Patricia Cornwell LIVID Hype

 

LIVID for Patricia Cornwell's 26th Kay Scarpetta Book

"Chief medical examiner Kay Scarpetta is the reluctant star witness in a sensational murder trial when she receives shocking news. The judge’s sister has been found dead. At first glance, it appears to be a home invasion, but then why was nothing stolen, and why is the garden strewn with dead plants and insects?

Although there is no apparent cause of death, Scarpetta recognizes telltale signs of the unthinkable, and she knows the worst is yet to come. The forensic pathologist finds herself pitted against a powerful force that returns her to the past, and her time to catch the killer is running out . . ."

Y’all. I am so glad Patricia Cornwell is back with Kay Scarpetta. To think how 2016’s Chaos was potentially the last book in the series. Until we got Autopsy last Fall as a series revive. NOW we immediately get ANOTHER new one in Livid. Which is due later this month. I don’t want to wait until the freakin’ 25th!

What's in a REBOTCO TBR?

Not One but TWO Patricia Cornwell Books This YEAR...

Finally–after a good year or two or three since its announcement–Patricia Cornwell’s new series’ debut has a release date.  Amazon Publishing is taking the reigns on this book.  I suppose somewhere in all that (along with contracts) was the reason they used to hold the exact release date around so long.  Shoot, for a minute I believed the whole thing was scrapped.  

Nevertheless, October 1st of this year is the DAY!  Hee-YAH!  We are finally getting our hands on Cornwell's Quantum, first in her Captain Calli Chase series.  And I'm writing this because they FINALLY released the cover as well!  BHA!

#MarchMysteryMadness | My 6 Eye-Burner Mystery Reads

Hi, guys.  Here are 6 mystery books within any given series that has caused my eyes to burn (more so than glisten) with tears.

All links are Amazon affiliate (the books' descriptions are from Amazon as well)...

1.  Body of Evidence by Patricia Cornwell: https://amzn.to/2IZC0Zt

A reclusive author, Beryl Madison finds no safe haven from months of menacing phone calls—or the tormented feeling that her every move is being watched. When the writer is found slain in her own home, Kay Scarpetta pieces together the intricate forensic evidence—while unwittingly edging closer to a killer waiting in the shadows.

2.  Promises in Death by J. D. Robb: https://amzn.to/2Ia4YER

Amaryllis Coltraine may have recently transferred to the New York City police force from Atlanta, but she’s been a cop long enough to know how to defend herself against an assailant. When she’s taken down just steps away from her apartment, killed with her own weapon, for Eve the victim isn’t just “one of us.” 

Eve starts questioning everyone while her husband, Roarke, digs into computer data on the dead woman’s life back in Atlanta. To their shock, they discover a connection between this case and their own painful, shadowy pasts. The truth will need to be uncovered one layer at a time, starting with the box that arrives at Cop Central addressed to Eve, containing Coltraine’s guns, badge, and a note from her killer: “You can have them back. Maybe someday soon, I’ll be sending yours to somebody else.” 

But Eve Dallas doesn’t take too kindly to personal threats, and she is going to break this case, whatever it takes. And that’s a promise.  

3. O is for Outlaw by Sue Grafton: https://amzn.to/2GdorUv

O is for once upon a time. . .

Let’s talk about Kinsey’s past. We know of the aunt who raised her, the second husband who left her, and her long-lost family up the California coast. But what about Kinsey’s husband number one? He was always a blip on the radar―until now.

4.  The Lily Bard Series by Charlaine Harris: https://amzn.to/2IVnemu

While trying to prove her innocence in the murder of her landlord, Lily Bard, karate student and cleaning service proprietor, finds plenty of skeletons in the closets of Shakespeare, Arkansas.

5.  When Death Comes Stealing by Valerie Wilson Wesley: https://amzn.to/2DZaiIQ

Struggling as a single mother to make ends meet on the mean streets of Newark, New Jersey, ex-cop-turned-PI Tamara Hayle races against time to find a murderer when someone begins killing her ex-husband's sons--and her own son might be next.

6.  Blind Descent (Anna Pigeon#6) by Nevada Barr: https://amzn.to/2GivefX

When a fellow ranger is injured in a caving accident, Anna swallows her paralyzing fear of small spaces and descends into Lechuguilla to help a friend in need. Worse than the claustrophobia that haunts her are the signs-some natural, and some, more ominously, man-made-that not everyone is destined to emerge from this wondrous living tomb. All the skills Anna has honed in the terrestrial world are called into play on precipitous climbs, exhausting treks, and descents into canyons that have never seen the sun. The terrain is alien and hostile, the greed and destructive powers of mankind all too familiar. In this place of internal terrors, Anna must learn whom she can trust, and, in the end, decide who is to live and who is to die.

Coffee With Cornwell?

Random Thought: Why Murder Mysteries Never Talk About This...?

So listen (err, read). I finished reading Chaos by Patricia Cornwell a couple of weeks ago. Now, for those familiar with the series, it follows the narrative of a medical examiner using her profession of forensics and pathology to out-craft a crafty criminal or two. Good deal, right? Sure. But here’s what bits of illumination crawled across my mind during my reading of the book. Given that the series follows the theme of death and autopsies, why do authors skip details related to one particular ickier part of death? What's that I have in mind? Well...shit...
Sure many of us don’t need that piece of detail, but let’s talk about it all the same.
Writers setting up a crime or autopsy scene are quick to dish details such as the body’s temperature (algor mortis). Then there’s the examination of the body’s state/condition–as an observation of this can help relay the time of death.
Authors will relay to the reader if the victim is in a state of rigor mortis (where the body's muscles stiffen shortly after death). Rigor mortis can last for about a day or two–give or take. Which, once observed, helps the reader and protagonist unfold the crime with an invaluable clue. But what if the body is found after its been through rigor? The author will, of course, then relay how the body is in a relaxed state of livor mortis (where gravity pools blood in the body).

So with those many relaxed muscles–including the body’s sphincter–why do authors never describe a pile of shit stuck underneath the victim? Okay, okay. Sure this doesn’t always happen–given all your muscles are too relaxed to push anything from your gut. But because it does happen, why have I yet to read a fictional crime scene where the author describes a corpse’s having released his or her bowels or bladder? Though a murder victim can hardly be described with pleasantries, I would like to read an author just once take it a step grosser. That’s right. Gross me all the way out!

Just a thought.

Next I’ll talk about SEX in romance…

Completed Patricia Cornwell's Chaos! Last Interview EVENT!

Well, folks.  I completed the 24th Kay Scarpetta book, Chaos, over the weekend.  Saturday I crunched through the last 187 pages between eating apples and Oreos.  And it was worth all the time.  I'll get back to you all on that, though.  Anyway, with a whole year before the 25th book comes around (with lots of surprises given what took place in the 24th), I'll be quiet about this series from here on out.  At least I think so. 

But in closing the countdown I set up weekly this month for Chaos's release, I now share the last interview event with the author....

Patricia Cornwell's 24th Kay Scarpetta Book is Here! CHAOS!

Sooooo in keeping with my Chaos COUNTDOWN; here I am true to my word!  I have my copy of the latest forensics/medical examiner crime thriller, Chaos.  Featuring our favorite pathologist, Kay Scarpetta!

Whoo-hoo!

Book Openers Revisited ~ PART ONE...

The first paragraph in a book doesn’t always “contractualize” you into the author’s work, but it starts as potential.  I mean just step back for a moment and think about the power the first paragraph in your favorite book had.  How did it deliver enough to keep you reading and re-reading the book over the years?  What was it about that opening that enticed you upon your initial exposure?  Did the author break you with a vivid setting?  Or maybe it was a character’s voice that captivated you?  Did the author deliver a joke that threw you into laughter, in a moment when you needed it?  Was it a matter of tone or emotion?  Or were you just excited when an author flung you right in the middle of a scene?

Whatever the case, we can’t deny the power of the opening paragraph.

So I decided to pull a few books off one of my bookshelves and share with you a couple of interesting ones I've loved.  Some are from books I found myself compelled to read by the author's style alone.  While some are from books I never read beyond just yet.  And some are from favorite reads of mine that has kept me coming back for more.

~ Sula by Toni Morrison ~

Loved the indefinable usage of the phrase “that place.” 

As the paragraph later concedes, "that place" turns out to be a black neighborhood.  Yet, somewhat usual, it's a neighborhood long gone as it fell victim to capitalism (to keep it light).  It fell at the hands of businessmen who uprooted the land and cut down trees to build a golf course and suburban neighborhood.  Hosting and furnishing whites only?  You bet.  Nevertheless, the catch is “that place” may be gone, but its spirit isn't.  There’s a haunting story stilled buried in the land‘s past.  And, of course, Morrison invites us into that haunting history with this opener.

Dare you step back into the 1920s and find out...

COUNTDOWN: Patricia Cornwell's 24th Kay Scarpetta Book, Chaos

There's been a few new Patricia Cornwell interviews popping up as we get closer and closer to the release of Kay Scarpetta #25, Chaos.  This particular interview really caused me to pause.  I've never seen Cornwell on the brink of becoming emotion.  She chokes up a little in this BBC News HARDtalk interview.  Enjoy!

Are you looking forward to Chaos?  Or have you given up on this series?  Share your comments below!

COUNTDOWN: Patricia Cornwell's 24th Kay Scarpetta book, Chaos

TWO WEEKS IS TOO LONG!

Patricia Cornwell's Kay Scarpetta #24 Chaos Trailer

#ClueMeInPC: Q&A w/Patricia Cornwell (Video)

Depraved Scarpetta

I almost giggle while writing this.  But I must stress again (and again and again): chances of your liking this book is low if you aren’t faithful to the series.  Or, to be a little clearer, a dedicated fan to its leading character, Kay Scarpetta.  In all her re-found first-person glory, she controls every piece of her latest adventure in Depraved Heart.  And personally, given how much of a dedicated fan I am after surviving Cornwell’s third-person slumps (along with the hot mess of last year’s Flesh and Blood), I love Kay in control.  So despite another elusive and “cut-rate” ending, I was here for Depraved Heart.  In my equally troubled mindset (referring to Cornwell’s character), I found myself surrendering to Scarpetta's narrative once more.

Yet, as stated, this will most certainly not be everyone’s resounding experience with Depraved Heart.  In a matter-of-fact, I would bet money only 20% of those who’ve read the book are feeling the way I feel.  Perplexed.  Distraught.  But... pleasantly... content.  

Waiting on the next release?  You damn well BETCHA!

Now that I got all gush ‘n’ hush mess out of the way, let me tell you what the book is about.  After that I want to just bullet point a few of the crazies involved in Depraved Heart.  The good crazies (from a personal standpoint) and the bad crazies (from a technique/stylish standpoint).  Boy, oh boy.  This one may take all night.

So here’s the set up of book 23 in Patricia Cornwell’s popular (though debatable these days) Kay Scarpetta series…

But first!  Those who keep up with Scarpetta won’t look surprised to find her and her niece, Lucy, in trouble.  Again!  And it’s the same old drama.  Same old recipe.  Some damn-near omnipotent political or criminal force lurking in the shadows.  Calculating.  Studying.  Developing methods to psychologically torture and wreck our protagonist and her team.  At least until he or she can finally tap them with murder.  Generally, said foe is almost always singularly after Scarpetta’s wonder kid niece.  This, naturally but not-so, involves Scarpetta.  So that should tell you everything you may need to know.  But we’ll get into the smaller details anyway.

FRIDAY READS: Depraved Heart by Patricia Cornwell (READING UPDATE)

Let's pray this year's Scarpetta novel makes a lot more structural sense than last year's...

According to Amazon:

Dr. Kay Scarpetta is working a suspicious death scene in Cambridge, Massachusetts when an emergency alert sounds on her phone. A video link lands in her text messages and seems to be from her computer genius niece Lucy. But how can it be? It’s clearly a surveillance film of Lucy taken almost twenty years ago.

As Scarpetta watches she begins to learn frightening secrets about her niece, whom she has loved and raised like a daughter. That film clip and then others sent soon after raise dangerous legal implications that increasingly isolate Scarpetta and leave her confused, worried, and not knowing where to turn. She doesn’t know whom she can tell—not her FBI husband Benton Wesley or her investigative partner Pete Marino. Not even Lucy.

In this new novel, Cornwell launches these unforgettable characters on an intensely psychological odyssey that includes the mysterious death of a Hollywood mogul’s daughter, aircraft wreckage on the bottom of the sea in the Bermuda Triangle, a grisly gift left in the back of a crime scene truck, and videos from the past that threaten to destroy Scarpetta’s entire world and everyone she loves. The diabolical presence behind what unfolds seems obvious—but strangely, not to the FBI. Certainly that’s the message they send when they raid Lucy’s estate and begin building a case that could send her to prison for the rest of her life.

In the latest novel in her bestselling series featuring chief medical examiner Dr. Kay Scarpetta, Cornwell will captivate readers with the shocking twists, high-wire tension, and cutting-edge forensic detail that she is famous for, proving yet again why she’s the world’s #1 bestselling crime writer.

~Backup~  But is it really necessary?

Tonight I'm going in on Patricia Cornwell's latest Scarpetta release, Depraved Heart.  I'm praying on everything it's better than last year's Flesh and Blood.  I won't even plot my expectations in this post.  At the end of the day, I love Kay Scarpetta.  I just don't have any reservations for taking digs at Cornwell's story should it fall short.  So it's time to light the candles, turn on the heater, and slip under the covers for another crime-riddled adventure.  That hopefully makes some damn sense!  No seriously, last year's Flesh and Blood was so bad I DNF'ed it and skipped to the last pages.

So stay tuned for the results...

IN OTHER NEWS.  If Cornwell's latest fails, I have this interesting book to fall back on.  For some reason I went to two different stores in search of Tess Gerritsen's latest, Playing with Fire.  It was my intent to have it handy as a weekend reading back up to Cornwell.  However, I just couldn't find it.  Not even Barnes and Nobles had the book out!  Regardless, I finally got the balls to take on William C. Dietz's urban fantasy novel, Deadeye.

HAPPY READING, EVERYONE!

{Saturday - 10/31 Reading Update - 10:39pm}

Depraved Heart has been in my lap all morning.  I woke at about 8am and didn't get out of bed (officially) until 1pm.  I'm 262 pages in and I have to say I'm really, really enjoying it.  It has absolutely zero motion.  No motion or traction at all.  Characters sit around from scene to scene deducting, contemplating, and rehashing a collection of concerns and story matter.  Zero moment.  Yet!  I absolutely am hooked as to what's going on, and where the story will go.  I may be bias because I genuinely like Scarpetta's first person POV, as well as the other characters.  So I don't feel too slighted by the lack of movement in the story.  It's like sitting down with old friends and....  I'll leave that for later.  No, really.  I'm actually enjoying the book.  Besides, the weather–which is wet and chilly–helps the experience.  I'm hoping to have the book complete tomorrow.  Much, much better than last year's disaster, Flesh and Blood.  While Depraved Heart reads like a stalled jalopy, it's a lot more reader-friendly and comprehensible than the spaghetti-splaying Flesh and Blood.

Cornwell's Totem Pole | Win Lamont Sykes

So moved by my Pickles & Scarpetta post, I had to find a means to get this pressuring need for a Cornwell read out of my system. I didn't necessarily want to re-read a Kay Scarpetta book, though. Nor did I want to continue and complete Cornwell's Andy Brazil series; I started it in the summer of 2011 and only managed to finish the first book before I put the series on hold. However, there was one more alternative available–which was to catch Cornwell's two-book series featuring her Massachusetts state investigator character, Winston Garano ("Win" or "Geronimo"). Told in the presence-tense–which is probably better suited where the series serialized as a 15-part series in The New York Times magazine–I have to say that I felt the series started kind of strong. Now before I get into how "strong" it started, let me preface that with "rocky as hell" "weird" and "exaggeratedly present." Not one of those phrases are unoriginal when it comes to Cornwell, or unfamiliar to me when it concerns her writing (trying reading the first book in her Andy Brazil series). Nonetheless, let's get into book one, At Risk, and book two The Front.

At Risk

"A Massachusetts state investigator is called home from Knoxville, Tennessee, where he is completing a course at the National Forensic Academy. His boss, the district attorney, attractive but hard-charging, is planning to run for governor, and as a showcase she's planning to use a new crime initiative called At Risk; its motto: "Any crime, any time." In particular, she's been looking for a way to employ cutting-edge DNA technology, and she thinks she's found the perfect subject in an unsolved twenty-year-old murder—in Tennessee. If her office solves the case, it ought to make them all look pretty good, right? 

Her investigator is not so sure—not sure about anything to do with this woman, really—but before he can open his mouth, a shocking piece of violence intervenes, an act that shakes up not only both their lives but also the lives of everyone around them. It's not a random event. Is it personal? Is it professional? Whatever it is, the implications are very, very bad indeed ... and they're about to get much worse."

Brevity.  It's the number one–and I mean number one–reason why I thought At Risk was an okay read.  Ballpark?  Never.  Engaging just enough?  Certainly. So yes, the brevity in all surrounding areas gave At Risk motion. Whether it's character, setting, theme (I'm not conscious whether there was one); brevity was the book's saving grace. Granted, as I stated before, the series originally operated in The New York Times magazine, through a stream of weekly story articles. 

Nonetheless, in contrast to some page-filler feats featured in Cornwell's Scarpetta and Brazil series, At Risk did a lot less of characters standing around over-analyzing crime scenes/circumstances throughout a number of pages. At Risk was, in fact, fast-paced. A thrilling fast pace, though? Not so much. Did Cornwell weave a number of character threads and plot points, coinciding with her usual overdrawn and poorly-plotted standards? Yes. However, the muddled trap of page-filler-material didn't tangle up the narrative and motion–which I thought made the book easy to traverse. So you're not stuck in scenes where narrative/information is messy and unloaded like a commercial truck tipped on the freeway (because of ambitiously swerving directions) and characters aren't overstaying his or her welcome inside of a scene.  

But what I really, really want to write about is the way the main characters took the stage.  Why?  Because despite everything else semi-sorta worth talking about, this is what stuck me; spilling into my displeasure of the second book, The Front.

The characters.  I found most of them either on the brink of caricature-esque, dull, or cryptically unusual with the seldom practical individual mixed in. But let's talk about the main character first, Winston Granano. Actually, let me be quite frank in stating how boring he came across. And to be extremely clear, I would freely say that his investigator partner/comrade/colleague assisting him with his investigation was far more engaging and productive.  Now I won't give all honors to said assistant, but dammit did she bring what I came to At Risk for. 

Even so, Winston is bi-racial. He's of Italian and African ancestry, and an unrestrained expression of a sex magnet. That's a winning ticket right there, as outside characters can't seem to help but prattle about his good looks.  And I could agree, I suppose.  Only it got obnoxious after the tenth time, which didn't seem to help the credibility of his character or direction.  Seriously, for a minute I questioned whether he was a efficient investigator, or an efficient investigator after his undeniable sex appeal?  Luckily, he had a grandmother strung on the idea of psychics and hoodoo to keep his character grounded.  Visits with her and her prophecies over his choices were always welcoming. 

Outside of Winston's sex appeal ticket, Cornwell gave him an interesting past to go along with his heritage.  So as the story progressed, I decided that she did a decent job of shaping him out to be a heroically diplomatic justice seeker.  However, I felt his dealings were mostly overshadowed by Cornwell's foxy ambitious district attorney character, Monique Lamont.

Think of Lamont in red Jimmy Choo with matching $16 M.A.C. lipstick. An Armani ensemble of a pencil skirt and loosely buttoned blouse and blazer. An attitude in hand, and ruthlessly crafty when it concerns gathering her goals. She, in all of her limelight-stealing glory, damn near over-road Winston's character. And considering she's his boss, she had him under her thumb from a number of angles. One of those angles were the progression of his career/studies back in Knoxville, where she sent him to the National Forensics Academy pre-At Risk.  She is, quite plainly, a desperately enterprising hot mess. And with all that overdrawn characterization and subtle glamour, Cornwell did Lamont a favor by knocking her down a host of egocentric pegs.  Naturally, Winston came to pick up the pieces. When Lamont uses her tragedy as a chess piece toward her governor-focused goals, you can do little more than notice how Winston becomes her lapdog and struggling voice of reason in the process.  But you never quite get the truth of their relationship.  Is it based on simply respect?  Attraction?  What?

Well, who needs them in the end?

In my eyes, the true hero/star of At Risk was Winston's partner back in Knoxville, Delma Sykes. A little older than Winston, and somewhat driven by her attraction toward him, she's the character who (as far as I'm concerned) did the real legwork.  See, Winston and Lamont were busy trapped in verbal scrimmages about politics and shady political moves. Meanwhile, Delma was the character Winston sought out to gather information on the cold case handed to him by Lamont. That meant Sykes was visiting and speaking with law enforcement members behind the investigation. She was shuffling through their record boxes, tracking down receipts, knocking on doors, beating bushes, and confronting liars.  She, essentially, put Winston's case together for him and Lamont. All the while, Sykes risked her career with time spent uncovering the cold case instead of meeting the demands of the National Forensics Academy.  

Sykes may seem foolish, giving up her time to assist Winston who sat on the edge of Lamont's desk the whole while.  However, I personally found myself piqued as her drive and determination displayed the engine to the book's mystery.  She was the sleuth.  The gem.  The character whom toyed with relatable stakes–even as far as confronting the killer.

So on everything I love, At Risk was her book!  And she was the reason why I even liked it.

Such an odd thing, though. And one that I found severely disappointing when I went into the second book, The Front, and found her character nowhere to be found. Which, quite frankly, is the reason why I don't care to write about The Front. That should tell you everything you need to know about this series.  And how shady Cornwell can be toward her characters.  (Yes, yes.  I say that as a joke.)

The Front

Slick move on me? I know.  However, the book is hardly memorable without Delma Sykes, or a character focused on the project (no matter how mundane and disinterest-breeding) at hand. I mean, we are talking about a crime fiction drama. Nevertheless, there were a few kooky classic Cornwell characters present (one being a woman with a prosthetic leg).  Still, outside of the return of Monique Lamont and Winston's grandmother's brighter role, nothing else really... well... changed from the first book. But seriously, The Front was probably on par with someone's outline. I honestly can't recall anything about this book that I can find worth talking about. Nevertheless, I'll give you a piece of Goodreads' synopsis just in case you can think of something:

"And in The Front, peril is what comes to them all. D.A. Lamont has a special job for Garano. As part of a new public relations campaign about the dangers of declining neighborhoods, she's sending him to Watertown to "come up with a drama," and she thinks she knows just the case that will serve. Garano is very skeptical, because he knows that Watertown is also the home base for a loose association of municipal police departments called the FRONT, set up in order that they don't have to be so dependent on the state--much to Lamont's anger. He senses a much deeper agenda here--but he has no idea just how deep it goes. In the days that follow, he'll find that Lamont's task, and the places it leads him, will resemble a house of mirrors--everywhere he turns, he's not quite sure if what he's seeing is true."

In keeping with all I've just stated, it would be interesting to watch the Lifetime movie adaptation of both books.  Other than that, I'll just let this disappointing series be.

Quick Brown/Cornwell Housekeeping

It happened.  I got inspired by the Kay Scarpetta countdown POST.  So I stepped into my library's used bookstore, and walked out with the first two–and only I presume–books in Cornwell's Win Garano series.  I’ve avoided them for so long, but saw At Risk [Book 1] and The Front [Book 2] ready and available for a fair $1.50.  I say fair also because, outside of Cornwell’s Kay Scarpetta series, I read the first book in her Andy Brazil series and more or less got excited for the proceeding two entries.  (Owned and unread I should add.)  So we’ll see how this goes.  If anything, the books are so thin they should finally catch up my lagging reading challenge.

GOLD.  Here I am finishing book seven of Rita Mae Brown’s Mrs. Murphy series.  And now I've found a nice, hardback copy of book eight.  Pawing Through the Pastis begging for some attention.  Man, if I can take this one down, that’ll be three Rita Mae Brown books in a month.  I’m down for that.

Used bookstores are the best.  Let’s just say that as one.

Pickles & Scarpetta | Top 6 Favorite Kay Scarpetta Cases

Ever just look at your bookshelves, spot a series, and find yourself talking to yourself about your love for it?  For five or so minutes, you’re left using your memories to trace and calculate your way through the events that took place in each entry.  You’re throwing your thoughts back to each book’s conclusion and resolution.  You recall your favorite scenes, characters, and plots.  And most of all, you remember the sour ones.  And while you may be all caught up, and awaiting the author’s next release, you get the feeling that you can squeeze a re-read into your TBR just for the hell of it.  Well, that happened recently, as I stared up at my collection (which is very much current, thank you) of Patricia Cornwell’s Kay Scarpetta series.

As some of you may or may not know, Patricia Cornwell is known for establishing the forensic thriller literary form with her 1990 debut, Post-mortem. As of now the series is twenty-two books deep, and it’s been a pickle of a ride between (I only started reading the series one hot July night in 2009). But what do I mean by “pickle”? Well, the bad, sketchy, and usually disconnected entries don't overtake the general good and enjoyment you gain.  I say that because there's a lot to say from reading through Scarpetta‘s many crime-stopping endeavors. However, while I have your attention, let’s talk about the pickles; I love to be honest about my feelings all around.

The "pickles"; books 12-17

While the series started in the first-person, via Scarpetta’s medical examiner lens, Cornwell switched to the third throughout books 12-17.  Already creating pushy, series arcing plots that would eventually back her into a corner; she took her readers out of the head of her famed hero and gave us a line of books probably best forgotten.  Well, to be clear, some were a little more memorable than others for their twisted villains alone. Nonetheless, from 2003’s Blow Fly to the final straw of 2009’s The Scarpetta Factor (the absolute worst in the series, and one I never finished), I almost gave up on the game. As I said in posts past, Scarpetta was like the aunt I wish I had.  So for me to have conversations with her from a wide, narrative berth was no fun. 

I didn’t necessarily want to prowl around in the killer’s head space (though sometimes interesting, they were mostly desperate necrotic musings). And, quite frankly, I didn’t want to do the same with the many strong, secondary characters in the series. Speaking of which, that would include Scarpetta’s F.B.I. husband [Benton], her techno-geek niece [Lucy], and her best friend and fellow detective [Marino]. Their roles have flipped and changed over the course of the series, but I was cool with hearing their many transgressions from a length.  And Lucy, being the most obnoxious of the listed trio, only seconded the villains per her chance at a narrative go.

Thankfully, in 2010, Cornwell changed back to first person and back into her series star’s head. And when I tell you that switch came right on time–I mean right on time. However, that doesn’t mean the series fully recovered from those few unrestrained books written in the third. Some of the post-third POV books were hit or miss, as it concerns containing a solidly maintained and operating plot (last year‘s Flesh and Blood wasn't that great at all). Even so, having Scarpetta back in the narrative seat makes a difference.  I love this series because Kay Scarpetta is intelligent, thoughtful, and works for the dead. Something we all have a fascination for, but can only seem to explore from a healthy distance.

Now in stating all that gush and fuss, I want to countdown to my six favorite Scarpetta cases!

My Inconvenient Truth About Flesh and Blood...

"It’s Dr. Kay Scarpetta’s birthday and she’s about to head to Miami for a vacation with her FBI profiler husband Benton Wesley when she notices seven pennies on a wall behind their Cambridge house. Is this a kids’ game? If so, why are all of the coins dated 1981 and so shiny it’s as if they’re newly minted? Then her cellphone rings, and Detective Pete Marino tells her there’s been a homicide five minutes away. A high school music teacher has been shot with shocking precision as he unloaded groceries from his car. No one heard or saw a thing. It’s as if God did it.

In this 22nd Scarpetta novel, the master forensic sleuth finds herself in the middle of a nightmarish pursuit of a serial sniper who seems to leave no evidence except fragments of copper. The shots are so perfect, they cause instant death and seem impossible, and the death scenes aren’t crime scenes because the killer was never within hundreds of yards of the victims. The victims seem to have nothing in common, and there is no pattern that might indicate where the Copperhead will strike next. First New Jersey, then Massachusetts, and then into the murky depths off the coast of South Florida, where Scarpetta dives a shipwreck, looking for answers that only she can discover and analyze. There she must face an unthinkable truth that points in the direction of her techno genius niece, Lucy, Scarpetta’s own flesh and blood."

~ Take from Goodreads

My inconvenient truth about Flesh and Blood is that I was so disinterested that 220 pages in (and a host of days held hostage to the drudgery of the book), I skipped to its end. Now I have to keep it real when I say that these Scarpetta books aren't anywhere near as thrilling as they once were.  So I more or less expected as much tedium out of Flesh and Blood. However, despite that sort of naked truth, I'm still into Kay Scarpetta.  She’s the aunt I wish I had, and a comfortable hat in the forensic literary form. Those are truths that has never changed–and never will. 

So nowadays it’s a matter of revisiting her year after year. I enjoy her pathologist and techno knowledge, alongside her perspicacious (can you tell I just wanted to use that word?) insight. I love when she goes between being a chef and a medical examiner; an aunt, wife and friend.  I can appreciate her often intimidating–yet grounded–role in her relationships with the other veteran characters and small-time cast members.  So simply put, I like her and look forward to another publication in the series.

However, sadly, this year it just didn't cut to stick around and play with dear Aunt Kay. If I thought last year's Dust was "dusty," Flesh and Blood drained me until I dejectedly decided to jump to its conclusion more than halfway through.

https://www.facebook.com/patricia.cornwell 

Besides the usual bad pacing, the real problem I had with Flesh and Blood was that I couldn't find value in its direction, nor find a means of empathizing with the round of victimizing events leading me through it. Not that every book has to have a foreseeable direction, but I would much rather be comfortable trusting that there is one instead of running into a stream of events that doesn’t appear even marginally connected. No, no. Not marginally, but more like believably connected. Therefore, one arbitrary occurrence or issue leading into another kind of bred mistrust in me during Flesh and Blood.

Gather ingredients consisting of copper pennies, snipers, terrorist, realtors, and insurance men that apparently look like something that stepped out of Goonies (or that weird s/he beast villain in Cornwell's Hornet's Nest book).  Toss in a victim who operates as a drug mule carrying cocaine wrapped in condoms in his stomach, and an incident involving a teenage girl drowning in some politician's pool.  And then sprinkle in law enforcement individuals having affairs, and the standard (often jealous and mean-spirited) personal concerns from the B-cast (particularly Lucy and Marino).  Wrap all of those and branching events for Scarpetta to spend a too many pages mulling and discussing with others (in contrast to scenes with movement), and you may feel as uninspired as I. And while so many of those events were surely connected somehow, I couldn't help but imagine someone throwing pasta against a wall and seeing what sticks. In the case of Flesh and Blood it's seeing what sticks, forcing it into a believable and plausible space.  Then hammering it into truth when there could've been an easier way, with a little more caress and ingenuity spent, on managing a sound plot.

Am I even making sense here?

So yeah. I cheated. I skipped to the end to give myself permission to put the book up and go elsewhere. And really, the ending wasn't all that great either–which right away killed my guilt for cheating. It involved Benton and Scarpetta scuba diving into some underwater wreckage.  For a moment I actually started to find interest in the story (but not enough to retrace), only to have the scenario cut short through a matter of paragraphs and a few pages. It cliff-hangs, then the resolution is spoken over in the proceeding epilogue. One, in which, is never unfolded to the reader first hand. Bummer because that underwater scene/confrontation had some serious potential.

And that's basically what I was left with as a whole: spoiled potential with the gratification of spending a little time with Kay Scarpetta.  Here's to next year's attempt!  I made a list of what I'd like to see, but decided to hold back for now.