The Body Farm (Paperback)

Kay Scarpetta, medical examiner and noted forensic pathologist, is called in by the North Carolina authorities, After an initial review, she believes that the murder may have been commited by serial killer, Temple Gault. Long known to the FBI, He has managed to elude capture and remains at large. More careful review of the forensic evidence, however, leaves her with unanswered question that initially puzzle her. As she endeavors to untangle these strange and tantalizing clues, she realizes that they begin to point away from Gault and in a direction more horrifying than anyone ever imagined.

Meanwhile, Dr. Scarpetta must contend with other issues closer to home. Her troubled niece, Lucy, an intern at the FBI facility at Quantico, becomes enmeshed in a legal controversy that threatens to derail her future employment hopes. Scarpetta's long time associate and homicide detective, Pete Marino, may have bitten off more than he could chew and has personally gotten involved with Emily Steiner's mother. Meanwhile, Dr. Scarpetta, herself, is undergoing a certain amount of personal angst over the sexual tension that is building between her and married FBI agent, Benton Wesley. All these personal concerns overlay her investigation for Emily Steiner's killer.

The forensic questions that arise from Emily's murder lead Dr. Scarpetta to "The Body Farm", a secret research facility in Tennessee, where some of the answers to her questions may be found. It is the forensic clues and their analysis by Dr. Scarpetta that provide the most interesting aspects of the book. All in all, It is another excellent addition to the Kay Scarpetta series and well worth reading.

**Possible Spoilers**

Firstly again Scarpetta has undergone a major personal change since the last book that doesn't seem to be totally covered. At the end of the previous book, Cruel and Unusual, she was planning to work more closely with FBI Profiler Benton Wesley and then this books starts with her not only working with him but embarking on an affair with him also. Whilst I don't question the possibility of this happening it would have been nice to have had longer to see the relationship develop, not see them jump into bed in the opening chapters. Secondly the book centres on the happenings of Lucy, Dr Scarpetta's niece, who was never my favourite character in the books. Whilst trying to explain Lucy's insecurities and anger at her own mother I've always found her character comes over as spoilt and ungrateful rather than sad and tragic. At first I was dreading reading so much about her, but actually by the time of finishing the book I have warmed slightly to her character, not least because the books describes the first face to face meeting of Dr Kay and Lucy's mother, her sister, Dorothy. A wonderful self-centred bitchy character that is great fun to read.

The actually "thriller" storyline in the book is good, but again not maybe as good as some of those that have gone before. Scarpetta, who is forever reminding everyone else that evidence and proof is needed to suspect someone of a crime, seems to leap on the eventual suspect in this murder very early on and pursues her on what seemed to me to be very flimsy clues.

Not the strongest book in the series, but I will definitely return for more.