Review by New York Times Review
HERE'S A STEAMY romantic scene for you, right out of Patricia Cornwell's new thriller, FLESH AND BLOOD (Morrow, $28.99): "I trace the second cervical vertebra down to C7, gently, slowly digging my fingertips into the Longus colli muscle, feeling him relax." The sexual hoyden showing off her bedroom technique is Dr. Kay Scarpetta, the chief medical examiner for the state of Massachusetts and an awesome force in the field of forensic science. Scarpetta and her husband, the F.B.I. profiler Benton Wesley, are getting in the mood for a sybaritic vacation in Florida when her expertise is suddenly needed with a murder victim, a man once accused of being a terrorist who has been killed by two shots from a sniper's rifle. The use of copper bullets is unusual enough to make this case interesting. But with the coming Boston Marathon trial stoking anti-Islamic passions, and President Obama in town to speak against the indiscriminate hostility toward Muslims, the terrorism angle is also a factor. So much for that vacation. Cornwell deftly conveys the lingering mood of outrage after the Boston bombing. "There's a lot of sensitivity around here about jihadists, about loser extremists," says Pete Marino, a Cambridge cop and Scarpetta associate who knows of two similar shootings in New Jersey. "Maybe we're dealing with a vigilante who's taking out people he thinks should die." The case proves more complicated. From sources in the Department of Defense, Scarpetta learns of a connection with political unrest in Ukraine. Homeland Security is drawn into the narrative through the problem son of a Florida congressman who chairs a key subcommittee. And there's always that "Russian problem" in the aftermath of the bombing. There are many more layers to this plot, not all of them worthy of excavation. But it does take skill to link one modest murder to a "global" problem. And the overstuffed narrative yields other, unexpected pleasures. Readers who share Marino's memories of Scarpetta as "cold and impersonal" should welcome her warm childhood memories of working alongside her father in the family grocery store. And we finally learn why she dislikes references to her workplace as a "morgue." To her, it's "my dark Emerald City where guests are taken apart and put back together again." THE BRITISH AUTHOR ANDREW Taylor presents a fresh and surprisingly provocative perspective on a decisive chapter of American history in THE SCENT OF DEATH (HarperCollins, $26.99). When Edward Savill, a functionary with the American Department of the British government, sails into New York Harbor in 1778, his first glimpse of the city shows him "a paltry, provincial sort of place." Unlike the native heroes in American period mysteries, who are invariably thrilled by the pulsing life in this unruly city, Savill sees a wretched populace of Loyalist war refugees. On his first day in what is basically the headquarters of the British government in North America, he also sees two corpses, one of them a murdered man of special interest to the Crown. Charged with reporting on the justice system in this British stronghold, Savill is appalled by what he witnesses: a mockery of a murder trial, quickly followed by a dreadful hanging; the mistreatment of slaves; the wretched slums that arose after the Great Fire of 1776; and the suffering brought on by food and fuel shortages during the fierce winter of 1778-79. Taylor's sensitivity to the wholesale misery of the dispossessed puts a new face on the noblest of wars. you could drown in the waves of corruption that surge through Timothy Hallinan's Bangkok mysteries. In FOR THE DEAD (Soho Crime, $26.95), the latest tsunami involves a commercial enterprise of murder-for-hire run by a senior police officer and employing cops as hit men. The series sleuth, an expat travel writer named Poke Rafferty, stumbles onto this bizarre operation when his adopted teenage daughter, Miaow, buys a stolen cellphone on the black market that contains photos of Thai policemen who are now dead. Hallinan sets this brutal narrative within the context of Bangkok's seething slums, where so many find their way after fleeing the countryside. Of all the exotic sights in this narrative, the most disturbing is a shelter for abused and abandoned children. Rafferty rescued Miaow from the streets of this "poor-people world," and she still has nightmares about it. She's not the only one. STANLEY HASTINGS, the meekest and mildest of private eyes, is the last person you'd expect to find thrashing about in the bush, having close encounters with lions and elephants. But here he is, in Parnell Hall's SAFARI (Pegasus Crime, $25.95), in the company of his fearsome wife, Alice, trekking through Zambia and Zimbabwe with an outfit called Clemson Safari. In a dry comic voice, Stanley narrates this account of his furtive investigation into three murders that the other tourists observe with remarkable sangfroid. "You're having too much fun with this," the safari leader chides during one of those wonderful circular arguments Stanley instigates with the sharper wits among his intrepid companions. But whenever his detective work threatens to boost his ego, Alice is there to cut him down with an accurate but deflating observation. "What you do," she reminds him, "is largely guesswork."
Copyright (c) The New York Times Company [November 2, 2014]
Review by Booklist Review
In the latest Kay Scarpetta thriller, a serial sniper is racking up the body count while leaving virtually no evidence and no clues to his (or her) identity. Scarpetta, who, over the years, has moved further and further from her roots as Virginia's chief medical examiner, is involved in the investigation, and she's dumbfounded when evidence is discovered that suggests her own daughter, Lucy, might be involved in the case somehow the key question here being whether Lucy knows she's involved (it's a complicated situation). Cornwell is working hard to reenergize the series, which entered a creative slump several years ago, and this is in many ways the best of the recent Scarpetta novels, boasting an involving story and some fine writing. Kay has finally found her voice as a first-person narrator, which makes the book rather less clumsy than some of the recent series entries. Cornwell seems determined not to let the series peter out, and readers will give this one an enthusiastic thumbs up. HIGH-DEMAND BACKSTORY: Critical reaction to the Scarpetta series may fluctuate, but Cornwell keeps racking up big numbers: 100 million copies sold in 36 languages across 120 countries; 22 number-one New York Times best-sellers.--Pitt, David Copyright 2014 Booklist
From Booklist, Copyright (c) American Library Association. Used with permission.
Review by Publisher's Weekly Review
Bestseller Cornwell's thrilling 22nd novel featuring Dr. Kay Scarpetta (after 2013's Dust) pits the chief medical examiner against a threat uncomfortably close to home. On the eve of a Florida birthday trip with her FBI agent husband, Benton Wesley, Det. Pete Marino calls Scarpetta to the scene of a fatal shooting in Cambridge, Mass., with all the hallmarks of a sniper attack. Even worse are the alarming similarities between the victim, music teacher Jamal Nari-recently erroneously classified as a terrorist-and two shooting deaths in New Jersey. Not only is the killer an ace shot, but even handcrafts the bullets. Scarpetta knows the signature copper bullets are somehow connected to an odd discovery outside her and Wesley's home: seven shiny pennies, all from 1981. Soon the hunt is on, stretching from the tonier streets of Cambridge to the murky waters off the coast of Florida. Series fans may be pleasantly shocked by the return of a once-vanquished nemesis. Agent: Esther Newberg, ICM. (Nov.) © Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved.
(c) Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved
Review by Library Journal Review
Starred Review. In Cornwell's 22nd Kay Scarpetta thriller (after Dust), Kay and her FBI profiler husband, Benton Wesley, ready themselves to leave for a much-needed vacation. But a curious discovery on her garden rocks seven shiny pennies that date from 1981 and the flashing of a small reflective light from the distant trees put their getaway plans on hold when Det. Pete Marino calls to tell her that a long-distance sniper had targeted a music teacher, one of several victims who appear to have nothing in common. Kay is still adjusting to Marino now working for the "other" side on the police force, rather than for her as an investigator. Another unsettling fact for Kay is that her niece, Lucy, is an expert markswoman. Is someone trying to frame Lucy? The ending is unseen and unexpected and terrifying. VERDICT Deduction is the key to solving this mystery, and Scarpetta fans will relish this nail-biting novel, Cornwell's debut with publisher Morrow. [See Prepub Alert, 5/12/14; turn to p. 80 for a profile of Cornwell. Ed.] Susan Carr, Edwardsville P.L., IL (c) Copyright 2014. Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.
(c) Copyright Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.
Review by Kirkus Book Review
Happy birthday, Dr. Kay Scarpetta. But no Florida vacation for you and your husband, FBI profiler Benton Wesleynot because President Barack Obama is visiting Cambridge, but because a deranged sniper has come to town. Shortly after everyone's favorite forensic pathologist (Dust, 2013, etc.) receives a sinister email from a correspondent dubbed Copperhead, she goes outside to find seven penniesall polished, all turned heads-up, all dated 1981on her garden wall. Clearly there's trouble afoot, though she's not sure what form it will take until five minutes later, when a call from her old friend and former employee Pete Marino, now a detective with the Cambridge Police, summons her to the scene of a shooting. Jamal Nari was a high school music teacher who became a minor celebrity when his name was mistakenly placed on a terrorist watch list; he claimed government persecution, and he ended up having a beer with the president. Now he's in the news for quite a different reason. Bizarrely, the first tweets announcing his death seem to have preceded it by 45 minutes. And Leo Gantz, a student at Nari's school, has confessed to his murder, even though he couldn't possibly have done it. But these complications are only the prelude to a banquet of homicide past and present, as Scarpetta and Marino realize when they link Nari's murder to a series of killings in New Jersey. For a while, the peripheral presence of the president makes you wonder if this will be the case that finally takes the primary focus off the investigator's private life. But most of the characters are members of Scarpetta's entourage, the main conflicts involve infighting among the regulars, and the killer turns out to be a familiar nemesis Scarpetta thought she'd left for dead several installments back. As if.No wonder Scarpetta asks, "When did my workplace become such a soap opera?" Answer: at least 10 years ago. Copyright Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.
Copyright (c) Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.
