Lise Olsen - Investigative Reporter and Author

THE SCIENTIST AND THE SERIAL KILLER
Out now from Random House. Click any link to order.

THE SCIENTIST AND THE SERIAL KILLER is the gripping, upside-down detective story of a Texas forensic anthropologist named Sharon Derrick who, determined to close the cases of the notorious 1970s Houston-area serial killer Dean Corll, has painstakingly deployed the latest science to identify victims who had become known as the Lost Boys of Houston. This unforgettable narrative of forensic science, missing persons, and unsolved crimes by award-winning investigative journalist Lise Olsen will be published in April by Random House, an imprint and a division of Penguin Random House LLC.

Advance Praise

"The Scientist and the Serial Killer is a masterwork of crime writing. Lise Olsen has taken a 50-year-old story and made it new and fresh and terrifyingly real... this is a must read. Her brilliantly organized pages turn themselves,"

-- S.C. Gwynne, Author of New York Times Bestsellers Empire of the Summer Moon and Rebel Yell.

"The Scientist and the Serial Killer, is a brilliant work of reporting and writing, as author Lise Olsen takes readers on a dark voyage into a mass murder that has haunted Houston for decades. But instead of stopping there, she recounts how one brave forensic investigator finally brought light to families whose private investigations and perpetual grief had been repeatedly ignored by authorities. Olsen's mystery story is impossible to put down, but the families' losses and her heroine's persistence will stay with you forever,"

-- Mimi Swartz, author of Ticker

"The once forgotten murder victims of a Houston serial killer are lost no more, their stories brought achingly to life in an act of redemptive recognition that is both haunting and heartbreaking,"

-- Ellen McGarrahan, author of Two Truths and a Lie

"Lise Olsen is not only a masterful investigative reporter, she's one hell of a storyteller. Her writing jumps off the page. Her sentences are completely dramatic, her character descriptions spot on. I felt a pit in my stomach reading The Scientist and the Serial Killer."

-- Skip Hollandsworth, New York Times bestselling author of
The Midnight Assassin

Lise Olsen is a senior investigative reporter and editor whose work has appeared in the Texas Observer, Inside Climate News, and the Houston Chronicle, as well as in documentaries on Netflix, CNN, A&E, and Paramount+.

Her latest book, THE SCIENTIST AND THE SERIAL KILLER: The Search for Houston's Lost Boys, (Random House April 2025), is a USA Today Bestseller.

Latest coverage:

Audio book preview. Listen here

"The Scientist and the Serial Killer is a sort of forensic thriller, with shades of conspiracy and cover-up. In telling the story of Dr. Sharon Derrick, the forensic anthropologist who devoted years of her life sifting through bones, studying DNA analysis and consulting with victims' families, Olsen...focuses on the hero, not the villain," --Chris Vognar, Houston Chronicle, "How One Scientist Dedicated Her Life to Identifying the Lost Boys of Houston."

Watch a report on this book on ABC 13: "New revelations emerge about Dean Corll, Houston's Candy Man serial killer."

KXAN - Austin: "True Crime author says issue of lost identity at the center of book on 1970s Texas serial killer.

Listen to a segment on the THE SCIENTIST AND THE SERIAL KILLER: on the Dateline NBC Podcast!

Follow Lise on:

For more information, email the author: liseolseninvestigates@gmail.com

Or Rachel Parker, Publicity, Random House: rparker@randomhouse.com.