Customer Reviews

Detecting Forgery: Forensic Investigation of Documents

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Joe Nickell is an excellent researcher and has found many interesting aspects of document examination to write about. He is not, however, a document examiner. As a result he includes an interesting history but he only mentions the new techniques. The book is recommended for those who want to know what goes on in the broad field of forensic document examination but is far short of being a guide for detecting forgery.

This book is a fairly in depth study into the history and current practice of forensic study of written materials. It is a bit broad for modern use of law enforcement investigations but has some good information. For the price and information provided it's a good investment.

I agree with the other two reviewers that this work is not a comprehensive treatise on the subject of detecting forgery. However, it does give beginners (like me) a good place to start. It is clearly written and broad (if not deep) in coverage. I would call this book "workmanlike" and "solid." If I were a writer of mystery novels, this would be a good reference for this area of criminal(?) activity. The small section on the autopen especially intrigued me (hint: don't buy John F. Kennedy autographed documents). The bibliography in the back is its greatest asset if you want to pursue the topic of forgery to a deeper level. Our interlibrary loan people are going to be hustling for years as I track down some of the sources Nickell cites in this book.