Forensic Mystery Fiction

When Dr. Alex Taylor opens her eyes, she is hooked up to an IV, is bound to an operating table, and her legs are raised in stirrups. Disoriented and alarmed, she assumes she's been anesthetized and brought to surgery after being in an accident. But the man standing over her is no doctor she recognizes at the hospital where she works as a successful and respected doctor. He’s a stranger - and he’s calmly and methodically telling her how he's about to attack her. Before Alex can even scream for help, she succumbs to another dose of anesthesia, rendering her unable to defend herself.

Superintendent of Nurses Julia Stimson must recruit 64 nurses to relieve the battle-worn British, months before American troops are ready to be deployed. She knows the young nurses serving near the front lines will face a challenging situation, but nothing could have prepared her for the difficulties that await when they arrive at British Base Hospital 12 in Rouen, France. The primitive conditions, a convoluted supply system, and horrific battle wounds are enough to discourage the most hardened nurses, and Julia can do nothing but lead by example.

Her body floats. A bloated thing half atop the river. Naked. Pale. Mouth and eyes open wide. When two fishermen discover a corpse floating in the Clackamas river, profiler Violet Darger heads to rural Oregon to hunt another serial killer. What she discovers in the woods might change the course of her life. What secrets does the water conceal? The girl in the water marks the third such case in the area - all drowned with superficial stab wounds and discovered in a body of water - and Darger feels certain she won't be the last. The corpses are badly decomposed.

A successful entrepreneur in the mushroom industry, Jaakko Kaunismaa is a man in his prime. At just 37 years of age, he is shocked when his doctor tells him that he's dying. What is more, the cause is discovered to be prolonged exposure to toxins; in other words, someone has slowly but surely been poisoning him. Determined to find out who wants him dead, Jaakko embarks on a suspenseful roller-coaster journey full of unusual characters, bizarre situations and unexpected twists.

Rick Hayden's brother, Keith, a prominent zoologist at NYU, walks out of his office one day and disappears. The only clue they have are his brother's book, which mentions "the God Gene". A million or so years ago, a gene designated hsa-mir-3998 appeared as if by magic from the junk DNA of the hominids who eventually evolved into Homo sapiens. It became a key player in brain development - specifically creativity - and laymen started calling it "the God Gene".

While the federal government is launching a national investigation on the “equity” of organ distribution, a female tech CEO flies across country to get a liver transplant. Soon, well-respected transplant nurse Sarah Golden and her best friend, Jackie, find themselves tangled up in an intense plot to uncover the answer to the question on everyone’s mind: Can you buy your way up to the top of the waiting list?

The job presented to forensic genealogist, Morton Farrier, ought to have been simple and easy. But the surprise discovery of an additional marriage to his client’s father leads Morton on an enquiry, revolving around a mysterious death in the county asylum. Requiring his various investigative genealogical skills, Morton must work to unravel this complex 80-year-old secret and finally reveal the truth to his client.

There’s a body crushed under a load of pipes on a San Francisco construction site, and medical examiner Dr. Jessie Teska is on call. So it’s her job to figure out who it is - and her headache when the autopsy reveals that the death is a homicide staged as an accident. Jessie is hot on the murderer’s trail, then an earthquake sends her and her whole city reeling. When the dust clears, her case has fallen apart and an innocent man is being framed. Jessie knows she’s the only one who can prove it, and she races to piece together the truth.

When Dr. Tom More (of Love in the Ruins) is released on parole from state prison, he returns to Feliciana, Louisiana, the parish where he was born and bred, and where he practiced psychiatry before his arrest. Upon arriving, he notices something strange in almost everyone around him: unusual sexual behavior in women patients, a bizarre loss of inhibition, a lack of complexity in speech - even his own wife’s extraordinary success at bridge tournaments, during which her mind seems to function like a computer.

Lou Welcome, from Palmer's bestselling Oath of Office, is back in this heart stopping medical thriller. A desperate phone call embroils Lou in scandal and murder involving Dr. Gary McHugh, known around the Capital as the "society doc." Lou has been supervising McHugh, formerly a black-out drinker, through his work with the Physician Wellness Office. McHugh has been very cavalier about his recovery, barely attending AA and refusing a sponsor. But Lou sees progress, and the two men are becoming friends.

The two crime experts are enlisted by legendary rock star Billy Diamond to find his missing daughter. A level-headed student at Yale, Devon left six months earlier with her boyfriend, Carlos, for a career development retreat in Nevada. Her calls and notes became less frequent until they stopped. Billy wanted to give his daughter space—but after learning Carlos' body was found a few miles upstream from the ranch, he needs answers.

Dr. Kate Turner is happy with her new life in Oak Falls in upstate New York. Working as a relief veterinarian at a small house-call practice, she truly enjoys helping her patients. All that changes when client Claire Birnham is found dead, an apparent suicide. A talented artist, Claire had everything to live for: a new job; a Manhattan apartment; her cairn terrier, Toto. As feisty as the Wizard of Oz's Toto, he and Claire were devoted to each other. Kate can't imagine Claire simply abandoning her pet. Was her death murder?

Ex-cop Jacqueline "Jack" Daniels, ex-criminal Phineas Troutt, and ex-private eye Harry McGlade are all healing after a near-fatal encounter. But it's tough to mend when there's a serial killer prowling the halls at night, draining patients of their blood.

Forensic geologists Cassie Oldfield and Walter Shaws investigate one way: trouble on the canyon's Colorado River. Stranded raft. Life vests unused. Rafters missing. The only clue to the fate of the rafters is a bag of pebbles caught in the bowline. Following that clue, the geologists uncover a hellish scheme. Not only are the rafters in peril, but the river itself is under attack. The race to stop it takes Cassie and Walter deep into the canyon, and onto the mighty river, putting their own survival at stake.

Temperance Brennan, forensic anthropologist for both North Carolina and Quebec, has come from Charlotte to Montreal during the bleak days of December to testify as an expert witness at a murder trial. She should be going over her notes, but instead she's digging in the basement of a pizza parlor. Not fun. Freezing cold. Crawling rats. And now, the skeletonized remains of three young women. How did they get there? When did they die?

Eleri wanted a different kind of case. She should have been careful what she wished for. When an odd human skeleton in Michigan’s Manistee-Huron National Forest triggers a NightShade investigation, Eleri and Donovan arrive to find it missing. But two other skeletons are a little too easily uncovered—each displays different anomalies that raise alarming questions. The bones aren’t from the area or probably even the continent. A decades-old abandoned building doesn’t register on satellite images.

Written with the riveting authenticity that only world-classic forensic anthropologist Kathy Reichs can provide, Fatal Voyage pairs witty, elegant prose with pulse-pounding storytelling in a tour de force worthy of crime writing's new superstar.

Eisenmenger has reluctantly taken a job as a locum in the pathology department of St Christopher's Hospital - his partner Helena is pregnant and they must prepare financially for the baby's arrival. John doesn't relish the prospect of being back on the treadmill, working within the NHS again, but when he is unwilling to accept his boss' "death from natural causes" diagnosis after autopsies on various bodies, his professional suspicions are piqued.

In Los Angeles, FBI counterterrorism agent Quinn Traynor receives an urgent call from CDC agent Madeline Hamilton. She’s discovered the first victim of a lethal, unfamiliar virus. Their joint investigation uncovers an imminent bio-terror attack, and their only hope is to identify the terrorists carrying the disease. With just two days remaining before it’s too late, the FBI and the CDC race to prevent a pandemic. The ensuing nightmare will hit closer to home than they ever anticipated, and one of them will pay an unimaginable price for protecting the country.

When her elderly patients start dying at home days after minor surgery, anesthesiologist Dr. Kate Downey wants to know why. The surgeon, not so much. “Old people die, that’s what they do,” is his response. When Kate presses, surgeon Charles Ricken places the blame squarely on her shoulders. Kate is currently on probation, and the chief of staff sides with the surgeon, leaving Kate to prove her innocence and save her own career. With her husband in a prolonged coma, it’s all she has left.