Kathy Reichs

Page Updated: 08/07/2005

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Kathy Reichs - Page 2

Deadly Decisions

Death du Jour

First British Edition Heinemann (2000)

Paperback - Arrow (2001)

Deadly Decisions
The third novel featuring Dr Temperance Brennan

’I settled back and closed my eyes. Questions swirled in my brain, twisting and eddying like the waters of a swollen creek. Who was the third victim? How had he died? Those answers I hoped to find in the lab. When had the death occurred? How had part of the cadaver ended up in a clandestine grave in St Basile? Those queries I figured the Vipers should field. Most perplexing of all was the question of the absent body parts. Where was the rest of the skeleton?'

It is a beautiful spring day and in the quiet woods of the FBI's headquarters at Quantico, Dr Temperance Brennan is teaching a body recovery course. Then comes an urgent phone call recalling her to Quebec, where she is forensic anthropologist for the state. A gruesome duty awaits her: a biker war is raging and two of the foot soldiers have blown themselves up. The only person qualified to make sense of what remains is Tempe.
Like many in Montreal, Tempe cares little what les motards - the bikers - do to each other. Until the body of a nine-year-old girl is wheeled into the morgue, slain in biker crossfire.
Sickened and angry, Tempe vows to fight this evil. When an exhumation brings to light a further mystery, she works day and night to uncover the secrets the bones guard. But can she do so before other innocents die in the escalating violence? Entering the dark biker underworld, Tempe finds herself pitted against dangerous outlaws and organised crime. Unable to turn to her sparring partner Andrew Ryan for help, she finds herself increasingly vulnerable. Will she too make the wrong decision -a deadly decision?
‘Reichs’ fluid prose style and scientific know-how coupled with the unusual setting and situation – biker gangs and organised crime in Montreal – make for a n interesting and intriguing read. Sometimes there is nothing like the real deal’ Sunday Tribune
‘Deadly Decisions is a great read… confident and enthralling’ Manchester Evening News
‘Brisk and intelligent with ideas that give the action a run for its money’ Literary Review
‘Tough, exciting stuff… you are in for a good, chilling time’ Daily Express

First British Edition Heinemann (1999)

Death du Jour
See Review by Val McDermid - Gold Dagger winner & creator of Lindsay Gordon, Kate Brannigan & Tony Hill
The stunning new novel from the award-winning author of Dčja Dead, the international number one bestseller.
'In Quebec, winters can be slow for the forensic anthropologist. The temperature rarely rises above freezing. The rivers and lakes ice over, and the ground turns rock hard, and snow buries everything. Bugs disappear, and many scavengers go underground. People, too, burrow in. Hunters, hikers, and picnickers quit roaming the woods, and some of last season's dead are not found until the spring melt...'
March in Montreal, and from the charred remains of an horrific arson to a trail of sinister cult activity in the Carolinas, Dr Temperance Brennan gathers the evidence to confront the terror of a killer out of control.
Acclaim for Deja Dead
'Deja Dead is terrific and terrifying in its own right, easily rising above Cornwellian similarities... Excellent plotting, appealingly headstrong heroine and superb mastery of tension' The Times
'Reichs can wield a scalpel with the best. The hotter the trail gets the more Brennan puts herself in danger and the bloody climax admirably sets off the tautness of the narrative with a bang' Irish Times
'With its pacy action, gritty realism, insights into an unusual form of detection, a setting in bilingual Montreal and a heroine with a delicious turn of phrase, Deja Dead cannot be beat' The Independent
'"As good as Patricia Cornwell or your money back" comparisons are usually odious, but I doubt there will be a single return on this volume' Mail on Sunday