(“Remains Silent” by Michael Baden and Linda Kenney, Alfred A. Knopf, 226 pages, $23.95). Once upon a time in a Tarzan book, Edgar Rice Burroughs was faced with having to make up an ending on a single page. There we were, dear readers, in an exciting moment when danger faced some main characters and help was many miles away. But we looked ahead in the book and there was only that single page left. What would happen?

Well, suddenly a secret hole opened up and a long tunnel was found, leading the threatened folks unerringly to safety. End of book.

That sort of abrupt, inconclusive climax is a problem with the book under review here, as the authors end an entertaining, even informative, novel with … ugh.

The authors are married, living in Manhattan. She is a criminal law and civil rights lawyer, and he is a noted medical examiner and forensics expert. They know what they are writing about when they tackle the creation of two like characters in a woman lawyer (“Manny” Manfreda) fighting for the underdog and a doctor (Jake Rosen), who is a deputy chief medical examiner of New York.

They have known each other from previous court cases, both as allies and antagonists, and are thrust together when developers in a small New Jersey town unearth old skeletons. The local medical examiner, Pete Harrigan, is near retirement and is Rosen’s mentor of many years. He involves Rosen, who makes sure that Manfreda is brought in, and the story gets complicated.

Everyone else involved wants this whole deal swept away so the new shopping mall can be built quickly, and the situation rapidly becomes hairy. A number of interesting twists and turns keeps us turning pages, until the very end. That is when it becomes clear the authors didn’t really think out how the book would conclude, and sort of winged it. Too bad.

Francis Moul, Ph.D., is an environmental historian.