So do his readers. color.