Ali's Reviews > Crypt: Life, Death and Disease in the Middle Ages and Beyond

This is just an excellently easy and fun series to read (assuming medieval syphilis is your idea of fun, of course). Roberts has a patter down, well, pat, and her case studies are nicely chosen to illustrate how modern technology is changing our understanding of the past. These are not overly technical books; Roberts keeps the focus firmly on what it all means and how it works, but there is enough to give that warm, learned-something glow.
This volume, the last in the series of three, focuses on what we can learn about health from medieval burials. This includes a better understanding of the past, as well as a better understanding of diseases that are still with us. The Black Death is probably a highlight (yes, it is that kind of book), as Roberts takes us through how genetic sequencing of the causal parasite has illuminated our understanding of likely transmission routes for bubonic plague. Not all her mysteries are so neatly solved, but there is something very heartening about the pace with which we are learning to interrogate the past and to understand how it all connects together.