Livid

​Author: Patricia Cornwell
Publisher: Grand Central
Reviewer: Nancy Richards
100 million people can’t be wrong, I thought. It may be some people have bought more than one, but roughly, that’s how many copies of Patricia Cornwell’s books have been sold, to date. Making her, I’d say, deserving of the title ‘international phenomenon’. You have to gasp – she’s written damn nearly 40 (though I abandoned the count), and 26 of them have been in the Kay (medical 

​examiner) Scarpetta series. The first one Postmortem was written in 1990, the latest Livid in 2022 – with a few beats in between, that’s pretty much one a year. Impressive hey!
Someone refers to Cornwell’s ‘fanatically loyal fan base’ – someone else inferred that you need to have a bit of background on Ms Scarpetta to make sense of the latest. But what I say is Phew! Can you imagine all those words around one woman – can you imagine all those words from one woman. And from one woman with a story of her own. Cornwell’s father walked out on the family when she was five. Ruth Bell Graham (wife of evangelist Billy) was a key figure in her upbringing (and about whom she wrote a book which seems to have soured the relationship), she was a promising tennis ace, worked as a reporter, suffered anorexia, molestation and depression at different stages and had three novels rejected before the first, Postmortem, was published. With a personal story like that, why would you write about anyone else?
It’s been suggested that Kay Scarpetta is Cornwell’s alter ego – but then she’s also had a long time obsession with Jack the Ripper, about whom she wrote a book called Portrait of a killer - Jack the Ripper, Case Closed. I rest my case.
All of this is a lot to process in an author’s background. But intrigued, I gave Livid, the latest in the Scarpetta series, a go. Truth to tell, I was a bit overwhelmed. Drowned in detail and razor-edged dialogue. The opening chapters of snapping court cross examination set the tone – but I soldiered on. Finally, the take home factor for me, was learning a lot about the American way of speaking, smoking, eating, drinking and thinking – I also found out what livid, and also birddogging, really means. But phewy, I take my hat off to the 100 million devotees – but more especially I take my hat off to Ms Cornwell, and look forward to her autobiography – unless she’s already done it.