Forensic Mysteries

When she fell asleep, the world was doomed. When she awoke, it was dead. In the wake of a fever that decimated the earth's population - killing women and children and making childbirth deadly for the mother and infant - the midwife must pick her way through the bones of the world she once knew to find her place in this dangerous new one. Gone are the pillars of civilization. All that remains is power - and the strong who possess it.

Chief medical examiner Kay Scarpetta is the reluctant star witness in a sensational murder trial when she receives shocking news. The judge’s sister has been found dead. At first glance, it appears to be a home invasion, but then why was nothing stolen, and why is the garden strewn with dead plants and insects? Although there is no apparent cause of death, Scarpetta recognizes telltale signs of the unthinkable, and she knows the worst is yet to come. The forensic pathologist finds herself pitted against a powerful force that returns her to the past.

Forensic pathologist Dr. Kay Scarpetta has come almost full circle, returning to Virginia, the state where she launched her storied career, as the chief medical examiner. Finding herself the new girl in town once again after being away for many years, she’s inherited both an overbearing secretary and a legacy of neglect and potential corruption.

From the depths of the Indian Ocean, a horrific plague has arisen to devastate humankind - a disease that's unknown, unstoppable, and deadly. But it is merely a harbinger of the doom that is to follow. Aboard a cruise liner transformed into a makeshift hospital, Dr. Lisa Cummings and Monk Kokkalis, operatives of SIGMA Force, search for answers to the bizarre affliction. But there are others with far less altruistic intentions.

Dr. Morton Handler practiced a strange brand of psychiatry. Among his specialties were fraud, extortion, and sexual manipulation. Handler paid for his sins when he was brutally murdered in his luxurious Pacific Palisades apartment. The police have no leads, but they do have one possible witness: seven-year-old Melody Quinn.

Dr. Katheryn Newton has dedicated her brilliant mind to groundbreaking medical research. She’s attempting to save lives and hoping to start a family when a catastrophic twist turns her world upside down. Suddenly, Kate finds herself with the power to invisibly end any life. Within hours, Kate is caught in a moral conundrum and trapped in a web of deception. She fights on, fiercely determined to help her country and the planet, but it’s tough when doing good means being bad—and dangerous when someone knows your secret.

You will have ninety minutes to solve the murder. A startling declaration by a new Harvard instructor: sixty-seven-year-old Frances Glessner Lee. It’s 1945. Before her, six wary male students given to assumptions—especially when it comes to women without a formal education—are challenged to solve a real-life whodunit using Mrs. Lee’s creation, the crime scene diorama. Every detail is accurate. And every detail matters when solving a crime with no survivors…

Someone is stalking the UCLA Medical Center - a depraved madman who is preying upon the staff, particularly those who are young and female. No stranger to the terrible ravages of senseless violence, E.R. Chief Dr. David Spier must keep the emergency room running smoothly and efficiently, even as his terrified co-workers wonder who will be the next victim. But when the monster himself is dragged into the E.R. in handcuffs - hideously burned, suffering, and begging for mercy - the nightmare is far from over. It has only just begun.

In this quick-hitting thriller set in Baltimore, during the waning years of the Cold War, Lussi Sim, a Norwegian physician, is the medical director of a newborn intensive care unit. Lussi had practiced pediatrics near her parents in Oslo until her father suffered a stroke. Growing up, Lussi experienced chronic mental trauma in the self-assigned role of her mother’s bodyguard. Ironically, her father’s stroke removed the physical threat to her mother and enabled Lussi to pursue her long-suppressed goal to train as a newborn intensive care subspecialist in the United States.

New York Times best-selling author Kathy Reichs returns with her 16th riveting novel featuring forensic anthropologist Tempe Brennan, whose examination of a young girl killed in a hit and run in North Carolina triggers an investigation into international human trafficking. When Charlotte police discover the body of a teenage girl along a desolate stretch of two-lane highway, Temperance Brennan fears the worst.

New Orleans has been quarantined, an unknown virus sweeping the city, killing 100 percent of those infected. The Center for Disease Control, desperate to find a cure, is approached by BioDyne Pharma who reveal a former employee has turned a cutting-edge medical treatment capable of targeting specific genetic sequences into a weapon, and released it.

The study of twins and the genetics of aggression totally consumes research scientist Jeannie Ferrami. An accomplished and headstrong researcher, Jeannie has developed a sophisticated software program to identify identical twins reared apart. But Jeannie's breakthrough project is threatened by the appearance of a sudden impossibility - identical twins born weeks apart to different mothers at separate locations.

Dr. Theo Cray has a legendary mathematical knack for catching serial killers. Until his exposure to a mind-altering pathogen knocks him off his game. It has upended an investigation, destroyed his reputation, and left him to question his own sanity. One person still trusts him to finish the job. His former professor Amanda Paulson is helping point Cray down a logical path to his prey: a nomadic health-care worker whose murder spree stretches back decades and whose victims number in the hundreds.

Not too long from today, a new, highly contagious virus makes its way across the globe. Most who get sick experience nothing worse than flu, fever, and headaches. But for the unlucky one percent - and nearly five million souls in the United States alone - the disease causes "Lock In": Victims fully awake and aware, but unable to move or respond to stimulus. The disease affects young, old, rich, poor, people of every color and creed. The world changes to meet the challenge.

It is a case unlike any psychologist Dr. Alex Delaware has ever encountered. Five-year-old Woody Swope is ill, but the real problem is his parents. They refuse to agree to the one treatment that could save this boy's life. Alex sets out to convince Mr. and Mrs. Swope - only to find that the parents have left the hospital and taken their son with them. Worse, the sleazy motel room where the Swopes were staying is empty - except for the ominous bloodstain. The Swopes and their son have vanished into the sordid shadows of the city.

It's New Year's Eve, the final night of Virginia's bloodiest year since the Civil War, and another poor soul has turned up dead. Ted Eddings, a scuba diver and investigative reporter who was a favorite at the medical examiner's office, is found 30 feet below the Elizabeth River's icy surface. Kay Scarpetta, chief medical examiner for the state of Virginia, can't help but wonder why she received a phone call from someone reporting the death before the police were notified.

Step back into the gaslit alleys of Victorian London, where a shadow known only as Jack the Ripper unleashed a reign of terror that haunts us to this day. In the autumn of 1888, the impoverished district of Whitechapel became the hunting ground for a phantom. A series of brutal, ritualistic murders of destitute women exposed the dark underbelly of the world's wealthiest empire and launched one of the most intense and frustrating manhunts in history. The killer was never caught, leaving behind a terrifying legend and a perfect, unsolved mystery. This meticulously researched book cuts through...

Boston homicide detective Jane Rizzoli and medical examiner Maura Isles are plagued by what seems like a completely senseless murder. Sofia Suarez, a widow and nurse who was universally liked by all her neighbors, lies bludgeoned to death in her own home. But anything can happen behind closed doors, and Sofia seemed to have plenty of secrets in her last days, making covert phone calls to old contacts and traceless burner phones. When Jane finally makes a connection between Sofia and the victim of a hit-and-run months earlier, the case only grows more blurry.

This collection contains books four to six in the gripping, fast-paced crime fiction series featuring DCI Whitney Walker and forensic psychologist Dr Georgina Cavendish: Lethal Secret, Last Breath, and Final Verdict.

Fans of Stephen King and Joe Hill that like to listen to audiobooks like The Bird Box and The Haunting and can't get enough stories about serial killers are going to enjoy listening to The Asylum Confessions. The majority of these killers are expert manipulators. I realize they could be playing me and messing with my head. It's a chance I'm willing to take. And now...they might just be playing with yours too.