Patricia Cornwell Books In Order – Complete List

Reading the Patricia Cornwell books in order depends on which series you’re looking at – or whether it’s a series you want to read or her standalone novels, in the first place. Especially the Kay Scarpetta books can be considered a lengthy series, so what is the order of New York Times Bestselling author Patricia Cornwell’s Scarpetta books?

Here is the author book list in proper reading order with the series sorted in order of publication. The chronological order is the same.

Latest Patricia Cornwell Book

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Kay Scarpetta Books in Publication Order

1. Postmortem, 1990
2. Body of Evidence, 1991
3. All That Remains, 1992
4. Cruel and Unusual, 1993
5. The Body Farm, 1994
6. From Potter’s Field, 1995
7. Cause of Death, 1996
8. Unnatural Exposure, 1997
9. Point of Origin, 1998
10. Black Notice, 1999
11. The Last Precinct, 2000
12. Blow Fly, 2003
13. Trace, 2004
14. Predator, 2005
15. Book of the Dead, 2007
16. Scarpetta, 2008
17. The Scarpetta Factor, 2009
18. Port Mortuary, 2010
19. Red Mist, 2011
20. The Bone Bed, 2012
21. Dust, 2013
22. Flesh and Blood, 2014
23. Depraved Heart, 2015
24. Chaos, 2016
25. Autopsy, 2021
26. Livid, 2022
27. Unnatural Death, 2023
28. Identity Unkown, 2024

Andy Brazil Books in Publication Order

1. Hornet’s Nest, 1996
2. Southern Cross, 1998
3. Isle of Dogs, 2001

Winston Garano Books in Publication Order

1. At Risk, 2006
2. The Front, 2008

Captain Chase Books in Publication Order

Captain Calli Chase, a NASA pilot, quantum physicist, and cybercrime investigator

1. Quantum, 2019
2. Spin, 2021

Picture Books

• Life’s Little Fable, 1999

Short Story Anthologies

• The Mammoth Encyclopedia of Modern Crime Fiction, 2002

Non-Fiction Books in Publication Order

• A Time for Remembering, 1985
• Ruth, A Portrait: The Story of Ruth Bell Graham, 1997
• Scarpetta’s Winter Table, 1998
• Food To Die For: Secrets From Kay Scarpetta’s Kitchen, 2002
• Portrait Of A Killer: Jack The Ripper — Case Closed, 2002
• Chasing the Ripper, 2014
• Ripper: The Secret Life of Walter Sickert, 2017

Who is Kay Scarpetta?

Virginia’s Chief Medical Examiner Dr. Kay Scarpetta is of Italian descent both from her father’s and mother’s sides. Over the years, aka over several books, she moved quite a lot to various cities. In the first few novels, she was working in Richmond as the Chief Medical Examiner for the Commonwealth of Virginia.

Later, after what happened in The Last Precinct, she moved to Florida to become a private forensic consultant. In Trace, she moved back to Virginia. In The Book of the Dead she moved again to Charleston in South Carolina as a freelance forensic examiner/expert.

In Predator, forensic pathologist Kay Scarpetta becomes the head of the National Forensic Academy in Hollywood, Florida, which is a private institution founded by her wealthy niece, Lucy. Then she moved to New York, working full time.

Virginia’s Chief Medical Examiner Dr. Kay Scarpetta is quite a perfectionist and a true workaholic. Being of Italian descent, she does love Italian food, not only to eat it but also to make it. In terms of relationships, she married Tony Benedetti while at law school, but after several years they divorced, following which she had a relationship with Mark James, who eventually died in a London Tube station bombing. Her latest relationship was with Benton Wesley whom she eventually married.

Patricia Cornwell Biography – About the Author

One of the biggest names in crime fiction, Patricia Cornwell, was born in 1956 in Miami and grew up in Montreat, North Carolina.

During her childhood, Patricia suffered extensive emotional abuse. In an interview where she was asked why she is focusing on psychopaths in her books, the author mentioned it’s because she “grew up with terrible fear.” After her father left the family on a Christmas day when Patricia was only 5 years old, she was also molested by a convicted pedophile.

Thankfully nothing really bad happened, but it was enough to shake her to the core. When her brother appeared on his bicycle, the guy was trying to take Patricia to his car, which would have most likely ended up in her death.

Thus, in 1961, her mother took her and her two brothers and moved to Montreat, since she feared for the well-being of her kids. During school, Patricia was quite the bright A student, she was a good athlete and quite the talented cartoonist.

She attended Davidson College where she earned her English degree in 1979. She got her first job the same year, working for the Charlotte Observer where she did various jobs, starting from listing TV programs to covering the police beat as a crime reporter.

In 1981, she began working on the biography of Ruth Bell Graham, wife of the famous evangelist Billy Graham, who took Patricia in when her mother became sick.

After leaving her job as a journalist behind, in 1985 she started working as a technical writer and later a computer analyst with the Office of the Chief Medical Examiner of Virginia, where she stayed for six years. She also served there as a volunteer police officer. This is the very place that her fictional character, forensic pathologist Kay Scarpetta, would work at as well.

Her first novel, Postmortem, was written during this time, and while initially it was not successfully received, it was eventually published, and it became the first book in her popular crime series. This basically launched her writing career. The author is living in Boston where she is working on her next book.

Postmortem, published in 1990, is, I think, also her most popular book as well. It is really the book that started a new trend with CSI-style novels – forensic anthropology mystery books involved in solving brutal murders, and serial killer cases, all that would take the fiction genre by storm.

Not many people know, but the author of the popular dr. Kay Scarpetta novels has also written a couple of non-fiction books, among them being two foodie books as well – and they’re great too, and in addition a children’s book.

She also created two additional crime series focusing on Andy Brazil, a young journalist turned cop in Virginia, as well as the Win Garano series with center stage taken by Winston Garano in Boston. The author’s latest series, Captain Chase, features the main character as a NASA pilot, quantum physicist, and cybercrime investigator.

Over the years, the author sold over 100 million books all over the world and her novels were translated into close to 40 languages. An interesting side note is that the author appeared as herself on TV in one of the Criminal Minds episodes, “True Genius.”

Just like Dan Brown, she also had legal issues. The author of the Virginia Ghost Murders, Leslie Sachs, accused Patricia of plagiarism for her The Last Precinct novel, saying that the two books have too many similarities to be a mere coincidence.

During the trial, Patricia was awarded $37,780 in damages that she had to pay to defend herself from the other author’s attacks. Sachs also was permanently banned from defaming her in any shape or form in the future.

After the ending of her first marriage, in 2005 Cornwell married Stacy Ann Gruber, a psychiatry professor at Harvard, with whom she lives in Boston, Massachusetts.

In her book Depraved Heart, she made sure to point out just how useless the FBI is at times since they want to get people even when they are completely innocent. This was something like a literary revenge for what she had to endure at the hands of the FBI during that fateful year.

Should We Read The Patricia Cornwell Novels In Order?

The question is relevant to her 3 mystery series, but most importantly to her Kay Scarpetta novels. Having read the books, I’d suggest reading them in publication order – incidentally, in the case of all three series, the right chronological order is also the order in which the books were published.

You will see not only dr. Kay Scarpetta developing her personality through the books, but you will also get to learn about her relationship with her niece, Lucy Farinelli, which is worth learning about for the intensity of it. Overall sure, you can read them in any order you choose as the action evolved one story per book, but the characters develop, mature, and progress from novel to novel. Worth not missing out on.

As a side note, what I’m really waiting for (aside from the latest dr. Kay Scarpetta book, of course) is the new movie to be played by Angelina Jolie. We don’t know when the movie will air yet (it was initially rumored to air in 2015, but that deadline passed a long time ago).

What is Patricia Cornwell’s Latest Book?

The author’s latest book is part of the Kay Scarpetta book series, #28, called Identity Unkown, published in October 2024.

Books Adaptations to Film and TV

• At Risk was the first adaptation of any book by Cornwell. It aired in 2010 based on the book with the same title. It featured Andie MacDowell as Massachusetts State Investigator Win Garano.
• The Front was the sequel to At Risk, and it aired the same year, in 2010. The film continued the story of Win Garano, portrayed again by Andie MacDowell.
• Scarpetta is an upcoming TV series based on the Kay Scarpetta novels. The TV show, imply called Scarpetta, features Nicole Kidman as Kay Scarpetta and Jamie Lee Curtis as Dorothy Farinelli, Kay’s sister. Additional actors that joined the crew are Sircar as Blaise Fruge, a policewoman, Diop joins as Sierra “Tron” Patron, who is a Cyber Investigator with the FBI. The series is being created by Liz Sarnoff for Amazon Prime Video. The filming started in October 2024 in Nashville and it has a tentative release date year of 2025.

Patricia Cornwell Awards and Nominations

Some of the articles she wrote on prostitution and crime in the downtown Charlotte area brought her a lot of attention, praise, and respect, and this was when she received her first award, the North Carolina Press Association’s Investigative Reporting Award.

She also got several other awards, including the French Prix du Roman d’Aventure, the British John Creasey Award, and the American Edgar Award.

• Postmortem – winner of the Anthony Awards Best First Novel in 1991
• Book of the Dead – winner of the BCA Crime Thriller of the Year Best Novel in 2008