Clay and Bones: My Life As an FBI Forensic Artist

Clay and Bones follows Lisa Bailey’s extraordinary career as an FBI forensic artist, from the aftermath of 9/11 to sculpting the faces of the unidentified dead, while battling the Bureau’s entrenched culture of sexism and retaliation.

Just two months after the September 11 terrorist attacks, Lisa Bailey began her career as an FBI forensic artist.

She threw herself into the work, and over the next eighteen years handled hundreds of cases: unidentified remains pulled from shallow graves, sexual assaults, acts of terrorism, and kidnappings. She became a recognized authority in facial approximation from the skull, witnessing firsthand how her sculptures could restore a victim’s identity and bring closure to grieving families.

But even in those early days, Bailey noticed cracks in the Bureau’s polished image. She’d heard stories of women who reported harassment or discrimination only to find themselves quietly dismissed. She wanted to believe the rumors weren’t true . . . then it happened to her. Now, Bailey breaks her silence in this raw, eye-opening account.

She takes readers behind the scenes of the Bureau’s most haunting cases, from mass disasters to cold-case homicides, and exposes the hidden toll of a career inside one of the world’s most powerful law enforcement agencies.

She describes the painstaking art of restoring a face from an unknown victim’s skull, the profound relief of a confirmed identification, and the eerie reality of working among the dead at the University of Tennessee’s famed “Body Farm.”

Told with candor, grit, and dark humor, Clay and Bones offers a rare glimpse into the macabre yet meaningful world of forensic art, and the resilience of a woman who refused to be silenced by the very institution she served.