Patricia Cornwell - The Scarpetta Factor (Kay Scarpetta series, Book 17)

It is the week before Christmas. The effects of the credit crunch have prompted Dr. Kay Scarpetta to offer her services pro bono to New York City's Office of the Chief Medical Examiner. But in no time at all, her increased visibility seems to precipitate a string of dramatic and unsettling events. She is asked live on the air about the sensational case of Hannah Starr, who has vanished and is presumed dead. Moments later during the same broadcast, she receives a startling call-in from a former psychiatric patient of Benton Wesley's. When she returns after the show to the apartment where she and Benton live, she finds a suspicious package -- possibly a bomb - waiting for her at the front desk. Soon the apparent threat on Scarpetta's life finds her embroiled in a deadly plot that includes a famous actor accused of an unthinkable sex crime and the disappearance of a beautiful millionairess with whom Lucy seems to have shared a secret past.

-

The last two installments in the Scarpetta series gave some hope of improvement back to a series most readers once loved but that had lost it's bite. Unfortunately The Scarpetta Factor is a drawback once again. Although it seems that Cornwell tries to give back some substance to the series characters it just isn't what the reader wants. Those who have read the series right from the beginning will miss Scarpetta's investigations, autopsies and exciting morgue stories.
Instead there is a lot of high tech investigation like GPS, Internet and what not.

Cornwell rehashes a lot of the old junk between Scarpetta and now husband Benton. Why he left her and went undercover etc. . It is good to know but not enough substance to fill a 500 pages book.
I'm not sure if the reader still wants to read about the Chandonne family or wants the remaining part to return at all. The Chandonnes' were a part of Cornwell's books way to often and at one point it just gets stale. At least for my taste.

The personal stuff in each characters life got boring and uninteresting, it distracts from the rather thin main plot.

That being said, you'll still like Scarpetta after reading this book but if it is enough to keep you interested for another 500 pages book is the question to be answered.

Rating:
Visit Patricia Cornwell.

Hardcover: 512 pages
Publisher: Putnam Adult (October 20, 2009)
Language: English
ISBN-10: 0399156399
ISBN-13: 978-0399156397

Patricia Cornwell - Scarpetta

Leaving behind her private forensic pathology practice in Charleston, South Carolina, Kay Scarpetta takes up an assignment in New York City, where the NYPD has asked her to examine an injured patient on Bellevue Hospital's psychiatric prison ward. The handcuffed and chained patient, Oscar Bane, has specifically asked for her, and when she literally has her gloved hands on him, he begins to talk - and the story he has to tell turns out to be one of the most bizarre she has ever heard.

The injuries, he says, were sustained in the course of a murder ... that he did not commit. Is Bane a criminally insane stalker who has fixed on Scarpetta ? Or is his paranoid tale true, and it is he who is being spied on, followed and stalked by the actual killer ?
The one thing Scarpetta knows for certain is that a woman has been tortured and murdered - and more violent deaths will follow.
Gradually, an inexplicable and horrifying truth emerges:
Whoever is committing the crimes knows where his prey is at all times. Is it a person, a government ? And what is the connection among the victims ?

In the days that follow, Scarpetta, her forensic psychologist husband, Benton Wesley, and her niece Lucy, who has recently formed her own forensic company investigation firm in New York, will undertake a harrowing chase through cyberspace and the all-to-real streets of the city--an odyssey that will take them once to places they never knew but also much, much too close to home.

-

I'd be lying to say I did not anticipate the publishing of Cornwell's newest Kay Scarpetta novel "Scarpetta" for whatever reason. When it arrived I was surprised by it's thickness and the overall appearance of the book. I held it in my hands and got this feeling of not being disappointed this time before I even read the first sentence.

Scarpetta has a small medical examiner's office in Charleston, Carolina and is bby her now husband Benton Wesley to New York. The District Attorney Jamie Berger asks her for help with a patient who admitted himself to the forensic psychiatric unit. His name is Oscar Bane and he hasn't been charged with anything just yet. The only thing police has against him is that he was the first person to arrive at his girlfriends apartment and discovers her killed in a gruesome way.
Bane seems to be a little bit off claiming someone is following him, trying to steal his thoughts and mind and the only person who is allowed to examine his wounds is Dr. Scarpetta who finds herself in a huge dilemma:
For one thing she isn't allowed to break her patient/physician confidentiality as long as Bane hasn't been charged and for the other thing, she learns that Benton after Marino's sudden disappearance, took care of him, helped him with getting treatment for his alcoholism and other issues. She also learns that Marino now directly works for the District Attorney's office and is directly involved in the murder of Oscar Bane's girlfriend.
The next days reveal more confusion, more misleading evidence and more death.

-

Initially I've detached myself from expecting the Scarpetta we know from the early books because I think this might have been the downfall in Cornwell's past few publishing's. So I went into reading the book without the expectancy of the character Scarpetta. What I got was a mixture of Scarpetta, Lucy Farinelli and Marino and I actually liked the book very much.
In the beginning I feared we might again get too much of Benton and Scarpetta's relationship issues but during the plots development we completely got away from that and learn about how each of the "Scarpetta Team" deals with what happened in the previous novel between Marino and Scarpetta and that Scarpetta partly takes responsibility for it. All this happens between investigations, not too much at once but bit by bit so that it doesn't get annoying and gives closure to the The Book Of The Dead novel.

I think it was fantastic to get back a piece of what I missed in previous novels and a new direction. In the end they all redeem themselves in one or another way. Not only speaking of the characters here.
So would I recommend this book to Scarpetta fans ? Definitely and especially when the disappointment about the last novels was/is still there.

Twist and turns kept me reading and wanting more Cornwell for the first time in years and I appreciate the work for detail the author put into this work. Speaking for myself, I couldn't put it down and I'm not ashamed to admit it.

Rating:
Visit Patricia Cornwell.

Hardcover: 512 pages
Publisher: Putnam Adult (December 2, 2008)
Language: English
ISBN-10: 0399155163
ISBN-13: 978-0399155161

Patricia Cornwell - Book of The Dead

Another sad reading experience by Patricia Cornwell.

The title and the book description are missleading. The book of the dead is mentioned once. Shortly and briefly. It's not even relevant for the plot.
It is hard to find any good words for the book so I will focus on the bad things which by far were enough.
The book says it is a Cornwell but it could have been written by anybody else. (I remember myself saying the same on an Amazon review about "Predator").

Gone are times were the reader knew how Scarpetta thinks and feels. Gone are the times were the reader was capable to follow the crime and the main characters life through Scarpettas eyes. The writing in third person, and the focus on the wrong things makes the story boring, unplausible and unbearable.

The whole books focus seems to be of Scarpetta´s, Benton´s and Marino´s messed up lifes, worthy to make a soap opera about it.

I can not say much without spoiling the book but what the h... did she do to Marino ! ? And then there is Dr. Self, you might remember her from "Predator". What a bad choice to turn her (again) into one of the key personalities.

***

Obviously I´m not the only person that had some hopes left that Patrica Cornwell would get back to her own writing, her early, inspiring Scarpetta novels. After Predator and the last few Scarpetta novels I can only see one direction which is downhill.

Rating:
Visit Patricia Cornwell.

ISBN-13: 9780399153938
ISBN-10: 0399153934
Publisher: Putnam Adult
Publication Date: 10/23/2007
Pages: 416
Book Type: Hardcover