Never Suck A Dead Man's Hand: Curious Adventures of a CSI [Hardcover]

Dana Kollmann (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: January 30, 2007

Step past the flashing lights into the true scene of the crime with Never Suck a Dead Man's Hand, a frank, unflinching, and unforgettable account of life as a crime scene investigator. Smart, sassy, and blessed--or cursed, depending on your point of view--with a stomach capable of working through the most horrific circumstances, Dana Kollmann details her true, unvarnished experiences as a CSI for the Baltimore County Police Department. Unlike the popular crime dramas proliferating on today's television networks, Kollmann's forensic tales forgo glitz for grit to show what really goes down once the yellow tape goes up.

With an informative, outspoken voice, Kollmann unveils the process and science of crime scene investigation in all its can't-take-your-eyes-away fascination. Whether explaining rigor mortis or the art of fingerprinting a stiff corpse on the side of the road, frantically brushing off a shower of roaches or pushing away a dead body, speeding to a horrific accident scene or cautiously entering a house of death, she shows what it's really like to work in the front lines as a forensics expert.

Vividly detailed and lightened by a disarming gallows humor, Dana Kollmann's true life-and-death experiences bring the sights, smells, and sounds of a crime scene alive as never before. She recounts stories that the cops and the CSI's usually leave on the field, far away from the delicate sensibilities of the average civilian--and forbidden from her family's dinner table. It's a strange world behind the yellow tape, and Never Suck a Dead Man's Hand offers a truly eye-opening perspective on the day-to-day life of a CSI.

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

Fans of CSI and Court TV, your book has arrived: a chronicle of the most unusual, macabre and malodorous experiences from 10-plus years of crime scene investigation. Baltimore Police Department CSI Kollman has the enthusiasm, wit (she dedicates the book "to all the bugs I've loved before") and natural storytelling ability to make this memoir sparkle-not easy for a text devoted largely to death and decay. Kollmann aims to educate those with "a Hollywood mentality about a Hell's Kitchen kind of job," and to that end she accentuates glamourless, largely drama-free case-solving. Thankfully, however, there's no lack of adventure: Kollman gets her title from a mishap she suffered while trying to get prints on a bitterly cold night, huffing on the fingers of an accident fatality. At another scene, a rotating ceiling fan flings down grisly bits of a suicide victim's head; at another, maggots are already devouring a body as Kollman tries to get photos. Amid consideration of office politics and her long-suffering family ("literally sickened by my job"), crime-scene anecdotes can get bogged down in details; luckily, Kollman's bright prose, which achieves an approachable, chick-lit tone without sounding flip, makes this squirm-inducing tale highly enjoyable. Photos.
Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

From Booklist

Former Baltimore County Police Department CSI Kollmann tells her story in the perky manner of the CSI and Law and Order TV franchises, proudly delivering terse commentary and gory detail while puncturing common tube-inspired misconceptions about forensics. "You can't get fingerprints off of rocks," she imparts, and "crime scene investigators don't interview suspects." Furthermore, "luminol doesn't glow blue hours after it's sprayed," and "a miniskirt and heels" aren't the usual raiment of distaff CSIs. Kollmann eventually left the crime lab after realizing she "didn't want the cranberry sauce [at] Thanksgiving . . . to remind [her] of blood clots anymore." This informative, witty treatment of her work accessibly illuminates the reality of forensic science, making it a natural adjunct to true-crime collections. The title, by the way, refers to "the day a dead man's hand ended up in [Kollmann's] mouth"---- just one of the many true-life experiences unlikely to befall TV CSIs that she reports. Mike Tribby
Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved

See all Editorial Reviews

Product Details

• Hardcover: 272 pages
• Publisher: Citadel; First Edition edition (January 30, 2007)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0806528222
• ISBN-13: 978-0806528229
• Product Dimensions: 9.2 x 6.3 x 1 inches
• Shipping Weight: 13.6 ounces
• Average Customer Review: 4.2 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (39 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #85,690 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
  • #68 in Books > Politics & Social Sciences > Crime & Criminals  > Forensic Science

More About the Author

Discover books, learn about writers, read author blogs, and more.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

78 of 83 people found the following review helpful:

1.0 out of 5 stars Such an Unpleasant Person!, June 13, 2009

By 

I. Zawilski - See all my reviews
(VINE VOICE)    (REAL NAME)   

Amazon Verified Purchase

This review is from: Never Suck A Dead Man's Hand: Curious Adventures of a CSI (Paperback)

The further along I got in this book, the more I disliked the author. I worked in the criminal justice field for thirty-four years (not as a police officer or a forensic person, by the way) and she typifies the kind of person who gives us all a bad name. Smug, self-important, and arrogant. So quick to denigrate the public she was supposed to serve. In Chapter Seven she meets a pair of poor souls, an obviously mentally disordered mother and son. As they started running away from her she says "I split open with laughter..I snickered as Jimmy...loaded down with bags and sliping on the icy sidewalk, tried to keep pace with his mother...His mother was a fruit loop--but poor Jimmy, if he were any dumber, he'd have to be watered."

In the same chapter, she meets another mentally challenged individual, whom she nicknames Frodo because of his feet. His house is dirty. Here's another excerpt: "I continued dusting [for fingerprints], not even caring that I was using my dirty brush. This was the brush I saved for gross things, like powdering toilet seats. I didn't like to use the filty, germ-laden thing...inside people's homes, but Frodo had asked for it. I was tempted to cover the earpiece and mouthpiece of his telephone with fingerprint powder so he'd walk around town with a black face just because he annoyed me."

Does this sound like a professional person to you? There are many, many more incidents like those mentioned above, including a gratuitous bit of nastiness to a funeral home receptionist. She also documents times when, while on duty, she went home to tend to personal business. She knew she was doing wrong because she was worried about being "caught" at home. If she had worked for me, she would have been gone. I think I understand at least partly why her training detectives at the beginning didn't like her (you know, the ones she called the "defectives.")

Add this to chapters on her mother's quirks, and a half a chapter devoted to toilet habits of people she worked with (I'm not kidding) and I was disgusted. Usually when I finish a book, it either goes on my bookshelf or gets donated to the library. This one is going in the trash.

30 of 30 people found the following review helpful:

2.0 out of 5 stars Disappointing really ..., October 2, 2009

By 

Toonfan (Golden State) - See all my reviews

Amazon Verified Purchase

This review is from: Never Suck A Dead Man's Hand: Curious Adventures of a CSI (Paperback)

This book is filled with personal anecdotes of a former crime scene investigator. There's not much you learn from this book except that the work of a CSI is neither glamorous nor desirable. The book is 260 pages long and it really seems like the author had to dig deep to find stories to tell because most of the stories are very boring. There's one story of how the author had to buy enough coffins to house sixteen skeletons. There was a lot of confusion with the funeral home employee, but it seemed like the author could have cleared up the confusion by just telling the employee the exact purpose of her purchase. Instead she relished in the confusion to exasperate the funeral home employee. This kind of meanness permeates the book. There is an attempt at dark humor, if you can really make fun of decomposing bodies and disgusting stenches. This is hardly an account of how a CSI works in general. It's just one person's account of how she coped with a job that apparently was distasteful for her. The book was disappointing.

13 of 14 people found the following review helpful:

2.0 out of 5 stars Not a top-notch effort, January 15, 2010

By 

Irene E. Cooper - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Never Suck A Dead Man's Hand: Curious Adventures of a CSI (Paperback)

The book is interesting in a morbid way, as the author tells gross stories about awful things that she has investigated. However, in my opinion, her chatty and rambling writing style is more tiresome than funny, like listening to a teenage girl rattle on about cute guys for several hours. I'd agree with the other reviewer that her presentation is not very professional. Her flippancy about human tragedy seems immature and insensitive.

Also the book contains many typos and word choice errors (i.e., site instead of sight, shuttered instead of shuddered) which makes me wonder if the publisher employs any proofreaders at all. Overall, the book seems sloppy and rushed. But she gives plenty of disgusting details about death scenes.