Customer Reviews

Cause Of Death

5 star:		(19)
4 star:		(22)
3 star:		(23)
2 star:		(29)
1 star:		(17)

 

 

I haven't read ALL of the books in the "Scarpetta" series, but I've gone through my fair share. This one ranks last in that list.

The "book" is used more as a vehicle to develop the characters in the series, than as a story that can stand on its own. There seems to be no true plot, and it is almost predictable... a "typical" ending except in this case the "bad" guy is nowhere to be found throughout the whole book, so you end up with this totally off feeling that you've just wasted your time in trying to put some thought into figuring the "mystery" out. Aside from all of this, in this particular story Scarpetta is closer to the female version of James Bond than in any of her other stories... man this girl can do it all, knows it all and can take on a heard of rhinos all by her self.... too much.

I like to be challenged by a story, not to be fed a pointless story because she had to write 'x' many books to fulfill a publisher's contract. This is what this book is, no less, no more.

Enjoyable read although not the best of the Kay Scarpetta series. Still, if more of Kay is what you want, this will entertain you.

A general in the Navy? Almost as believable as a 23-yr. old genius with an attitude who is the FBI's secret weapon. This book read as though Ms. Cornwall phoned it in.

I really liked "Cause of Death" by Patricia Cornwell until the climactic sequence. When she rolls out the big guns, so to speak, it seemed so ridiculous to me. I laughed out loud and finally quit reading.
Until then, I liked the central character, who is well educated and high strung and has trouble relating to people and is surrounded by conflict and troubles. I liked the forensic stuff and the who-dun-it structure.
(This is only the second Kay Scarpetta novel I've read.)
I liked Pete Marino and Lucy and the setting for the first killing and Roche and the way the mystery unfolds.
The best thing is that most of the time the setting and the characters mimic the real world in a good way. She is a very responsible person, who is both doctor/pathologist and a lawyer, and who is in conflict with people all around her, because she is a woman, because she does a good job, and because she uncovers crimes that other people would overlook.
I don't think the author needed all that elaborate hokum at the end. I like a smaller story, where evil is not about to destroy so much of the world but is about to destroy the life of one or two people.
This is still a decent crime novel and worth reading, but I'd give it a B minus. (Sorry, Ms. Cornwell. You are a heck of a writer.)

In CAUSE OF DEATH by multi-talented writer, Patricia Cornwell, the murder of a scuba-diving reporter pulls Kay Scarpetta into a vortex of evil!

Chilling story that had me glued in spot throughout the entire read!

(Highly Recommended Novel!)

Although this book was not my favourite in this series, there is still a lot to recommend it. The forensic detail is wonderful, and written in a fashion that makes it easy to understand. My main complaint with this book is Kay's niece, Lucy. She is not a believable character, and I find her even more unbelievable in this book. My main reason for this is that I don't think an agency like the FBI would have an untrained, young agent like Lucy involved at the heart of their big cases. Yes, I realize she's supposed to be a genius, but seriously, please!! But other than Lucy, I like the other characters, and they are developing very nicely. My favourite is of course, Marino. In this book Kay and Marino are trying to determine the cause of death of a diver that is found dead in the water in an old ship graveyard. Everyone is trying to convince them that it was an accident or suicide, but Kay knows differently, and both her and Marino know that there is very real evil surrounding this death. As they dig deeper, the true extent of the evil is revealed to all, many lives are at stake. This book, like all the others in the series is chock-full of suspense from the opening paragraph right to the very end.

Cause of Death involves a plot that is better left to a different genre of fiction. By the time Scarpetta and her cronies begin to figure what is ultimately going on, it has already happened. The book starts off okay but steadily declines to a less than admirable conclusion. Could not empathize with the personal troubles of either Scarpetta or her niece Lucy, as Cornwell tries to get the reader to do.

As far as this being one of Cornwell's best books, it would not qualify. The book started off too abruptly and didnt give as much detailed background as it should have. In the beginning it introduced us to a mysterious death. There was a peson killed on a dock. Dr Skarpetta was the person in charge of investigating this crime. It goes on and on about this, not really introducing any new material. This made the book less attention grabbing. The same happened over and over throughout the book, and really didnt feel like we were getting anywhere. The only thing that gave it a weird feeling was the fact that it took place on New Years Eve. Normally Cornwell keeps you wanting to read the next page, Cause of Death just didnt cut it. Dont take this, as if she writes bad books, since most of hers that I have read were excellent. I just wouldnt go out and get this one until you have read some of her others.

This was my first (and last) book by Patricia Cornwell. I picked it up at the suggestion of another customer at the book store and I'm sorry I did. My mom read this book first and when it took her almost two weeks to finish I knew it wasn't good. I didn't even get half way through before I gave up. My mom is far stronger than I and will see a book till the end no matter how bad it is. I must agree with other reviewers, there's no plot and it's truly predictable.

And to quote another reviewer:
"I like to be challenged by a story, not to be fed a pointless story because she had to write 'x' many books to fulfill a publisher's contract. This is what this book is, no less, no more."

Avoid being bored to death. Don't buy this book.

This is the first Kay Scarpetta I have read, and I am not only not impressed, it ranks as one of the worst reads of life.

Ms. Cornwell has a horrid propensity for using the word "for" in a sentence instead of "since" or "because." An example of a sentence Cornwell would write could be, "I wanted to go to the grocery store, FOR I needed milk for my cereal." It was incredibly distracting to me because it was an amateurish attempt to pump up the prose. The best way to pump up the prose is to write a great story, not inject archaic forms of speech into the writing.

Another problem I had was with Dr. Kay Scarpetta. According to what I've read in this book, Dr. Scarpetta is an expert at, quite literally, EVERYTHING. Whether it's forensics, ballistics, photography, or any other subject, Scarpetta is portrayed as a woman who knows it all. Every expert she sees says things to her like, "Well, as you already know . . . " as they describe the technical details. This became irritating as I felt the author was simply bragging about her own knowledge. Also, in the rarest of rare cases when Kay Scarpetta did NOT know something, usually Lucy, Kay's all-too imperfect, but brilliant niece, knew the answer. I wanted desperately to see Kay NOT know something, or at least have a hunch that proved wrong, but Cornwell has written Scarpetta to be a nearly perfect professional. Her only flaws seem to be emotional.

Another irritant is Scarpetta's tendency to have to prove that she's an authority figure wherever she goes, and to whomever DARES threaten her authority. After all, how dare ANYONE usurp Scarpetta's authority. Scarpetta is one of the most irritating protagonists I've ever come across in fiction. I found her colleague, Marino, to be FAR more interesting because he was noticably flawed. I don't want to read about perfect characters, and Cornwell seems to want Scarpetta as a perfect medical examiner. That may be fun for some people, but it kills all the drama in a book for me. She is materialistic when she talks about her car as if it's a child by always referring to is as "My Mercedes." Puh-leez! If I have to hear anything more about her damn Benz, I think I'm gonna hurl.

Finally, the ending was ridiculous. Without ruining it for others, I'll only say that it was about as satisfying as watching an impatient mother who ends a story to her 5 year old daughter by saying "everybody lives happily ever after. The end. Now go to sleep."

This is one reader who is thoroughly unimpressed with Ms. Cornwell's Scarpetta series.