A New York Times Bestseller Trace is the heart-stopping new Dr. Kay Scarpetta thriller from America's number-one bestselling crime writer. Now freelancing from South Florida - Dr. Kay Scarpetta returns to the city that turned its back on her five years ago. She travels to Richmond - Virginia - at the odd behest of the recently appointed Chief Medical Examiner who claims that he needs her help. When she arrives she finds that her former lab seems neither as organized nor as well run as it once was. Then Scarpetta is faced with solving the death of a fourteen-year-old girl despite the smallest pieces of evidence - traces that only the most thorough hunters can identify. It's up to her to follow the twisting leads and track the strange details in order to make the dead speak - and reveal the sad truth that may be more than she can bear. Patricia Cornwell divides her time between New York City and Florida Patricia Cornwell is an award-winning novelist whose books have consistently appeared on the New York Times bestseller list Dr. Kay Scarpetta won the 1999 Sherlock Award for best detective created by an American author Kay Scarpetta made her debut in Cornwell's first novel - the internationally acclaimed Postmortem - which won the Edgar - Creasey - Anthony - and Macavity awards and the FrenchPrix du Roman d'Adventure in a single year Cruel and Unusual won Britain's prestigious Gold Dagger Award for the year's best crime novel of 1993 Cornwell has since written 12 more books featuring Scarpetta