Karin Dufner Book order (chronological)

"#1 New York Times bestselling author Patricia Cornwell delivers the twenty-fourth thriller in her high-stakes series starring medical examiner Dr. Kay Scarpetta"--

Patricia Cornwell delivers the next enthralling thriller in her high-stakes series starring Kay Scarpetta - a complex tale involving a serial sniper who strikes chillingly close to the forensic sleuth herself.

Receiving a grisly communication in the wake of an eminent Canadian paleontologist's disappearance, Kay Scarpetta investigates the discovery of a body in Boston Harbor and clues about other unsolved cases, a situation that makes Scarpetta wonder who she can trust.

The nineteenth book in the Kay Scarpetta series, from No. 1 bestselling author Patricia Cornwell. 'America's most chilling writer of crime fiction' The Times Kay Scarpetta has arranged to meet an inmate at the high-security Georgia Prison for Women. The prisoner is a convicted sex offender and the mother of a vicious and diabolically brilliant killer. Against advice, Scarpetta is determined to hear this woman out - she believes she may hold some answers to the murder of her former deputy. But soon she finds connections to a string of grisly killings. As she learns more, Scarpetta is compelled to conclude that this is only the beginning of a terrifying terrain of conspiracy on an international scale. And she is the only one who can stop it . . . Praise for the groundbreaking series: 'One of the best crime writers writing today' Guardian 'Devilishly clever' Sunday Times 'The top gun in this field' Daily Telegraph 'Forget the pretenders. Cornwell reigns' Mirror 'The Agatha Christie of the DNA age' Express

A desperate mother, her missing child, and a stolen chalice set the stage for a gripping Christmas tale. In this suspenseful narrative, beloved characters Alvirah, a lottery winner turned amateur sleuth, and her husband Willy, navigate a mystery that tests Alvirah's deductive skills and Willy's common sense. The story opens with a young woman leaving her newborn on a church rectory doorstep while a man inside steals a precious chalice adorned with a diamond. Both the baby and the chalice vanish without a trace. Fast forward seven years, just before Christmas, and Alvirah and Willy are helping Willy's sister Cordelia, a nun who runs a thrift shop and after-school shelter for local children, prepare for a Christmas pageant. The shelter's future is in jeopardy as the city condemns the building, and plans to relocate to a nearby brownstone are complicated when it is revealed that the property has been willed to a young couple living there. Alvirah suspects the couple are con artists and embarks on a quest to uncover the truth, intertwining the fates of the missing child and the stolen chalice. This tale promises to be a delightful Christmas gift for readers.

It is the week before Christmas. A tanking economy has prompted Dr. Kay Scarpetta - despite her busy schedule and her continuing work as the senior forensic analyst for CNN - to offer her services pro bono to New York City’s Office of the Chief Medical Examiner. In no time at all, her increased visibility seems to precipitate a string of unexpected 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 telecast she receives a startling call-in from a former psychiatrist patient of Benton Wesley’s. When she returns after the show to the apartment where she and Benton live, she finds an ominous package - possibly a bomb - waiting for her at the front desk. Soon the apparent threat on Scarpetta's life finds her embroiled in a surreal 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. Scarpetta's CNN producer wants her to launch a TV show called The Scarpetta Factor. Given the bizarre events already in play, she fears that her growing fame will generate the illusion that she has a 'special factor,' a mythical ability to solve all her cases. She wonders if she will end up like other TV personalities - her own stereotype.

Meridian Sozu is a Fenestra—the half-human, half-angel link between the living and the dead. She has the dark responsibility of helping souls transition safely into the afterlife. If people die without the help of a Fenestra, their souls are left vulnerable to be stolen by the Aternocti, a dark band of forces who disrupt the balance of good and evil in the world and cause chaos.Having recently lost her beloved Auntie—the woman who showed her what it meant to be a Fenestra—Meridian has hit the road with Tens, her love and sworn protector, in hopes of finding another Fenestra. Their search leads them to Indiana, where Juliet, a responsible and loving teenager, works tirelessly in the nursing home where she and several other foster kids are housed. Surrounded by death, Juliet struggles to make a loving home for the younger kids, and to protect them from the violent whims of their foster mother. But she is struggling against forces she can't understand . . . and even as she feels a pull toward the dying, their sickness seems to infect her, weighing her down. . . .Will Meri and Tens find Juliet in time to save her from a life of misery and illness? And will Meri and Tens' own romance weather the storms of new discoveries?From the Hardcover edition.

"Florida is full of predators, from the animals who thrive in its humid heat to the humans who stalk the air-conditioned malls, and they all give Dr Kay Scarpetta, now Director of Forensic Science and Medicine at the National Forensic Academy, the opportunity and the means to do what she does best - persuading the dead to speak to her. In the icy chill of Boston, Benton Wesley is working on a secret project involving convicted killers, one of whom appears to confess to an even higher number of murders than the authorities had known about. It is a project that gives Scarpetta deep disquiet, as does the behaviour of her neice Lucy, who is spending too much time drinking and indulging in causal pickups in cheap bars. Then the Academy is called in to assist in the discovery of a young woman's body in Massachusetts. She has been tortured and sexually abused, her body tattooed with handprints. The same sort of handprints Lucy has seen on the flesh of her latest pick-up..." - back cover.

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