Audio version: 3 to 3.5 stars - #7 in Dr. Kay Scarpetta series

I started off really liking this series, but the more I've read (esp. several back-to-back in a short time), I've become more frustrated or disappointed in several of them, including this one. The audio might have magnified it some. I'm not sure if KS was written a little harsher in this one or if some of that was the audio's narrator. I've read most of the others prior to this & the one audio had a different narrator, which was a much better KS. I started off liking this one just b/c setting was a little different and finally not about Gault/Grethen as the 3 previously installments were, and for me it was getting old. However, not only did I begin to lose interest in the plot, but the sub-plot was so repetitive of several previous installments--KS still worrying about Lucy & complaining to anyone, including bosses, who would listen; someone else in law enforcement being crooked but turning it around & either making her look bad or outright accusing her; one of her staff being killed; all four main characters, despite different careers/orgs, miraculously all being assigned or working on same case, investigation or operation. Then it abruptly ended w/little to no wrap-up which is pretty unusual for this author/series so maybe was trying something different or she was as ready as I was for it to be over. There are still some positives esp. considering when they were written & published. I hope some of the newer installments are better and fresher.

CAUSE OF DEATH - Okay
Cornwell, Patricia

An investigative reporter is found dead in Virginia's icy waters ... New Year's Eve and the final murder scene of Virginia's bloodiest year takes Scarpetta thirty feet below the Elizabeth River's icy surface. A diver, Ted Eddings, is dead, an investigative reporter who was a favourite at the Medical Examiner's office. Was Eddings probing the frigid depths of the Inactive Shipyard for a story, or simply diving for sunken trinkets? And why did Scarpetta receive a phone call from someone reporting the death before the police were notified? The case envelops Scarpetta, her niece Lucy, and police captain Pete Marino in a world where both cutting-edge technology and old-fashioned detective work are critical offensive weapons. Together they follow the trail of death to a well of violence as dark and forbidding as water that swirled over Ted Eddings.

Better than the last two but only okay. Go to paperback for future books.

Scarpetta is covering an area called Tideswater for one of her subordinates who is away tending a sick relative, when she receives a call about a body which has been found in the Elizabeth River, near some decommissioned navy ships. The caller leaves their name & number & rings off but shortly after, Scarpetta receives a second call about the same body. When she queries this, the caller says that as far as they are aware no-one else has called, & the name & number left turn out to be bogus.

On site, most personnel there are strangely hostile when Scarpetta insists on retrieving the body herself. Changing into diving gear (she's a certified diver, naturally), she locates the body who turns out to be a journalist she is familiar with, Ted Eddings. The autopsy confirms that Eddings didn't drown but was poisoned with cyanide gas. What follows is a slightly meandering story incorporating a religious cult & the takeover of a nuclear power facility.

This isn't the usual style of plot for Cornwell & it's okay but not as page-turning. It’s also not as tightly plotted as most of the previous books, but the main problem is Scarpetta herself. First of all she really needs to back off when it comes to niece Lucy - Lucy is no longer ten years old, she's an FBI agent & Scarpetta needs to let her do her job instead of trying to shield her all the time. No wonder Lucy gets irritated with her aunt at times. Secondly, Scarpetta finds out Benton is separating from his wife but didn't tell her himself so she is mad at Benton for not telling her (understandable), mad at him for leaving his wife (huh?), & mad at him because he wants to keep distance between them whilst his divorce is happening. He literally cannot do right for doing wrong. Scarpetta needs to take a holiday & chill.

3.5 stars (rounded up)

These books are getting harder and harder to read. My dad was in the FBI at Quantico and a person like Lucy, with all her emotional problems, would never be hired no matter how brilliant she was. I also lived in Richmond, VA for years and found that some of the characterizations of the area to not be well done. All this personal angst is getting in the way of the plot. Corwell's earliest books used to be about the crime and it's solution and were incredibly interesting, but she has gotten to the point where every returning character has a neurosis and none of them can put aside their personal problems and solve the crime.