As usual, the dead are just more interesting than the living. Something to look forward to.
Another 15 rounds for Virginia chief medical examiner Dr. Kay Scarpetta and her well-placed enemies past and present.
Why is her old law school roommate, Judge Annie Chilton, allowing Alexandria’s Commonwealth’s Attorney Bose Flagler to beat up Scarpetta on the witness stand? Normally the state’s CME would be on the prosecutor’s side, but this time Scarpetta is determined to testify that her predecessor, the late Dr. Bailey Carter, who had rapid-onset dementia, mistakenly called beauty queen April Tupelo’s drowning murder, leading to the arrest of her live-in Romeo, Gilbert Hooke. Even so, Chilton’s rulings seem consistently heedless of Scarpetta’s formidable reputation and personal feelings, as if the judge were distracted by something. Maybe she’s having previsions about her sister, CIA press secretary Rachael Stanwyck, who’s soon found dead in the kitchen of the judge’s family estate, rendering the introductory case moot to everyone but the protesters who attack Scarpetta, bellowing “JUSTICE FOR APRIL!” and providing the media with more anti-Scarpetta grist. Certainly Cornwell seems to forget about it in her eagerness to linger over the diabolical, state-of-the-art murder weapon by which the judge’s sister met her doom and to evoke the endless infighting among Scarpetta, her nemesis, Virginia health commissioner Dr. Elvin Reddy, and his minions. A second (or is it a third?) murder provides the basis for more of the post-mortem set pieces that make fans of this long-running series salivate, and it’s especially gratifying to see Scarpetta wring important evidence from a dust bunny. But the forensics mean more to Cornwell than the suspects, and the ideal reader of this installment won’t care any more than she does whodunit.
As usual, the dead are just more interesting than the living. Something to look forward to.Pub Date: Oct. 25, 2022
ISBN: 978-1-5387-2516-0
Page Count: 400
Publisher: Grand Central Publishing
Review Posted Online: Aug. 30, 2022
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 15, 2022
BOOK TO SCREEN
BOOK TO SCREEN
Gleefully sadistic, gloriously gratifying revenge fiction.
A frustrated advice columnist takes matters into her own hands.
Before dropping out of MIT during the second semester of her sophomore year, Debbie Mullen had designs on becoming the next Bill Gates. Now, almost 30 years later, the stay-at-home wife and mother of two uses her considerable genius to keep the Mullens’ Hingham, Massachusetts, household functioning “like a well-oiled machine.” In her spare time, Debbie also gardens and shares “the fruits of [her] wisdom” with neighbors via the weekly advice column she writes for Hingham Household, a local “family-oriented” newspaper. Though Debbie is proud of her husband and teen daughters’ accomplishments, her own life sometimes feels a bit empty. As such, she’s both honored and excited when Home Gardening magazine selects her backyard to feature in their next issue. Then, at the last minute, the publication decides to go in a different direction and instead spotlights the roses of her arch rival. Later that day, the editor-in-chief of Hingham Household axes her column because she’d counseled a reader to get a divorce. That evening, Debbie learns that her hard-working husband’s miserly boss refused his promotion request, her brilliant older daughter’s sketchy boyfriend broke her heart, and her athletically gifted younger daughter’s chauvinistic coach cut her from the soccer team for being “chubby.” Enough is enough. Debbie has always given great advice—everybody says so. If certain individuals don’t know what’s best for themselves, maybe it’s her obligation to help them see the light. Increasingly unhinged entries from a “Dear Debbie” drafts folder pepper the briskly paced, meticulously crafted tale, which unfolds courtesy of a pinwheeling first-person narrative. Some of the plot’s myriad twists are more impressive than others, but plucky, puckish Debbie is a nontraditional antihero for the ages.
Gleefully sadistic, gloriously gratifying revenge fiction.Pub Date: Jan. 27, 2026
ISBN: 9781464249624
Page Count: 336
Publisher: Poisoned Pen
Review Posted Online: Dec. 10, 2025
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 15, 2026
A dark and twisty look at just how far one woman is willing to go to find inspiration.
A struggling writer finds an unexpected muse when a mysterious man shows up at her cabin.
Petra Rose used to pump out a bestselling book every six months, but then the adaptation happened—that is, the disastrous film adaptation of her most famous book. The movie changed the book’s storyline so egregiously that fans couldn’t forgive her, and the ensuing harassment sent Petra into hiding and gave her a serious case of writer’s block. Petra’s one hope is her solo writing retreat at a remote cabin, where she can escape the distractions of real life and focus on her next book, a story about a woman having an affair with a cop. When officer Nathaniel Saint shows up at her cabin door, inspiration comes flooding back. Much like the character from Petra’s book, Saint is married, and he’s willing to be Petra’s muse, helping her get into her characters’ heads. Petra’s book is practically writing itself, but is the game she’s playing a little too dangerous? Does she know when to stop—and, more importantly, is Saint willing to stop? Hoover is no stranger to controversial movie adaptations and internet backlash, but she clarifies in a note to readers that she’s “just a writer writing about a writer” and that no further connections to her own life are contained in these pages—which is a good thing, because the book takes some horrifying twists and turns. Petra finds herself inexplicably attracted to Saint, even as she describes him as “such an asshole,” and her feelings for him veer between love and hate. The novel serves as a meta commentary on the dark romance genre—as Petra puts it, “Even though, as readers, we wouldn’t want to live out some of the fantasies we read about, it doesn’t mean we don’t enjoy reading those things.”
A dark and twisty look at just how far one woman is willing to go to find inspiration.Pub Date: Jan. 13, 2026
ISBN: 9781662539374
Page Count: -
Publisher: Montlake
Review Posted Online: Sept. 27, 2025
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Nov. 1, 2025
© Copyright 2026 Kirkus Media LLC. All Rights Reserved.
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