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Jan 13, 2010

Gennine rated it:

This book was long, redundant, like a song with no end. There were times when I felt the need to scream, yell in frustration, toss the book as the point was never made. The story line was slow, confusing and erratic. It reminded me of a time when I first started reading and thought how great books were, not caring how the plot rambled or made a point, not caring for significance, not caring if it wasn't organized, like I was smarter then most because I could follow along, because I read the book More...

4 comments like (12 people liked it)

Dec 01, 2009

Nancy rated it:

I am a huge Kay Scarpetta fan. Love that this book is set in NYC right next door to where I work (Bellvue) !

Story was typical Cornwell...A good fast enjoyable read

2 comments like (1 person liked it)

Dec 31, 2011

Barbara rated it:

I read all her early books, I still have them on my shelves and then I read one that made me think - no more. So I stopped. Saw The Scarpetta Factor on sale and thought I'd give her another try. Oh dear. Wished I hadn't. What on earth has happened to the writer she once was? POV changes all over the place - including the same paragraph - that left me confused. I liked reading just from Scarpetta's POV. I liked her as a ballsy character and what I read in this book was a stupid woman who should h More...

1 comment like (1 person liked it)

Dec 22, 2011

Arlee rated it:

Good grief. I just returned this book to the library (so glad I didn't spend money on it) after having already renewed it, yet I dropped it into the slot wth 60 pages still unread. It was a painful five weeks to get through 432 pages; I've never taken so long to MAKE myself try to finish something.

I have read all of Cornwell's Scarpetta books and absolutely devoured the first ones. Maybe it's that I haven't read any in quite a while...or maybe...just maybe I couldn't finish this one More...

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May 04, 2011

Emily rated it:

I thought this one was a lot better than some of the other recent ones Cornwell has written for the Scarpetta series. Some of it was a little repetitive, but I did like how she addressed Benton's character more and gave the reader some more insight on how Benton felt for those 6 years that he had to pretend to be dead. As far as Lucy, her life is always a secret and this time it is no different. She is always out for revenge and is always a very angry person. The only person who didn't seem to b More...

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May 01, 2011

Mike rated it:

I've been slack in reviewing my books lately, but had to savage this one after finishing it. The story itself is so convoluted while really not saying anything, it borders on stream-of-consciousness when trying to be a CSI/Police thriller. There's really no suspense, and the "conclusion" was a quick 30 seconds where the bad guys are dispatched without any buildup, with one "offscreen" as I guess it wasn't important enough to actually write about the finish. The " More...

1 comment like (3 people liked it)

Apr 20, 2011

Greta rated it:

I should have known...Twenty years ago I started reading Cornwell's books featuring Kay Scarpetta. I enjoyed the first several of them. Seventeen books later... Ugh. I was looking for a good mystery, an easy read, about interesting characters, with a lot of forensics thrown in. Didn't find it here this time, unfortunately. What I did find was a boring mystery with a bunch of one-dimensional characters whose back stories take up much of the space in the book. Guess you had to be there for More...

4 comments like (2 people liked it)

Mar 08, 2011

May rated it:

After a long break from reading Cornwell's books I stumbled across this one in a drug store line one day and grabbed it up. And I have to say this is the most painful read I've ever had for a book. I finished it but only because I wanted to know if I was right about who the killer was and ... really that was the ending?

It took me 4 months to read a paperback. I NEVER take that long it was just slow and just hard to read that I kept having to put it down and do something else. It More...

0 comments like (1 person liked it)

Mar 14, 2010

Donna rated it:

In this series, "Scarpetta" has gradually become the center of an ever-shrinking universe in which the only important people are Medical Examiner Kay Scarpetta herself and her long-time associates: her husband (Benton Wesley), her niece (Lucy), and her friend (Moreno). In the rest of this fictional world, everyone else follows their exploits in the tabloids and on CNN like fans in the real world follow events in the lives of stars like Tiger Woods. (BTW, how many real-life medical exam More...

0 comments like (1 person liked it)

Mar 03, 2010

Aaron rated it:

Cornwell brings back the ever-popular Dr. Kay Scarpetta for a 17th adventure with her newest work. The good doctor has now settled into a position as a part time medical examiner with the New York Crime Scene department. On the side, she is also a senior analyst for CNN, covering topics relating to forensics.

The story revolves around two unique murders. One involves the mysterious murder of a jogger found in Central Park. It quickly becomes clear that her time of death was much earli More...

0 comments like (1 person liked it)

Jan 29, 2010

KarenC rated it:

Where do I begin with my reaction to this one? Seemed better than the previous, Scarpetta, although I'm starring them the same.

I thought Dr. Scarpetta was supposed to be into the forensics end of the criminal investigation. What happened to the forensics? For that matter, what happened to the poor dead "jogger" in the park? Her case seemed to get lost in the mountains of angst among the investigating "team." This book, similar to the last, spent more time on the psychologica

More...

0 comments like (3 people liked it)

Nov 28, 2009

Amanda rated it:

For some reason, I now forget the Scarpetta books almost as fast I as read them. Which is a bad thing now since Cornwell keeps pulling old plots and characters from the past to make starring appearances in the new books.

Scarpetta has a dead body of a runner on her table that is causing her problems. Nothing about the crime looks right and the Biograph watch that was left on the body is more confusing when there isn't any information (on the internet) about it. Lucy and Berger are toget More...

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Dec 30, 2009

Katherine rated it:

Somewhere in the 500-plus pages of this book is a good 300 page mystery struggling to get out. There were many points where I thought it would succeed, only to lose it again under the suffocating weight of each character's relentless self-absorption and analysis.

Since The Body Farm, Cornwell has increasingly given over her books to a sort of public self-examination. She uses the pages of the Scarpetta series to work out her own issues, turning her characters into a sort of Gree More...

5 comments like (11 people liked it)

Jan 18, 2011

Andrea rated it:

As usual, Patricia Cornwell's books have fallen below par. It's like a freight train you can't help but read.

One thing that I liked about this book in particular was the look into why Benton had to go into protective custody for 6 years. The past couple of books hadn't gone into detail, so it was nice to get the real reasons. As a psychology major, I can also appreciate the forensic psychology brought about in this book.

That being said, I'm highly disappointed. The character More...

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Aug 29, 2010

Denise rated it:

3.0 out of 5 stars Complex and absorbing..., August 29, 2010

This review is from: The Scarpetta Factor (Hardcover)
This novel, the seventeenth in the series featuring Dr. Kay Scarpetta, is full of the forensic details, cutting edge FBI analysis protocols, and technological advances that Patricia Cornwell is known for writing. The well known and much-loved characters are all together again as they work a complex case that perplexes and engages them in various facets of t More...

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Jun 09, 2010

Nancy rated it:

I have read, and enjoyed, many of Cornwell's books. After four or five years of no Kay Scarpetta, I picked this book up at the library and expected to be fully entertained. Not so.

It is usually pleasurable for me to start a book with recurring characters; I like the comfort level of running into someone I'm acquainted with, not starting over etc. Somehow, that never happened with this book:
. . . People I thought I knew didn't feel familiar;
. . . People I thought were de More...

0 comments like (2 people liked it)

Jan 29, 2010

Kathy rated it:

Kay, Kay, Kay.... this book ties up a loose end with the Jondons... The wolf has recreated himself as hairless... (electrolisis)... but this time we don't get into his head. and he's struggling to weild the empire left to him by default by his family. Pesky murder and Kay keep getting in the way...

so the story goes from 4 angles... Lucy is fearful that Jamie is distancing herself, and so she overreacts to being duped by xxxxx, who is missing, and who has taken her for a goodly s More...

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Sep 17, 2011

Grete rated it:

One female body in the morgue, another high profile millionairess missing and a possible connection to a Hollywood actor rumoured to have unsavoury sexual practices. Kay Scarpetta while working pro bono for the New York’s Chief Medical Examiner is working on the case when she is asked to make one of her semi-regular appearances on a TV show. While being bombarded by the presenter with questions about the case of Hannah Starr, which she can’t discuss, she gets an unsettling call live on air More...

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Apr 17, 2011

Denna rated it:

I have to admit this wasn’t one of my favorite novels by Patricia Cornwell. When I first began the Scarpetta novels, it was like beginning a long love affair. I couldn’t wait to get my hands on each new book when it came out, even pre-ordering at times. Over the last few years, these characters that I had learned to love began to take paths I couldn’t relate to. I was very upset when Mareno turned into a mess I didn’t even recognize anymore, but I decided to go ahead and try one more time. More...

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Oct 17, 2010

Vivisection rated it:

This review has been hidden because it contains spoilers. To view it, click here

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Aug 05, 2011

Cindy rated it:

Um....yeah....I finally managed to finish it. The first 100 or so pages were dreadful. I had no idea what was going on, what the story was about, too many plots and characters introduced and didn't know why. By about page 300 it started to come together and you started to get a small inkling of how everything was connected, but it was still confusing. Too much technical jargon, psychobabble, and not enough forensic stuff in the morgue. So many twists that weren't necessary and left you more More...

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Jul 28, 2011

Sara rated it:

I have read all of the Scarpetta series and every year I look forward to buying the newest and latest installment. The last few years I have been let down, I felt that Cornwell had run out of plot twists and turns and had chosen to leave crime solving behind in preference for the dramas between the relationships of Kay, Benton, Lucy and Marino.

'The Scarpetta Factor' was difficult to get into initially, mostly because the characters were all so angry with each other and I felt like More...

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Dec 03, 2010

Shelley rated it:

I am quickly losing interest in this series, but somehow I still find myself borrowing these books from the library *See Port Mortuary*. This book was very hard to follow and too long, IMO. I believe it is time for a whole new cast of characters. Get rid of Benton. He has become a non factor even though he is married to Dr. Kay. Let him go back to working with the Bureau, where he was at least, SEMI worth reading about. Stop writing books that end up being almost 500 pages in length. Obviously i More...

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Jan 01, 2010

Joy rated it:

The last Cornwell novel I read was the very best, but this was the worst. It was full of gloom and doom, no one got along, the story line
jumped around too much, and the main characters were not in a good place in life. Only loyalty keeps me reading Cornwell's books -- but I am a loyal reader. This book is a Christmas present for Ashly. I did
finish it before we opened presents, fortunately.

I've also tallyed the books I read last year. I started recording them
on More...

0 comments like (1 person liked it)

Dec 26, 2009

Rhonda rated it:

After being disappointed in Scarpetta, I wasn't sure I would like this 17th book in the series. I was pleasantly surprised in the beginning. Benton and Kay are living in New York. Kay works (pro bono) for the coroner's office and is the forensic expert at CNN.

She is asked, on the air, about the ongoing investigation into Hannah Starr and her autopsy from that morning. She threatens to resign as the expert and is offered the interviewer's job. Someone involved with the news cast steals More...

0 comments like (1 person liked it)

Oct 03, 2011

Tim rated it:

This review has been hidden because it contains spoilers. To view it, click here

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Mar 11, 2011

Marianne rated it:

The Scarpetta Factor is Patricia Cornwell’s 17th Scarpetta novel. The Scarpetta novels have had a chequered history: they started out consistently good and then went downhill for a while. This one is quite an improvement on those of 5 or 6 years ago. While it’s a bit slow-moving in places, on the whole, it has something like the quality of the first novels. A lot of the subject matter is topical, the CSI bits are better than ever, and the characters have finally matured somewhat: they have gone More...

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Oct 10, 2010

Annabelle rated it:

The airport bookstore deal where you get 50% back is really not worth it, because of the choices. Cornwell has become a caricature of herself. There is no plot development, no character development, just bitter, wounded people. She likes to write with a punch, but that all there is now punch sentences. She always likes really sicko psychopaths, and this time it is necrophilia.
She seems to want to be a science fiction writer, since the technology that Scarpetta’s niece, Lucy, uses is r More...

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Nov 14, 2011

Marti rated it:

Classic intertwining plot with a "who done-it" finish as is customary for the amazing Patricia Cornwell. I'm hooked on the series surrounding heroine, Kay Scarpetta and have read almost every book produced by Patricia Cornwell. However this book seemed to have filler uncustomary for Cornwell which made it a little more tedious read than typical for the pace of her novels. It appeared, from this reader's perspective, that Cornwell wrote to fill a quota of pages for the novel versus f More...

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Sep 14, 2011

Irenic rated it:

This seventeenth novel in the series brings back a cast of characters, some of whom are interesting an likeable (Kay, her friend and colleague Pete Marino, her husband Benton Wesley) and some of whom get more tiresome with each novel (Kay's niece, Lucy). Set in NYC, a murdered young lady is brought into the M.E.'s office, and Kay must determine the cause of death. Of course, the evidence is curious, drawing Kay and Benton into an urgent search for clues, particularly when a package bomb, addre More...

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