3☆
A very readable romp. You start and before you know it you're halfway through. I understand why these books are so popular but it's not really my kind of thing.

By far Cornwell's weakest effort. A glorified coroner finds herself at the center of a terrorist attempt to takeover a nuclear power plant. The murders are ancillary, the characters various tics and eccentricities come off as contrived, and the plot defies logic.

Invariably with almost every single detective crime series, bar Ian Rankin's Rebus, there comes a book in the series, where a shark is jumped, and to all purposes it looks like it was written to a deadline... and unfortunately this 7th book in the series has done it for Kay Scarpetta for me... despite some great ongoing story arcs, a superb supporting cast and some cool forensic investigations. Cultists! Nuclear Weapons! Libya! Dearie me! 2 out of 12.

Reread her first three books because they were free. I loved them in high school but I can tell you they don’t really hold up. The mysteries are fine but a lot of really painful homophobia.

One of the best so far!

A great writer always keeps the reader guessing from the beginning to the end and in this book Msg. Cornwell does this for sure.. Truly one of the best stories of the Kay Scarpetta books.

I have never imagined a Medical Examiner as a heroic partner with James Bond! So, Patricia Cornwell has filled in this startling gap of literary imagination by writing 'Cause of Death!', using her most famous and beloved female character as a mentor to us fans!

'Cause of Death' is a well-written spy mystery (what a shock!) and I thought it a little strange for Dr. Kay Scarpetta, Virginia ME, normally a superb murder-mystery maven, to be involved in a possible international case of terrorism. She always is an extraordinary superwoman scientific medical doctor, though, and I love this over-the-top series because of that fictionalized exaggeration of her as a character. So, improbable as the direction this #7 in the series seems to be leading Dr. Scarpetta, it is a fun read! I think the reader will enjoy this series better if it is read in order, though. Plus, the mystery genre fan trying this series should have a healthy tolerance for soap opera...

:' - i

This is my least favorite Scarpetta book so far. I've loved the tension and suspense, fast pace, interesting characters, serial killers, and interpersonal connections in the previous books. This had the Navy, religious zealots, nuclear power, a slower pace, not much connection between the characters and it bored me. I did learn that Scarpetta is left-handed and Weasley is getting a divorce so at least there was that.

The main character, Kay Scarpetta is chief medical examiner for the Commonwealth of Virginia. In this seventh in the series by Patricia Cornwell, she's covering for the Tidewater area ME and has to perform an autopsy on an AP reporter she liked. Finding out what killed him and why leads to several other deaths. Seems they're related to a cult and plutonium.

Scarpetta is an interesting character. She's mostly all business and deals with male antagonism routinely and impatiently. And she loves and is protective of her brilliant niece Lucy, now 23 and working for the FBI.

Traditional of Kay Scarpetta, she finds herself immersed in a case that is far from what it seems. Somehow a dead reporter results in her being in the middle of a power plant that involves radioactive material. I found this book to be a quick read, if not a bit slow starting out. But as usual, Cornwell does an amazing job painting a scene that makes you feel like you're watching a movie.

I have seen a few reviews that claim they're tired of Lucy and her whining, and I can agree that I wish she wasn't quite so dramatic, or that she wasn't so harsh with Kay. But maybe that's the part of me that wants everyone to be friends haha!

The thing I enjoy about the Kay Scarpetta books is that Cornwell makes Kay seem human, she puts her in these strange cases, but also makes her deal with personal issues. She's dealing with her cop partner, Marino who seems to want to kill himself off most days with unhealthy tendencies, but then tells her that he's scared to die. And then she is in the middle of a messy "relationship" with another partner, Wesley.

I give this one four stars simply because I'm not crazy about naval/military type story lines, but otherwise it is another good installment in the Scarpetta series which I am slowly finding my way through.

Here we go again...

I bought the whole series for a cheap deal (although it didn't end there since she writes a Scarpetta book per year!) and I intend to finish the series. I really do and I am not comfortable with my stupid ambition, because this is going nowhere.

The book itself might worth 2-stars, but in the series it was the weakest one so far. I like detective stories even though I'm not an eager follower, and I really like the forensic details in this series. Yet the very perfect Scarpetta knows everything, which enhances her unsympathetic character let alone the incredibility of the story. I pictured her different this time and my version of Scarpetta is much better.

Personality development is essential in books, but here it goes way too far, covering the action and aim of a detective story. Because of the personal ups and downs of the characters, the drama takes its toll and nothing left for the murders to be solved. Not to even mention the "template" Cornwell is using: same old thing in every book; someone close to Scarpetta gets killed and Scarpetta saves the world again!

The book is a page turner, has an easy language, but boring. The end of the book was one of the worst endings I've ever read. I thought some pages were missing because of the abrupt end.

I think this New-Zionist stuff was too much in sight in the late 90s, so Cornwell just wanted to use them in her book and she didn't have anyone to talk about her lesbianism, therefore she just wanted to communicate about her personal rights through troubled characters.

I only hope that Lucy and Scarpetta are going to be more lovable so that I can stand the same old template, but after seven books, I feel nothing but dissapointed.

PS: The age correlation between Lucy and Kay is giving me a headache.

Morts en eaux troubles s’insinue lentement, comme une brume froide qui rampe sur l’eau, jusqu’à ce que vous réalisiez qu’il est trop tard pour faire marche arrière. Patricia Cornwell n’écrit pas seulement des thrillers ; elle construit des labyrinthes où chaque virage cache un nouveau piège, et où la lumière est plus menaçante que l’obscurité.

Dès les premières pages, le lecteur est immergé dans un décor oppressant, quelque part entre l’écho métallique d’un chantier naval déserté et les eaux sombres de l’Elizabeth River, où flotte un corps comme un avertissement. Ce n’est pas qu’un simple cadavre : c’est le point de départ d’une descente méthodique vers ce que l’être humain peut cacher de plus inavouable. Kay Scarpetta, médecin légiste, ne se contente pas de disséquer des corps. Elle dissèque le mensonge, le pouvoir, la peur. Son regard ne se détourne jamais, même face à l’horreur, et c’est là que Cornwell frappe fort : elle nous oblige à regarder, à rester là, figés, pendant qu’elle soulève le voile, couche après couche.


Scarpetta n’est pas l’héroïne parfaite et lisse qu’on pourrait attendre d’un roman policier. Elle est trop humaine pour ça. C’est une femme qui vacille, qui doute, qui tente de maintenir l’équilibre sur le fil fragile de la rationalité alors que tout autour d’elle menace de s’effondrer. Sa solitude est palpable, presque un personnage à part entière. Chaque décision qu’elle prend, chaque confrontation, résonne d’une tension sourde, parce que Cornwell sait que le véritable suspense ne naît pas seulement des indices qu’on accumule, mais des failles qu’on dévoile.


L’enquête, en apparence une simple noyade suspecte, se transforme en un écheveau complexe où se croisent les ombres de la corruption militaire, des manipulations politiques et des menaces invisibles que la technologie fait planer sur nos vies. Ce n’est pas un roman sur la mort ; c’est un roman sur ce qui survit après la mort, sur les secrets qui s’accrochent, sur la vérité qui refuse de couler à pic. Cornwell excelle à tisser ce climat de paranoïa sourde, où le danger n’est pas forcément là où on le croit. Chaque dialogue est un duel, chaque regard un soupçon.


Son écriture est précise, presque chirurgicale, mais jamais froide. Sous la surface clinique des descriptions médico-légales, il y a une tension nerveuse, un battement de cœur qui s’accélère. Les scènes d’autopsie ne sont pas gratuites ; elles sont des rituels de vérité, des moments où le corps refuse de mentir, même quand tout le reste s’y efforce. Cornwell ne cherche pas à rassurer son lecteur. Elle gratte, elle creuse, jusqu’à ce qu’il ne reste plus rien d’autre que l’inconfort de ce qu’on a découvert.

Morts en eaux troubles n’est pas un livre qui se lit à la légère. C’est un roman qui s’impose, qui s’ancre en vous comme une écharde invisible, avec cette sensation persistante que même une fois refermé, il continue de respirer quelque part, juste au coin de votre esprit. Cornwell n’écrit pas pour distraire. Elle écrit pour déranger, pour questionner, pour rappeler que sous la surface des eaux les plus calmes, il y a toujours quelque chose qui attend.

Benjamin L. Urbanski – Le Parfum des Mots

5 février 2025