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Unnatural Instinct
 
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Unnatural Instinct (Paperback)

by Robert Walker (Author)
4.2 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (4 customer reviews)

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Like many Washington D.C. law enforcement professionals, medical examiner Jessica Coran has had plenty of run-ins with Judge Maureen DeCampe, who's a little too liberal for her liking. But when DeCampe is kidnapped and tortured in a scenario so horrible that a psychic colleague of Jessica's falls ill with a mysterious syndrome after she attempts to "sense" the victim's whereabouts, Coran races the clock to find and free DeCampe before her friend can sever the psychic connection with the judge's kidnapper. It doesn't take long for the FBI to finger the perp--the father of a criminal DeCampe sentenced to death--but by the time they track him to the abandoned farm where he's bound the judge to the decaying body of his recently executed son, it may be too late for Jessica to save her friend. Fans of Robert W. Walker's nine previous thrillers featuring the redoubtable Ms. Coran will be delighted to meet her again; despite his sometimes stiff and ponderous style, Walker succeeds at telling a good story with plenty of the gory details that have made forensic suspense an increasingly popular genre. --Jane Adams --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.


From Publishers Weekly

Jessica Coran, the ace, if dry, medical examiner and detective heroine of Walker's long-running series, has a plum job working for the FBI. In composing her latest adventure, Walker takes his cue from the "unnatural" urges specified in his title and invents a demented father, Isaiah Purdy, who is determined to exact vengeance for the execution of his son, Jimmy, a killer sentenced to death by D.C. judge Maureen DeCampe. Isaiah abducts DeCampe, whisks her off to a newly rented barn by a chemicals factory and subjects her to a slow, gruesome death by gangrene, strapped to his dead son. Though no one much likes DeCampe, who is despised by Coran as a "closet libertarian," Coran sets out to save her. Coran's best friend, Kim Desinor, FBI agent and psychic, inexplicably is afflicted with full-scale life-threatening empathic stigmata, a sure sign that DeCampe is in trouble and perhaps a substitute for real sympathy for the judge's plight. While Coran herself is a sturdy central character who just about keeps the FBI circus on focus, the story flares up only via peripheral, crackpot characters: the Bible-thumping Isaiah Purdy; a homeless ex-teacher and dog lover, Marsden; and Nancy Willis, heroic busybody neighbor. Walker inserts plot devices and clues in a heavy-handed manner, deflating subtlety and suspense, and the novel's climax is perfunctory. Overall, this is a skilled but essentially formulaic suspense tale, high in melodrama.
Copyright 2002 Cahners Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

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Customer Reviews

4 Reviews
5 star:
 (2)
4 star:
 (1)
3 star:
 (1)
2 star:    (0)
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Average Customer Review
4.2 out of 5 stars (4 customer reviews)
 
 
 
 
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5.0 out of 5 stars Unnatural is Unbelievable in the best sense, Sep 10 2003
By "bloodworm" (Atlanta, GA United States) - See all my reviews
This review is from: Unnatural Instinct (Hardcover)
No one writing forensics novels takes the risks that this writer takes. He's an amazing storyteller in that you feel he does what ever happens in the book as if it were real life. As if he writes not knowing what is going to happen on the next page, and so damn, you don't have a clue either and your predictions for the storyline as you are reading are never exactly on, and if they are, you get a thrill out of it because it is like reading the author's mind. Not an easy task with this man. He is the giant in forensics fiction. He was writing his novels of forensics long before Silence of the Lamb appered or X-Files, and so his books have only gained and ganied in appeal. Each more striking and diffeent from the next, and Unnatural Rules and Rocks. What other author in the history of horrific suspense fiction ever lashed a victim to a dead guy and has given his heroine a time clock of DECAY to save the day? Just an amazing MAX to the limt storyline, and Walker's cameoing Lucas Stonecoat and Meredyth Sanger from his even more amazing Edge series is a stroke of genius. I love Lucas in all his books, and Meredyth is a DIVA. With Final Edge coming out next March, placing the Edge gang into this Instinct title so deftly as he does, well, it just makes Walker a genius. He simply takes you anywhere with such a deft hand and you are given over to his books in rapt attention. Can't say 'nough 'bout Unnatural Instinct. Sends the obsessive compulsives over the Edge with Bible-thumping Isaiah Purdy, the innocuous evil of the man permeating throughout. Wicked, wicked, and more wicked on top of cruel and unusual, thus the title perhaps? Unnatural (Unusual) and just plain weird fun. The most entertaining book I've read since reading Walker's Fire&Flesh under his pen name Evan Kingsbury, a Stoker recommended read.
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4.0 out of 5 stars a decently readable novel, picks up in the end, April 25 2003
By "ghiddyz2" (akron, ohio) - See all my reviews
This review is from: Unnatural Instinct (Hardcover)
This was a good, quick read. Not as emotionally gripping as earlier books in this series, but a good quick plot that I enjoyed, and Jessica Coran was vastly more interesting in this book than in the previous two Instinct novels. The last hundred and twenty pages fly by, which was a fairly nice surprise. I think my one real quibble with the book (and something I havent' seen mentioned yet) was the guest-starring of Stonecoat and Sanger from Walker's Edge series. That, and the small subplot with the Indian killings in Sioux Falls that Coran and Stonecoat both became involved in, shouldn't have even been written about and frankly took a bit away from the main story of this book, which would have been fine on its own if lengthened just a bit.

Overall though, it seems like Mr. Walker is returning to the form that he had last in Darkest Instinct and Extreme Instinct. Let's hope the next book in this series continues the trend of good books in this series.

But please, no more cameos from characters in the Edge series, ok?

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3.0 out of 5 stars A judge disappears and the FBI pursues her abductor., Sep 24 2002
By E. Bukowsky "booklover10" (NY United States) - See all my reviews
(TOP 1000 REVIEWER)    (REAL NAME)   
This review is from: Unnatural Instinct (Hardcover)
In Robert Walker's latest novel, "Unnatural Instinct," appellate court judge Maureen DeCampe has disappeared from an underground parking garage in Washington, D. C. The FBI fears that someone bent on revenge has abducted her. Dr. Jessie Coran, FBI medical examiner and sleuth extraordinaire, is in charge of the investigation.

Jessie, with the help of her colleagues, including her lover, Richard Sharpe, frantically seeks clues to the identity of Judge DeCampe's abductor. The investigators even enlist the aid of a psychic, Kim Desinor, who senses that the judge has been taken to a place filled with decay. As the investigators race against time, the judge is facing certain death at the hands of her crazed attacker.

Unfortunately, "Unnatural Instinct" does not rise above the pedestrian. The dialogue is stilted and the characters are mostly stereotypes. Although there is a fair amount of suspense as the killer eludes his pursuers time and again, the plot is basically a recycling of many similar novels. The only real distinction of "Unnatural Instinct" is the method that the killer uses to torture his victim. It is a novel idea, as original as it is gruesome, and it is one that I have never encountered before. Overall, however, "Unnatural Instinct" is an average thriller that breaks little new ground.

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5.0 out of 5 stars compelling and exciting thriller
FBI Agent and medical examiner Dr. Jessica Coran enjoys some downtime with Richard Sharpe, who resigned his position at Scotland Yard to become an FBI consultant. Read more
Published on Aug 18 2002 by Harriet Klausner

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