Content Warning: This section of the guide includes discussion of death, mental illness, and addiction.

The author notes in her acknowledgments that she modeled the fictional Delphine killings after the 2022 murders of four University of Idaho students and the media storm that followed their deaths. The case was highly publicized, and the sensationalistic nature of much of the coverage garnered criticism from both insiders in the true-crime community and the general public. This Book Will Bury Me has generated controversy for writing about the case not only so soon after it happened but also before the accused killer had the opportunity to stand trial. At the time of the book’s publication, his case was still in process.

The victims, all living in Moscow, Idaho, were fatally stabbed in their off-campus residence during the early hours of the morning on November 13. After returning from a night out, Madison Mogen, Xana Kernodie, Kaylee Goncalves, and Ethan Chapin were gathered in the home that Madison and Xana shared with roommates Dylan Mortenson and Bethany Funke. Like the fictional Larissa, Kaylee placed a series of unanswered phone calls to her longtime ex-boyfriend, a man whom the police investigated and ultimately cleared. Sometime before four o’clock in the morning, Dylan and Bethany, who both survived the attacks, went to sleep while the others stayed awake.

The killer accessed the home without any signs of forced entry and, sometime after four o’clock, stabbed the four victims. The surviving roommates heard the attacks, although they initially identified the noises as loud partying. Dylan went out to investigate and, like the fictional Harlow, saw the killer dressed in black walking quietly down the hallway before he exited the home through its sliding glass doors. She panicked and texted Bethany, and the two hid together until the following morning. When they finally emerged, they called friends and found what they thought were the unconscious bodies of their roommates. When they established that the four were actually dead, they called the police.

The murders instantly became a media sensation. As with the fictional Delphine murders, amateur sleuths shared information about the killings online and flocked to the town, a small community of roughly 25,000 residents (“Quick Facts: Moscow City, Idaho.” United States Census Bureau). Its police department, like the one in Delphine, publicly criticized the amateurs for impeding the investigation, spreading false rumors, distorting facts, and prompting harassment campaigns against suspects whom law enforcement had yet to vet. Meanwhile, several of the victims’ parents criticized the Moscow Police Department’s lack of communication and inability to make meaningful progress on the case.

The Idaho State Police and the FBI were brought on to assist, and the agencies set up a tip line. They received thousands of tips, but the piece of evidence that ultimately led them to the man who would be charged with the killings was security footage. A white Elantra made several passes past the house during the hours preceding the killings. Authorities tracked the car to Bryan Kohberger, a 28-year-old doctoral candidate and teaching assistant who lived in neighboring Pullman, Washington. Cell-phone data and DNA would eventually link Kohberger to the crime scene, and when Kohberger was arrested, police recovered a knife, a pistol, and a black face mask similar to the one worn by the killer.

Kohberger was a criminology student with a background in psychology and criminal justice. Several weeks before the murders, faculty members met with him to address reports of improper conduct, and shortly after the murders (but before his arrest), his teaching appointment was terminated. He was arrested on December 30, 2022, on four counts of first-degree murder and one count of felony burglary. Kohberger refused to enter a plea after the indictment, and the judge entered a “not guilty” plea on his behalf, scheduling his trial for August 2025. Like the character Odell Rhodes, Kohberger has a history of mental illness and addiction. He has written extensively on Reddit about his low empathy, lack of remorse, and fascination with high-profile killers.