While investigating an alleged death by lightning strike, a skeptical Kay Scarpetta receives threatening poems from a cyberbully who calls himself Tailend Charlie, and Kay begins to suspect that he was involved in the suspicious death.

Receiving a surveillance video of her niece taken twenty years earlier that reveals disturbing secrets, Dr. Kay Scarpetta becomes increasingly isolated as she realizes the dangerous legal implications of her niece's private life.

"Chief medical examiner Dr. Kay Scarpetta finds herself in a Northern Virginia wilderness examining the remains of two campers wanted by federal law enforcement. The victims have been savaged beyond recognition, and other evidence is terrifying and baffling, including a larger-than-life footprint. After one of the most frightening body retrievals of her career, Scarpetta must discover who would commit murders this savage, and why."--

Crime scene investigators and police work together in New York City, using forensics to solve crimes.

Sent to medieval Cambridge in order to exonerate Jewish prisoners who have been accused of murdering four children, University of Salerno medical expert Adelia discovers that the killer may be a former crusader.