The Daily Telegraph:Diana Remembered 1961-1997
- Pasta blanda 1997, ISBN: 9780333734742
Pasta dura
Berkley. Very Good. Paperback. 2010. 592 pages. <br>In this provocative thriller, forensic expert Kay Scarpetta is surrounded by familiar faces, yet traveling down the unfamiliar … Más…
Berkley. Very Good. Paperback. 2010. 592 pages. <br>In this provocative thriller, forensic expert Kay Scarpetta is surrounded by familiar faces, yet traveling down the unfamiliar road of fame.... It is the week before Christmas. A tanking economy has prompted Dr. Kay Scarpetta--despite her busy schedule and her continuing work as the senior forensic analyst f or CNN--to offer her services pro bono to New York City's Office of the Chief Medical Examiner. In no time at all, her increased v isibility seems to precipitate a string of unexpected and unsettl ing events, culminating in an ominous package--possibly a bomb--s howing up at the front desk of the apartment building where she a nd her husband, Benton, live. Soon the apparent threat on Scarpet ta's life finds her embroiled in a surreal plot that includes a f amous actor accused of an unthinkable sex crime and the disappear ance of a beautiful millionaire with whom her niece, Lucy, seems to have shared a secret past. Scarpetta's CNN producer wants he r to launch a TV show called The Scarpetta Factor. Given the biza rre events already in play, she fears that her growing fame will generate the illusion that she has a special factor, a mythical a bility to solve all her cases. She wonders if she will end up lik e other TV personalities: her own stereotype. Editorial Reviews Review Praise for The Scarpetta Factor [An] insistent and gripp ing thriller.--The Star-Ledger A finely crafted, pulse-racing th riller that readers won't wantto put down.--Library Journal Abou t the Author Patricia Cornwell is considered one of the world's b estselling crime writers. Her intrepid medical examiner Kay Scarp etta first appeared on the scene in 1990 with Postmortem--the onl y novel to win the Edgar, Creasey, Anthony, and Macavity awards a nd the French Prix du Roman d'Aventure in a single year--and Crue l and Unusual, which won Britain's prestigious Gold Dagger Award for the best crime novel of 1993. Dr. Kay Scarpetta herself won t he 1999 Sherlock Award for the best detective created by an Ameri can author. Ms. Cornwell's work is translated into 36 languages a cross more than 120 countries. Excerpt. ® Reprinted by permissio n. All rights reserved. Voltaire,Oeuvres Complètes 1785 A frigid wind gusted in from the East River, snatching at Dr. Kay Scarpet ta's coat as she walked quickly along 30th Street. It was one we ek before Christmas without a hint of the holidays in what she th ought of as Manhattan's Tragic Triangle, three vertices connected by wretchedness and death. Behind her was Memorial Park, a volum inous white tent housing the vacuum-packed human remains still un identified or unclaimed from Ground Zero. Ahead on the left was t he Gothic redbrick former Bellevue Psychiatric Hospital, now a sh elter for the homeless. Across from that was the loading dock and bay for the Office of the Chief Medical Examiner, where a gray s teel garage door was open. A truck was backing up, more pallets o f plywood being unloaded. It had been a noisy day at the morgue, a constant hammering in corridors that carried sound like an amph itheater. The mortuary techs were busy assembling plain pine coff ins, adult-size, infant-size, hardly able to keep up with the gro wing demand for city burials at Potter's Field. Economy-related. Everything was. Scarpetta already regretted the cheeseburger and fries in the cardboard box she carried. How long had they been i n the warming cabinet on the serving line of the NYU Medical Scho ol cafeteria? It was late for lunch, almost three p.m., and she w as pretty sure she knew the answer about the palatability of the food, but there was no time to place an order or bother with the salad bar, to eat healthy or even eat something she might actuall y enjoy. So far there had been fifteen cases today, suicides, acc idents, homicides, and indigents who died unattended by a physici an or, even sadder, alone. She had been at work by six a.m. to g et an early start, completing her first two autopsies by nine, sa ving the worst for last-a young woman with injuries and artifacts that were time-consuming and confounding. Scarpetta had spent mo re than five hours on Toni Darien, making meticulously detailed d iagrams and notes, taking dozens of photographs, fixing the whole brain in a bucket of formalin for further studies, collecting an d preserving more than the usual tubes of fluids and sections of organs and tissue, holding on to and documenting everything she p ossibly could in a case that was odd not because it was unusual b ut because it was a contradiction. The twenty-six-year-old woman 's manner and cause of death were depressingly mundane and hadn't required a lengthy postmortem examination to answer the most rud imentary questions. She was a homicide from blunt-force trauma, a single blow to the back of her head by an object that possibly h ad a multicolored painted surface. What didn't make sense was eve rything else. When her body was discovered at the edge of Central Park, some thirty feet off East 110th Street shortly before dawn , it was assumed she had been jogging last night in the rain when she was sexually assaulted and murdered. Her running pants and p anties were around her ankles, her fleece and sports bra pushed a bove her breasts. A Polartec scarf was tied in a double knot tigh tly around her neck, and at first glance it was assumed by the po lice and the OCME's medicolegal investigators who responded to th e scene that she was strangled with an article of her own clothin g. She wasn't. When Scarpetta examined the body in the morgue, s he found nothing to indicate the scarf had caused the death or ev en contributed to it, no sign of asphyxia, no vital reaction such as redness or bruising, only a dry abrasion on the neck, as if t he scarf had been tied around it postmortem. Certainly it was pos sible the killer struck her in the head and at some point later s trangled her, perhaps not realizing she was already dead. But if so, how much time did he spend with her? Based on the contusion, swelling, and hemorrhage to the cerebral cortex of her brain, she had survived for a while, possibly hours. Yet there was very lit tle blood at the scene. It wasn't until the body was turned over that the injury to the back of her head was even noticed, a one-a nd-a-half-inch laceration with significant swelling but only a sl ight weeping of fluid from the wound, the lack of blood blamed on the rain. Scarpetta seriously doubted it. The scalp laceration would have bled heavily, and it was unlikely a rainstorm that was intermittent and at best moderate would have washed most of the blood out of Toni's long, thick hair. Did her assailant fracture her skull, then spend a long interval with her outside on a rainy winter's night before tying a scarf tightly around her neck to m ake sure she didn't live to tell the tale? Or was the ligature pa rt of a sexually violent ritual? Why were livor and rigor mortis arguing loudly with what the crime scene seemed to say? It appear ed she had died in the park late last night, and it appeared she had been dead for as long as thirty-six hours. Scarpetta was baff led by the case. Maybe she was overthinking it. Maybe she wasn't thinking clearly, for that matter, because she was harried and he r blood sugar was low, having eaten nothing all day, only coffee, lots of it. She was about to be late for the three p.m. staff m eeting and needed to be home by six to go to the gym and have din ner with her husband, Benton Wesley, before rushing over to CNN, the last thing she felt like doing. She should never have agreed to appear on The Crispin Report. Why for God's sake had she agree d to go on the air with Carley Crispin and talk about postmortem changes in head hair and the importance of microscopy and other d isciplines of forensic science, which were misunderstood because of the very thing Scarpetta had gotten herself involved in-the en tertainment industry? She carried her boxed lunch through the loa ding dock, piled with cartons and crates of office and morgue sup plies, and metal carts and trollies and plywood. The security gua rd was busy on the phone behind Plexiglas and barely gave her a g lance as she went past. At the top of a ramp she used the swipe card she wore on a lanyard to open a heavy metal door and entered a catacomb of white subway tile with teal-green accents and rail s that seemed to lead everywhere and nowhere. When she first bega n working here as a part-time ME, she got lost quite a lot, endin g up at the anthropology lab instead of the neuropath lab or the cardiopath lab or the men's locker room instead of the women's, o r the decomp room instead of the main autopsy room, or the wrong walk-in refrigerator or stairwell or even on the wrong floor when she boarded the old steel freight elevator. Soon enough she cau ght on to the logic of the layout, to its sensible circular flow, beginning with the bay. Like the loading dock, it was behind a m assive garage door. When a body was delivered by the medical exam iner transport team, the stretcher was unloaded in the bay and pa ssed beneath a radiation detector over the door. If no alarm was triggered indicating the presence of a radioactive material, such as radiopharmaceuticals used in the treatment of some cancers, t he next stop was the floor scale, where the body was weighed and measured. Where it went after that depended on its condition. If it was in bad shape or considered potentially hazardous to the li ving, it went inside the walk-in decomp refrigerator next to the decomp room, where the autopsy would be performed in isolation wi th special ventilation and other protections. If the body was in good shape it was wheeled along a corridor to the right of the b ay, a journey that could at some point include the possibility of various stops relative to the body's stage of deconstruction: th e x-ray suite, the histology specimen storage room, the forensic anthropology lab, two more walk-in refrigerators for fresh bodies that hadn't been examined yet, the lift for those that were to b e viewed and identified upstairs, evidence lockers, the neuropath room, the cardiac path room, the main autopsy room. After a case was completed and the body was ready for release, it ended up fu ll circle back at the bay inside yet another walk-in refrigerator , which was where Toni Darien should be right now, zipped up in a pouch on a storage rack. But she wasn't. She was on a gurney pa rked in front of the stainless-steel refrigerator door, an ID tec h arranging a blue sheet around the neck, up to the chin. What a re we doing? Scarpetta said. We've had a little excitement upsta irs. She's going to be viewed. By whom and why? Mother's in the lobby and won't leave until she sees her. Don't worry. I'll take care of it. The tech's name was Rene, mid-thirties with curly bl ack hair and ebony eyes, and unusually gifted at handling familie s. If she was having a problem with one, it wasn't trivial. Rene could defuse just about anything. I thought the father had made the ID, Scarpetta said. He filled out the paperwork, and then I showed him the picture you uploaded to me-this was right before y ou left for the cafeteria. A few minutes later, the mother walks in and the two of them start arguing in the lobby, and I mean goi ng at it, and finally he storms out. They're divorced? And obvi ously hate each other. She's insisting on seeing the body, won't take no for an answer. Rene's purple nitrile-gloved hands moved a strand of damp hair off the dead woman's brow, rearranging sever al more strands behind the ears, making sure no sutures from the autopsy showed. I know you've got a staff meeting in a few minute s. I'll take care of this. She looked at the cardboard box Scarpe tta was holding. You didn't even eat yet. What have you had today ? Probably nothing, as usual. How much weight have you lost? You' re going to end up in the anthro lab, mistaken for a skeleton. W hat were they arguing about in the lobby? Scarpetta asked. Funer al homes. Mother wants one on Long Island. Father wants one in Ne w Jersey. Mother wants a burial, but the father wants cremation. Both of them fighting over her. Touching the dead body again, as if it were part of the conversation. Then they started blaming ea ch other for everything you can think of. At one point Dr. Edison came out, they were causing such a ruckus. He was the chief med ical examiner and Scarpetta's boss when she worked in the city. I t was still a little hard getting used to being supervised, havin g been either a chief herself or the owner of a private practice for most of her career. But she wouldn't want to be in charge of the New York OCME, not that she'd been asked or likely ever would be. Running an office of this magnitude was like being the mayor of a major metropolis. Well, you know how it works, Scarpetta s aid. A dispute, and the body doesn't go anywhere. We'll put a hol d on her release until Legal instructs us otherwise. You showed t he mother the picture, and then what? I tried, but she wouldn't look at it. She says she wants to see her daughter and isn't leav ing until she does. She's in the family room? That's where I le ft her. I put the folder on your desk, copies of the paperwork. Thanks. I'll look at it when I go upstairs. You get her on the li ft, and I'll take care of things on the other end, Scarpetta said . Maybe you can let Dr. Edison know I'm going to miss the three-o 'clock. In fact, it's already started. Hopefully I'll catch up wi th him before he heads home. He and I need to talk about this cas e. I'll tell him. Rene placed her hands on the steel gurney's pu sh handle. Good luck on TV tonight. Tell him the scene photos ha ve been uploaded to him, but I won't be able to dictate the autop sy protocol or get those photos to him until tomorrow. I saw the commercials for the show. They're cool. Rene was still talking a bout TV. Except I can't stand Carley Crispin and what's the name of that profiler who's on there all the time? Dr. Agee. I'm sick and tired of them talking about Hannah Starr. I'm betting Carley' s going to ask you about it. CNN knows I won't discuss active ca ses. You think she's dead? Because I sure do. Rene's voice follo wed Scarpetta into the elevator. Like what's-her-name in Aruba? N atalee? People vanish for a reason-because somebody wanted them t o. Scarpetta had been promised. Carley Crispin wouldn't do that to her, wouldn't dare. It, Berkley, 2010, 3, Trans-Atlantic Pubns. Good. 9 x 0.75 x 11.75 inches. Hardcover. 1997. 118 pages. Text buckled.<br>Presents highlights from the public a nd private life of the late Princess of Wales Editorial Reviews Review This collection of words and pictures--some of them rarely seen--celebrates the life of a woman who is missed b y many. The editors of the Daily Telegraph have assembled photos from Princess Diana's childhood up to the last month of her life that commemorate her roles as a wife, mother, activist, and woman . Images of the shy young woman (seen in the formal engagement ph oto) are followed by wedding photos and shots with her two young boys. Then the princess begins to emerge more on her own--dancing with John Travolta, bringing Prince William to his first day of nursery school, comforting a young patient, inspecting a recently cleared landmine field, and jogging in work-out clothes toward h er car. Together, these photographs form a portrait of a warm and engaging woman whose life was cut tragically short. Royalties fr om the book will be donated to the Diana Memorial Appeal, which c ontributes to Diana's favorite charities. Excerpt. ® Reprinted b y permission. All rights reserved. From the Introduction by W.F. Deedes (columnist and former editor of The Daily Telegraph): It was a life, when we think about it, of extraordinary contrasts. There were the troughs of despair. There were also peaks of delig ht. There were times when she appeared publicly to be inflicting wounds on herself. There were moments when she seemed sublime. Th at is why the life of Diana, Princess of Wales, was such an intri guing life ... and that is what makes this life worth close study . Nothwithstanding all that has been written about her and the pictures taken in all her moods, there remained a faint aura of m ystery about her. There were facets of her life we shall never fu lly comprehend ... </div ., Trans-Atlantic Pubns, 1997, 2.75<
