*This review will contain spoilers*
This is my first time reading the third installment in the Kay Scarpetta series, so this review is not clouded with any prior judgments as my previous two reviews may have been.
The novel starts with the phone ringing at Kay Scarpetta's house on a beautiful August morning. It's Detective Marino, calling to inform her that a fifth couple have gone missing, expected dead. Over the past two and a half years, four couples have gone missing and have been found dead months later - discovered by hunters in the woods, when their bodies have already partially skeletonised and almost completely decomposed. Due to this, Kay has had to write off the cause of death as inconclusive on all eight of the bodies, so with this fifth couple she goes in all guns blazing. However, it's not as simple as that, because Deborah - the missing female - is the daughter of Pat Harvey, the National Drug Policy Director and one of the most powerful women in the United States.
Due to Pat's high position and personal interest, she interferes in the case regularly, putting Kay in a terrible position by begging her for more information about her daughter's death. Kay hides away from all press, ignoring everyone's phone calls, while Pat gets more riled up about feeling stonewalled. After her daughter's body is discovered and no one will inform her of the cause of death, she makes a damning press conference announcement - she believes the serial killer is a member of the CIA, and the CIA and the FBI have taken it upon themselves to cover up the crimes and protect their own.
As time goes on and the case looks less and less likely to be solved, Kay gets suspicious of everyone around her: well, apart from Marino. Benton Wesley has been ignoring her calls and withholding evidence from her - such as the discovery of playing cards at each of the crime scenes, leading to the belief that the killings are military related - so she appears at his house to sit him down and get information about him, awkwardly turning up at the same time as he's receiving a visit from her ex, Mark James.
Meanwhile, Kay discovers a cold case from eight years ago - the double-murder of two students, Elizabeth and Jill. The murders are near identical: the shoes and socks are missing from the victims, while their cars were discovered abandoned miles away from their bodies. There were no playing cards at the scene of the crime, but the injuries were all mostly flesh wounds, meaning that the cause of death could also match. But how does a one off murder from eight years ago link with a series of murders still occurring now?
Furthermore, on top of all that's already going on, Abby Turnball, the spunky reporter from 'Postmortem', gets back in touch, as she's writing an article series about the killings and needs to interview some people in Richmond, so it's a great excuse to see her old friend Kay. Abby believes the FBI have been following her - getting a tail on her, tapping her phone lines and hacking in to her computer - to discover what information she may have unearthed about the crimes. Due to Abby's paranoia and increasingly erratic behaviour, she has been fired from her elusive position as police reporter at The New York Times, causing her to move in with Kay temporarily while she attempts to get her life back on track.
One night, after Abby and Kay go out for a meal together, they get asked for directions by a suspicious man in a dark car, and partly due to Abby's paranoia they write down the license plate number. Things don't add up - the plates are for a dark brown car, but the car that they were approached by was most definitely charcoal grey. After tracking down the owner of the dark brown car, it's revealed that the plates were switched, making the grey cars behaviour even more confusing. Kay is determined to find the car again and, after retracing their steps for the best part of a day, they find the car and the driver - a Steven Spurrier. Spurrier has a clean record: he was discharged from the navy after four months due to the death of his father, and has owned a little bookshop ever since. There's no reason to suspect that he would be the killer, but due to his unusual nighttime behaviour and the fact that two of his victims could have been patrons of his store, things escalate rather quickly over the last fifty pages of the novel, culminating in two deaths and a near fatal gunshot wound.
Evidence:
In the previous two Kay Scarpetta novels, I've had two major complaints: 1) that we don't get to interact with the killers and 2) the killers always end up dead. Thankfully, 'All That Remains' veers away from the first rule, even if the second rule is still holding fast at this point in time. Because Kay and Abby stumble across Spurrier (which is a tad contrived, but believable enough if the guy has been cruising round looking for couples for nearly a decade) we get to experience the frustration of the team as they attempt to find evidence that he's the killer and are left disappointed again and again because of how careful the guy is. Yes, it was irritating that they couldn't find anything to link him solidly to all of the couples being murdered, but it felt more realistic because of that - you hear all the time about police having a main suspect but being able to pin the crime to them successfully.
Because of this, I thought the last fifty to one hundred pages were absolutely flawless. There wasn't too much going on, the investigation was focused and it was narrowed down completely.
The same cannot be said for the rest of the story though. Because Kay has no idea on the cause of death, it's up in the air for a long time - could it be strangulation? Stabbing? Or could all of the couples be drug addicts, meeting up with dealers for their next fix and taking a bad batch? There's too many possibilities, too many different scenarios discussed, and it feels as though we're being drowned in a thousand plot choices as though this was a choose your own adventure. I understand that cases often get like this: there will be a favourite suspicion or theory, but there will also be the less likely ones that still merit discussion. That's okay in real life, but in a novel it just feels like a bit too much.
There were some things that I appreciated. Bringing in intuit/psychic Hilda Ozimek brought an extremely different element to the novel, and the fact that they didn't have her giving solid answers about the cases meant that it didn't feel like a get out of jail free card from Patricia. She knew where her story was going, so had the sense of mind to allude to it rather than giving any solid answers - this scene really kept the audience on its toes, and I wish it could have been longer.
I loved the reappearance of Abby! She's one of the more exciting minor characters, and her friendship with Kay (exemplified beautifully in their detective moments) is heart-warming and inspiring, making me want to meet up with friends and make the most of life. Towards the end of the novel she definitely starts to focus too much on her career, as she gets withdrawn from life and makes really stupid decisions, which disappoints me. I wasn't shocked by her death, because I think any character that gets close to Kay is going to be in danger, but I was surprised by the fact that she willingly visited a suspected murderer's house alone - she's been a reporter for the majority of her life and should have known that it wasn't worth the risk.
The reappearance of Mark was also nice, but it was bittersweet that they had separated in the time that passed between 'Body of Evidence' and this installment. Kay and Mark still obviously love each other, but because of how busy Kay was with this case the relationship wasn't explored as much as it potentially could have been. This is a brilliant thing: instead of trying to make every book have a strong romance storyline in it, the fact that Mark popped in and popped out again was reminiscent to real life, because people do have a lot more important things going on than worrying about fixing a romance. I wouldn't mind if he reappeared in more of the future novels, because I think the dynamic between them is brilliantly written and not at all irritating (as it can be with some, if not most, couples in crime novels).
The development of Marino's character? Flawless! Getting him to open up about the demise of his thirty year marriage - to a plump, yet seemingly pleasant, woman called Doris - was touching, as we haven't seen any of his personal life in any part of the start of the series. The scene between him and Kay, in which Kay is attempting to lecture him to get his life back on track, is extremely easy to relate to - we all have friends that we want to tell to pull themselves together, and it's a testament to how strong their personal relationship is that Marino puts up with her completely tearing him apart. It'll be interesting to see whether Marino and Doris restore their relationship in future novels, or whether we'll get to see Marino attempting to play the dating game for the first time in three decades.
Verdict:
This is my first time reading the third installment in the Kay Scarpetta series, so this review is not clouded with any prior judgments as my previous two reviews may have been.
The novel starts with the phone ringing at Kay Scarpetta's house on a beautiful August morning. It's Detective Marino, calling to inform her that a fifth couple have gone missing, expected dead. Over the past two and a half years, four couples have gone missing and have been found dead months later - discovered by hunters in the woods, when their bodies have already partially skeletonised and almost completely decomposed. Due to this, Kay has had to write off the cause of death as inconclusive on all eight of the bodies, so with this fifth couple she goes in all guns blazing. However, it's not as simple as that, because Deborah - the missing female - is the daughter of Pat Harvey, the National Drug Policy Director and one of the most powerful women in the United States.
Due to Pat's high position and personal interest, she interferes in the case regularly, putting Kay in a terrible position by begging her for more information about her daughter's death. Kay hides away from all press, ignoring everyone's phone calls, while Pat gets more riled up about feeling stonewalled. After her daughter's body is discovered and no one will inform her of the cause of death, she makes a damning press conference announcement - she believes the serial killer is a member of the CIA, and the CIA and the FBI have taken it upon themselves to cover up the crimes and protect their own.
As time goes on and the case looks less and less likely to be solved, Kay gets suspicious of everyone around her: well, apart from Marino. Benton Wesley has been ignoring her calls and withholding evidence from her - such as the discovery of playing cards at each of the crime scenes, leading to the belief that the killings are military related - so she appears at his house to sit him down and get information about him, awkwardly turning up at the same time as he's receiving a visit from her ex, Mark James.
Meanwhile, Kay discovers a cold case from eight years ago - the double-murder of two students, Elizabeth and Jill. The murders are near identical: the shoes and socks are missing from the victims, while their cars were discovered abandoned miles away from their bodies. There were no playing cards at the scene of the crime, but the injuries were all mostly flesh wounds, meaning that the cause of death could also match. But how does a one off murder from eight years ago link with a series of murders still occurring now?
Furthermore, on top of all that's already going on, Abby Turnball, the spunky reporter from 'Postmortem', gets back in touch, as she's writing an article series about the killings and needs to interview some people in Richmond, so it's a great excuse to see her old friend Kay. Abby believes the FBI have been following her - getting a tail on her, tapping her phone lines and hacking in to her computer - to discover what information she may have unearthed about the crimes. Due to Abby's paranoia and increasingly erratic behaviour, she has been fired from her elusive position as police reporter at The New York Times, causing her to move in with Kay temporarily while she attempts to get her life back on track.
One night, after Abby and Kay go out for a meal together, they get asked for directions by a suspicious man in a dark car, and partly due to Abby's paranoia they write down the license plate number. Things don't add up - the plates are for a dark brown car, but the car that they were approached by was most definitely charcoal grey. After tracking down the owner of the dark brown car, it's revealed that the plates were switched, making the grey cars behaviour even more confusing. Kay is determined to find the car again and, after retracing their steps for the best part of a day, they find the car and the driver - a Steven Spurrier. Spurrier has a clean record: he was discharged from the navy after four months due to the death of his father, and has owned a little bookshop ever since. There's no reason to suspect that he would be the killer, but due to his unusual nighttime behaviour and the fact that two of his victims could have been patrons of his store, things escalate rather quickly over the last fifty pages of the novel, culminating in two deaths and a near fatal gunshot wound.
Evidence:
In the previous two Kay Scarpetta novels, I've had two major complaints: 1) that we don't get to interact with the killers and 2) the killers always end up dead. Thankfully, 'All That Remains' veers away from the first rule, even if the second rule is still holding fast at this point in time. Because Kay and Abby stumble across Spurrier (which is a tad contrived, but believable enough if the guy has been cruising round looking for couples for nearly a decade) we get to experience the frustration of the team as they attempt to find evidence that he's the killer and are left disappointed again and again because of how careful the guy is. Yes, it was irritating that they couldn't find anything to link him solidly to all of the couples being murdered, but it felt more realistic because of that - you hear all the time about police having a main suspect but being able to pin the crime to them successfully.
Because of this, I thought the last fifty to one hundred pages were absolutely flawless. There wasn't too much going on, the investigation was focused and it was narrowed down completely.
The same cannot be said for the rest of the story though. Because Kay has no idea on the cause of death, it's up in the air for a long time - could it be strangulation? Stabbing? Or could all of the couples be drug addicts, meeting up with dealers for their next fix and taking a bad batch? There's too many possibilities, too many different scenarios discussed, and it feels as though we're being drowned in a thousand plot choices as though this was a choose your own adventure. I understand that cases often get like this: there will be a favourite suspicion or theory, but there will also be the less likely ones that still merit discussion. That's okay in real life, but in a novel it just feels like a bit too much.
There were some things that I appreciated. Bringing in intuit/psychic Hilda Ozimek brought an extremely different element to the novel, and the fact that they didn't have her giving solid answers about the cases meant that it didn't feel like a get out of jail free card from Patricia. She knew where her story was going, so had the sense of mind to allude to it rather than giving any solid answers - this scene really kept the audience on its toes, and I wish it could have been longer.
I loved the reappearance of Abby! She's one of the more exciting minor characters, and her friendship with Kay (exemplified beautifully in their detective moments) is heart-warming and inspiring, making me want to meet up with friends and make the most of life. Towards the end of the novel she definitely starts to focus too much on her career, as she gets withdrawn from life and makes really stupid decisions, which disappoints me. I wasn't shocked by her death, because I think any character that gets close to Kay is going to be in danger, but I was surprised by the fact that she willingly visited a suspected murderer's house alone - she's been a reporter for the majority of her life and should have known that it wasn't worth the risk.
The reappearance of Mark was also nice, but it was bittersweet that they had separated in the time that passed between 'Body of Evidence' and this installment. Kay and Mark still obviously love each other, but because of how busy Kay was with this case the relationship wasn't explored as much as it potentially could have been. This is a brilliant thing: instead of trying to make every book have a strong romance storyline in it, the fact that Mark popped in and popped out again was reminiscent to real life, because people do have a lot more important things going on than worrying about fixing a romance. I wouldn't mind if he reappeared in more of the future novels, because I think the dynamic between them is brilliantly written and not at all irritating (as it can be with some, if not most, couples in crime novels).
The development of Marino's character? Flawless! Getting him to open up about the demise of his thirty year marriage - to a plump, yet seemingly pleasant, woman called Doris - was touching, as we haven't seen any of his personal life in any part of the start of the series. The scene between him and Kay, in which Kay is attempting to lecture him to get his life back on track, is extremely easy to relate to - we all have friends that we want to tell to pull themselves together, and it's a testament to how strong their personal relationship is that Marino puts up with her completely tearing him apart. It'll be interesting to see whether Marino and Doris restore their relationship in future novels, or whether we'll get to see Marino attempting to play the dating game for the first time in three decades.
Verdict:
I think one of the reasons I enjoyed this novel so much was because it was a first read. If I re-read it, I might feel as though I can get to terms with the plot and appreciate it more fully, but I won't be learning about the characters for the first time so I think the charm would be lost on me.
Most of the positive aspects of this novel were definitely character based. Because the plot was so busy, it was nice to spend time getting to know the characters and seeing them interact with each other, because it was a relief from the constant bombardment of information, misinformation and potential leads. I enjoy cerebral leads, but when there's so much happening all at once that I feel I need to put the book down to get to grips with the events - well, that's just too in your face for me.
It's still annoying that the murderers keep getting murdered before we can see them questioned and get their motives, but hopefully that will change over the next few installments. I took a lot more time on this one because of needing to get my head around all of the constant goings on, so I'm hoping the next book isn't going to be a serial killing across the decades journey. This felt like quite an epic novel, with the discovery of the linked cold cases and the scope of different suspects considered, but I don't think the length of the novel allowed for the effect that Patricia was going for - it would have needed to be about another hundred pages in length to feel properly developed and less crowded.
This book would have been perfect for me if it hadn't been convoluted, so I'm hoping Patricia's writing might slim down in the following installments - if she could word things more succinctly, or explain terms straight away without needing to get the characters to prompt at explanation, it might feel as though everything was running much more smoothly. However, even with those aspects this is still the Patricia Cornwell book I've enjoyed most so far in this series, and I'm looking forward to the fourth book already.
Just a quick note to the writer of the synopsis (of my edition, at least) before I finish. Mentioning a killer 'leaving just one tantalizing clue' when he actually leaves four or five does not sell your book, it will just make an audience feel cheated when they realise it's more complicated than that. I'd say that the tantalising clues were the unbranded cigarettes, the missing shoes and socks, the playing cards, the white fibres on the car seats and, despite only being revealed in the last page, the CIA gas card. There's quite a lot of clues in this novel that confuse the investigators and the press - it'll perplex the audience if they think they're only meant to be tantalised by one of them.
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