Depraved Heart Synopsis
No. 1 New York Times bestselling author Patricia Cornwell delivers the twenty-third engrossing thriller in her high-stakes series starring medical examiner Dr. Kay Scarpetta. 'Dr. Kay Scarpetta ... [is] an awesome force in the field of forensic science' New York Times Book Review 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 beloved niece that raise dangerous legal implications, leaving Scarpetta confused, worried, and unable to turn to Lucy, her FBI husband Benton Wesley or her investigative partner Pete Marino. Cornwell launches these unforgettable characters on an intensely psychological odyssey, which 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. With the shocking twists, high-wire tension and cutting-edge forensic detail that she is famous for, Cornwell will captivate readers and prove yet again why she's the world's No. 1 bestselling crime writer.
About This Edition
Patricia Cornwell Press Reviews
Praise for Patricia Cornwell & the Kay Scarpetta Novels: 'Cutting-edge
Sun
'A pioneer of the genre of forensic psychological thriller'
BBC
'America's most stimulating and chilling writer of crime fiction'
The Times
'Devilishly clever'
Sunday Times
'She is a brilliant writer and I was absolutely gripped'
Mail on Sunday
'The top gun in this field'
Daily Telegraph
'Forget the pretenders. Cornwell reigns'
Mirror
'The Agatha Christie of the DNA age'
Express
'One of the best crime writers writing today'
Guardian
'Few writers match Patricia Cornwell when it comes to writing crime and her latest Scarpetta novel is one of her best'
Daily Express
'When it comes to the forensic sciences, nobody can touch Cornwell'
New York Times Book Review
About Patricia Cornwell
In 1990, Patricia Cornwell sold her first novel, Postmortem, while working at the Office of the Chief Medical Examiner in Richmond, Virginia. An auspicious debut, it went on to win the Edgar, Creasey, Anthony, and Macavity Awards, as well as the French Prix du Roman d'Aventures - the first book ever to claim all these distinctions in a single year. Growing into an international phenomenon, the Scarpetta series won Cornwell the Sherlock Award for best detective created by an American author, the Gold Dagger Award, the RBA Thriller Award, and the Medal of Chevalier of the Order of Arts and Letters for her contributions to literary and artistic development.
Today, Cornwell's novels and iconic characters are known around the world. Beyond the Scarpetta series, Cornwell has written the definitive nonfiction account of Jack the Ripper's identity, cookbooks, a children's book, a biography of Ruth Graham, and three other fictional series based on the characters Win Garano, Andy Brazil, and Captain Callie Chase. Cornwell continues exploring the latest space-age technologies and threats relevant to contemporary life. Her interests range from the morgue to artificial intelligence and include visits to Interpol, the Pentagon, the U.S. Secret Service and NASA.
Cornwell was born in Miami. She grew up in Montreat, North Carolina, and now lives and works in Boston.
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