Science Fiction novel with female scavenger/archaeologist

[Otissimo]

A friend was telling me about this, but couldn't remember the title or author:

• Long novel with female space scavenger/archaeologist as the main character. She finds stuff and sells it to collectors.
• Takes place in the far future (maybe 25,000 years from now?)
• She is following evidence related to a very early (the first?) warp drive spacecraft from Earth.
• She is able to travel around space very widely.
• This ancient craft was carrying a religious sect that was leaving Earth to find a new home
• She finds the descendants of this sect on another world, but the religion itself no longer exists. They have their own mythology and have forgotten that they ever came from Earth.
• Much of human history has been lost; items like a plastic cup with a cigarette brand (or something like that) are a matter for academic conjecture. Along the lines of, "what does Marlboro mean?"
• My friend thought the book was perhaps published around 2005; he read it around 2010.

Any help will be much appreciated.

 

[Parson]

I hope this is found. I have no clue, but I would be interested in reading it.

 

[Danny McG]

I hope this is found. I have no clue, but I would be interested in reading it.

I think I may have read it... memory banks are churning away!

 

[hitmouse]

THere's a whole series of these. I read them a few years ago for light relief. Quite undemanding. What on earth are they called?

 

[hitmouse]

One of the Alex Benedict books by Jack McDevitt. Or one of his Academy series.

 

[Otissimo]

I think you're right, hitmouse. It appears to be "Seeker," by Jack McDevitt. The plot as described on Wikipedia sounds very close to what my friend remembered. Thanks so much!!

 

[Ravensquawk]

I think I may have read it... memory banks are churning away!

*snort* Heh. I know the feeling.

You welcomed my first comment since 2006. What is funny is that I was Alakshak then, because I had an account with SFFChron UK and a different one with SFFChron "dot com". All very honest and straightforward: to me they were just two separate accounts on two different sites.
And yet more on Bradbury board, and stackexchange, and my mourned favorite, Allexperts, didn't even require one to "Add to Answer"!

Imagine my puzzlement the better part of a decade later when my bookmarks for the UK site kept shuttling me off to some dot com. And the notes I'd made of my username and password worked! I wasn't imagining things!

Finally I wrote admins asking to combine my two accounts. It happened. Without me needing to know when or how my bookmarked UK site disappeared and morphed.