Chaos (The Scarpetta Series Book 24) by Patricia Cornwell @HarperCollinsUK @1pcornwell #20booksofsummer22

The number one bestseller

Book blurb

Someone is following you…
One summer evening in New England, two young girls stumble upon a body. Forensic pathologist Dr. Kay Scarpetta arrives at the scene to find a young woman has been attacked with almost superhuman force.

Someone is taunting you…
Meanwhile, people close to Scarpetta start receiving suspicious calls. Could they be linked to Scarpetta’s anonymous cyber stalker, Tailend Charlie?

Someone wants to destroy you…
A second death shocks Scarpetta to her core. Because analysis of the body shows a material that doesn’t exist on earth. And it’s clear that someone, or something, is coming for her, and is hell-bent on creating chaos…

My thoughts

I have been a huge fan of the Scarpetta series by Patricia Cornwell for a number of years I have read them all (up to book 24) and own a copy of each of them. Chaos is the 24th book in the series and is, as you might expect, a polished and accomplished book from the best selling author.

Kay Scarpetta is on her way to meet Benton for dinner when she encounters an odd event. Things get even odder as both she and Benton receive calls and have to leave dinner for separate destinations. Kay has to attend a body found nearby.

Patricia Cornwell writes wonderfully constructed stories. Here there is principally a murder investigation but there is also the theme of issues including problem communications which her niece, Lucy, is looking into. Lucy and her partner are favourite characters. We have not just read about Kay but several members of her family, friends and colleagues such as Pete Marino. Following the forensic leads and demanding proper order and total compliance to procedure Scarpetta is taken on a mind blowing trip that brings back an old adversary and will bring serious consequences to the family.

In such a long series it is unsurprising to find that the occasional book can be less appealing or appreciated than others perhaps because the author is taking the lead character down a different path, coming across difficult times or simply not the readers ‘cup of tea’. Regardless, this series has continued to hit the mark time and again.

Chaos by Patricia Cornwell is a terrific story, I did enjoyed it and would most definitely recommend it.

Book: purchased

20 books of summer

Another of my #20Booksofsummer is finished. You can check out my list here. Cathy from 746Books is the mastermind and host behind this annual event do take a look at her excellent blog.

Information

Published: HarperCollins (20 Oct. 2016) (Paperback, 27 July 2017) @HarperCollinsUK

Buy: Publishers links

Author: Patricia Cornwell now lives in Boston. She was born in Miami and grew up in Montreat, North Carolina. After earning her degree in English from Davidson College in 1979, she began working at the Charlotte Observer, taking whatever stories came her way and rapidly advancing from listing television programs to covering the police beat. Cornwell received widespread attention and praise for her series of articles on prostitution and crime in downtown Charlotte. From the Charlotte Observer, Cornwell moved to a job with the Office of the Chief Medical Examiner of Virginia – a post she would later bestow upon the fictional Kay Scarpetta. It was during these years that Patricia penned Postmortem and began submitting it to major publishing houses in New York, without initial success.

Find out more about the author and her writing on the Patricia Cornwell Website or follow her on Twitter.

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Books

Scarpetta series: AUTOPSY (2021) is #25 in the series. Paperback out now, July 2022: BUY