This is the second book in Patricia Cornwell’s series centered around Kay Scarpetta, who is the Chief Medical Examiner for the State of Virginia. I don’t know if it’s common for medical examiners to actually investigate deaths. I thought they mostly found evidence and sent it to the police. Cornwell began writing these books when she worked in the Office of the Chief Medical Examiner, so I guess she would know better than me!

Body of Evidence was published in 1991. This is a time before everyone had cell phones, and the internet was not yet a big thing. I had an account on Compuserve, but there were few of us with home computers to get online at all. The lack of technology, plus the fact that everyone seems to be smoking, is indicative of the time it was written.

Kay Scarpetta is called in on the case of author Beryl Madison, who was murdered in her home. Beryl had just returned from Key West and was writing her memoirs. That might have something to do with her death, as she was the prodigy of another writer, Cary Harper. Harper is a J.D. Salinger-type hermit who had one hugely successful book published many years before and has lived off of that.

Initially, Harper is the focus of the investigation that Scarpetta begins with Lt. Pete Marino, a former New York City police officer now working in Virginia. They learn that Beryl ran off to Key West after a few incidents of stalking. Is Harper her stalker? A former love interest of Kay’s enters the picture as well, as he claims to work with Beryl’s lawyer, who is looking for the missing manuscript. After being accused of stealing it, Scarpetta learns her former lover is lying to her. When her life is also in danger, Scarpetta decides to follow Beryl’s path and takes off to Key West, thinking someone there might have the key to what’s going on.

The mystery is rather convoluted, but in the end, it worked. There are many red herrings here and many characters to follow. It can be hard to keep track of who is who. Again, I had trouble believing a state’s Chief Medical Examiner would be this involved in the investigation, but I have to take that at face value. Pete Marino makes a good partner for her. He’s protective of her and concerned, but doesn’t try to marginalize her during the investigation. If you look at how he’s written, you’ll see just how far we’ve come in 35 years. His homophobia and other biases wouldn’t fly in 2025.

This was where I had a problem with the audiobook. Narrated by C.J. Critt, the voice she uses for Marino is positively awful. It sounds like Dennis Franz on NYPD Blue with a much more exaggerated New York accent. I wanted to scream – I’m from New York originally, so the fake accent drives me crazy. There also seemed to be a lot of background noise, and at times I had to up the volume to hear the story. The rest of the characters she handles well. I’d knock the rating down a half-star from four if you’re going to listen to the audiobook.

The mystery was good, although there wasn’t really a way to figure out who it was until near the end. Cornwell puts a lot of red herrings out there with a number of different possibilities. Once one of the characters said something, I suddenly figured out what was going on before Scarpetta did. It was pretty realistic, though, as police investigations should be about collecting evidence and seeing the story it tells, rather than trying to find evidence that fits what they think happened.

I liked the tension between Kay and Mark James. They were once serious about each other before they went their separate ways. Kay wants to believe him, but things aren’t adding up at all. He seems concerned about her while at the same time not being truthful. It’s hard not to wonder if he’s using her once again and going to walk away when things heat up.

Overall, I enjoyed Body of Evidence quite a bit. It’s a product of the time it was written; good, bad, and sometimes ugly. I think it holds up, looking at it as indicative of that time period. Marino is a bit off-putting, but he’s a good guy overall who is concerned about Scarpetta. It’s nice to see a friendship between a man and a woman that doesn’t have any romantic tension to it. I like how some of the people from the first book are seen here, too, in regard to Kay’s workplace. It’s a solid mystery and police procedural.

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