At this point in the series I am heavily invested in the characters. Every one was weird in this one. Maybe that was the point. I miss her working in VA. I do not like Benton. What happened to Kay's dog?? What happened to Rudy? Not feeling the FL vibe. That being said it still rocked.

I haven't read anything by Patricia Cornwell in a long time, but picked this up at a garage sale. Very quick read. It wasn't great and once I was 3/4 of the way finished, I just wanted it to be over. I agree with other reviews stating that it jumped around a lot. The ending wrapped up really fast and sort of left you saying "that's it"?

Probably best used as kindling for a bonfire!

It's difficult to conceive of the depths to which a former star author has sunk and to convey through a review just how achingly, gut-bustingly awful this pathetic, little pooch of a novel was. The only saving grace (and trust me, this moved the novel from a DNF wall-basher to a 1-star "I struggled through it but I made it to the end" mere waste of time) was that Cornwell's ability to conceive multiple plot lines and plot threads was intact. Lots of stuff happening here - autopsies, forensic tidbits, sadomasochistic torture, serial killers, computer hacking, self-destructive psychological turmoil, citrus canker (yeah ... you read that right!), forensic "hell scenes" used as an educational tool for up and coming medical examiners and forensic investigators, narcissistic television psychoanalysts and much, much more.

But, sadly, the ultimate plot and the manner in which these disparate threads were linked together limped to a disappointing, anti-climactic uninteresting finish that simply fizzled out and death-spiraled to the last sentence of the novel. Cornwell made an attempt to simulate urgency and speed by changing scenes and characters at dizzying speed which achieved nothing but confusion (and occasionally anger) in the mind of this particular reader.

And, what sank this novel to even greater depths was the categorization of every single one of the characters as psychological shipwrecks. Kay and Lucy Scarpetta, Pete Marino, Wesley Benton ... nary a single happy moment, a smile, a chuckle or an upbeat moment in the entire novel. Cornwell seems to have set herself a personal contest to see which character she could portray as the weakest, the most uninteresting, the most dislikeable or the most dysfunctional.

I just can't imagine that even the biggest die-hard Cornwell Scarpetta fans would want to spend a moment of their limited reading time on this one. More than just not recommended ... this comes truly recommended against! Don't go there! To quote one of Cornwell's colleagues and competitors, YOU'VE BEEN WARNED!

Paul Weiss

This one includes a forward by the author warning of it's disturbing content.

In Predator, a compulsive murderer is extensively researched, not just the mind but the brain as well, to see if it differs in anyway from "normal" brains.

Is there some qualifying physical element that compels some to kill? Or are killers made from life's tragedies and abuse?

A lesson in the immense destruction a damaged psyche can leave in its wake.

Stil cam sec, telegrafic, nu prea m-a convins.

Oh good grief. Why do I do this to myself? I keep promising myself that a certain Patricia Cornwell book will be my last. This time I mean it.

In this book, Kay Scarpetta is running a forensics lab in Florida. Her niece, nerdy Lucy Farinelli is her boss. Her boyfriend, Benton Wesley, is scanning the brains of serial killers, and Pete Marino, a former cop who has known the other characters forever, is an investigator with trust issues.

Where to start? Random murders have been linked (a pastor, and the 3 people living with her, a neighbour, the owner of a Christmas shop, and her daughter, people in Massachusetts), because of course they are. And only Kay and the gang can find out whodunit, because 3 of them are the nerdiest nerds in NerdTown. Except that the dumb redneck, Pete Marino, does a lot of the heavy lifting in the case. Chips on shoulders can motivate it seems.

At the same time, we watch the office politics at Scarpetta’s work. I spent most of the time thinking ‘don’t care’. This said, the office scenes prove that she has the people skills of a dead dung Beatle, as the story progresses (in addition, can someone explain why so many people she employs want to do her harm?). At best she does no background research. At worst, she has this masochistic martyr complex which actively seeks out demeaning behaviour from others.

Oh and Lucy has issues of her own. One thing she does, exposes her to a bunch of law-suits that exposed the privacy of the facility, and probably opened herself to enough law-suits to close the lab.

My final grumble is the ending. It felt rushed. All the clues (coincidences more like) dropped at the same time, making it feel like it rushed, to fit in with some arbitrary page count.

So, all in all, not a good book!

Why?! I started reading Kay Scarpetta's stories years ago and I remember liking them.

Yet, reading Predator I wondered all along if the characters always were that unlikable and I rewrote all my memories, if they changed or if I just never noticed before.
It was painful. The language too. Arrfff.
And to think I still have a few of them to read...we'll see about that.

This book was terrible and reminded me why I stopped reading Scarlett’s stories last time. Every character is pointlessly angry with the others, won’t share why and won’t talk about the cases they are working. Then a complicated killer is caught in the last few pages, off-screen, without any explanation and solely because they try to break out another serial killer. Very unsatisfying!

First Read: April 2006
Re-read: January 2018

The plot: Predator is made up of several storylines that at first seem unconnected.

- Benton is working on a new project, codenamed PREDATOR that is assessing a killer named Basil. While Benton is interviewing him, Basil confesses to another murder that he says he was never caught for; the murder of a woman in her Christmas themed shop.

- Lucy is dealing with problems of her own she has been diagnosed with a benign tumour in her brain that is mimicking the symptoms of pregnancy and she meets a mysterious woman named Stevie, who has mysterious red handprints drawn or tattooed onto her body.

- Meanwhile Scarpetta is dealing with a murder victim; a woman has been found with red handprints on her body and she must investigate the crime.

- Marino is also having issues; he has received a threatening phone call from someone who called themselves HOG or Hand of God. He strongly suspects one of his work colleagues of somehow hacking into his private work files but cannot prove it. He is also seeing a therapist of his own, a woman named Dr Self.

I found Predator to be very fast paced as each chapter switched view points to different characters but the story was slow to put all the pieces together. I am still enjoying this series and looking forward to re-reading The Book of the Dead and Scarpetta but each book published after that will be new to me.

I used to love the Kay Scarpetta series! In an attempt to revisit an old friend I picked up Predator. I was sad to see my "old friends" had been replaced by a poor resemblance of themselves. I hardly recognized the characters as the story was told in a confusing third party narrative making the people dark, depressing and very impersonal. The constant shift in storyline was difficult to follow. I'm only half-way through the book and I can honestly say I'm not sure what the story line is! For the first time ever I'm not finishing a book and I sure don't want to pass the book on to any friends! I feel badly as I know each author puts a great deal of talent, heart and soul into writing but I felt the author was trying to revitalize old characters by changing format. It doesn't work! Keep the original characters, help them grow as individuals and involve them in a suspenseful story. That's the way to do it Patricia!

I've been a Cornwell fan since I read her first book. I've had some complaints about her recent books ("Blow Fly" was probably the worst). This is getting back to her roots, but still the magic of her earlier books isn't there. I hate what she has done with the character of Marino. In earlier works, I kind of pictured Marino as an Ed Asner type, but now he's buff and bald and riding motorcycles and I've lost my picture of him. I also loved the working relationship they had, and now it seems non-existent. I also don't like the way she has taken her niece Lucy. The thing I've enjoyed in previous Cornwell books was the weay that these three and Scarpetta's male friend, Benton Wesley worked together to solve crimes. Now...I don't know. The story was so convoluted and there was such a dark undertone to everything. Lucy hates herself, Kay isn't speaking to Benton because he kept Lucy's confidence about a health problem, Marino is whoring after anything with tits and has a love-hate relationship with both Kay and Lucy. The story held my interest, but it just wasn't her best. Also the evil Basil Jenrette, on whom the story appears to hang, has an almost non-existent role that fizzles out in the end. He can't even try to kill Kay and make it gripping. For Cornwell fans, this is a good read. If it's your first Cornwell book, go back and start at the beginning, when they seem to have had more substance.

I was going to read the next book, Book of the Dead, but all the negative reviews on Amazon.com made me decide it would be a waste of my time, since it seems to be even worse than this one. Sorry, Ms. Cornwell!

Dreadful book, as noted before books are getting progressively worse, this was #14, I have enjoyed the previous ones through #12 thinking that 13 was an one off . Still have all her books through 26. Hope I didn’t waste my money.