In the sixth Family Skeleton mystery, Dr. Georgia Thackery’s dog Byron goes missing on a cold December night. When he shows up again, he’s clutching a femur between his jaws, so Georgia and her daughter Madison wrest it from him and run upstairs to apologize to Sid—their walking, talking family skeleton—for letting the dog gnaw on him yet again.

Except that Sid has all his bones present and accounted for.

The bone is from somebody else, and when they track Byron back, they find the rest of the skeleton in an overgrown lot nearby. It’s the normal kind, no moving or telling bad jokes, and when the police come to take charge, they’re sure it was murder.

Soon Sid and Thackery are on the case, looking for a killer who struck on a creepy Christmas past.