The Chemistry of Death Book

Three years ago, David Hunter moved to rural Norfolk to escape his life in London, his gritty work in forensics, and a tragedy that nearly destroyed him. Working as a simple country doctor, seeing his lost wife and daughter only in his dreams, David struggles to remain uninvolved when the corpse of a woman is found in the woods, a macabre sign from her killer decorating her body. In one horrifying instant, the quiet summer countryside that had been David’s refuge has turned malevolent—and suddenly there is no place to hide.

The village of Manham is tight-knit, far from the beaten path. As a newcomer, Dr. Hunter is immediately a suspect. Once an expert in analyzing human remains, he reluctantly joins the police investigation—and when another woman disappears, it soon becomes personal. Because this time she is someone David knows, someone who has managed to penetrate the icy barrier around his heart. With a killer’s bizarre and twisted methods screaming out to him, with a brooding countryside beset with suspicion, David can feel the darkness gathering around him. For as the clock ticks down on a young woman’s life, David must follow a macabre trail of clues—all the way to its final, horrifying conclusion.

Publishers Weekly

British author Beckett (Fine Lines) delivers a promising serial-killer whodunit, the first of a new crime series. Dr. David Hunter, a successful forensic anthropologist, retreats to the quiet Norfolk village of Manham, where he works as a general practitioner, after a drunk driver claims the lives of his wife and daughter. Three years after this tragedy, the shattering discovery of the mutilated corpse of a neighbor, Sally Palmer, forces Hunter back into the world of studying decomposing corpses. When another woman disappears, Hunter and the police conclude that a serial predator is at work, and they race against time to prevent a second murder. High quality prose and a compelling if flawed hero haunted by the memory of his family help compensate for a plot that starts strongly but winds down to a somewhat predictable resolution. (Sept.) Copyright 2006 Reed Business Information.