Books like Ruth, a portrait by Patricia Cornwell

When a 26‑year‑old bicyclist dies under strange circumstances, forensic chief Kay Scarpetta suspects foul play and is stalked by a cyberbully sending cryptic poems. The case unfolds against a backdrop of forensic science, media scrutiny, and personal stakes.

Ruth follows a Moabite widow into Israel, leaving her native faith for the God of the Israelites while working the fields, meeting Boaz, and cultivating a steadfast devotion that inspires generations, as portrayed in Lois Henderson’s vivid biblical novel.

Dr. Kay Scarpetta, working freelance in Florida, investigates a cold case that travels from sunny Southern shores to icy Boston, confronting a cunning killer whose psyche tests her limits.

Little Emily Steiner is dead. She left a North Carolina church meeting late one October afternoon and strolled along a lakeside path toward her house two miles away. Who met her on the path? Who followed her home, kidnapped her from her bedroom, and left her body by the lake days later? It's a puzzling and terrifying crime, reminiscent of the work of serial killer Temple Gault, who has long eluded Dr. Kay Scarpetta and the FBI's Investigative Support Unit in Quantico, Virginia, where Scarpetta consults as a forensic pathologist. At the request of the North Carolina authorities, Scarpetta and her colleagues, Benton Wesley and Pete Marino, fly to the mountains near Asheville to assist. They find a mother in mourning and an investigation in disarray. It's particularly frustrating to work a homicide after the fact. An inexperienced pathologist missed or misinterpreted some of the evidence, leaving Scarpetta with inconclusive medical and laboratory reports, and photographs that only raise questions. What, for instance, is the strange mark on the child's body that causes Scarpetta to plead with a reluctant judge for an exhumation? What is the meaning of trace evidence from a plant not indigenous to the Carolinas? And where did the killer obtain the unique blaze-orange duct tape, with which he bound Emily and her mother? Most puzzling of all is the question of when Emily died. She disappeared the night of October 1. Her nude body was found a week later. Scarpetta's obsession with time leads her to The Body Farm, a little-known research facility in Tennessee where, with the help of some grisly experiments, she might discover the answer. It is Scarpetta alone who can interpret the forensic hieroglyphics that eventually reveal a solution to the case as staggering as it is horrifying. Scarpetta not only must search for a killer, she must endeavor to help her niece Lucy, who is accused of espionage while interning at the FBI's highly classified Engineering and Research Facility in Quantico. And she must reach out to Marino, who retreats deeply into a strange relationship that may wreck his career and ruin his life. Scarpetta, too, is vulnerable, as she opens herself to the first physical and emotional bond she has felt in far too long a time. This is Scarpetta even more realized and poignant than we've seen her before, tenacious and brilliant, tender and gentle. The Body Farm is a stunning achievement from a bestselling author at the peak of her powers.

A gripping historical mystery about a young woman struggling to navigate the dangerous underworld of Prohibition-era Newark, featuring supernatural elements and strong family dynamics.

Retells the Old Testament tale of the faithful daughter-in-law showing how the events of the story reveal the history of that period.

A spirited young woman seeks freedom from an unwanted marriage and heads west, only to find her own heart and a marshal’s duty caught in a budding romance.