Andy Broussard, the plump and proud New Orleans medical examiner, obviously loves food. Less apparent to the casual observer is his hatred of murderers. Together with his gorgeous sidekick, psychologist Kit Franklyn, the two make a powerful, although improbable, mystery solving duo. When the beautiful Kit goes to meet an anonymous stranger—who's been sending her roses—the man drops dead at her feet before she even could even get his name. Game on. Andy Broussard soon learns that the man carried a lethal pathogen similar to the deadly Ebola virus. Soon, another body turns up with the same bug. Panic is imminent as the threat of pandemic is more real than ever before. The danger is even more acute, because the carrier is mobile, his identity is an absolute shocker, he knows he's a walking weapon and... he's on a quest to find Broussard. And Kit isn't safe either. When she investigates her mystery suitor further, she runs fowl of a cold blooded killer, every bit as deadly...

It's a bizarre case for Andy Broussard and Kit Franklyn. A man is found in Jackson Square, stabbed, one eyelid removed and four Scrabble tiles with the letters KOJE on his chest. Soon, there's a second victim, also stabbed and missing one eyelid, but this time with only three letters on his chest, KOJ. The pattern is unmistakable, but does it mean there will be two more victims and then the killer will cease, or is he leading up to something bigger and deadlier? Broussard and Kit use their disciplines to profile the killer, but it soon becomes clear that the clues and objects they've found are part of a sick game that the killer is playing with Broussard; a game most likely engineered by one of the hundreds of attendees at the annual forensics meeting being held in New Orleans. Has Broussard finally met his match?

Broussard and Franklyn pursue justice through the steamy streets of New Orleans in this thriller from "a master of the gothic mystery" (Booklist). Chief medical examiner Andy Broussard is at a family picnic in Bayou Sauvage when his uncle Joe is killed in a murder-suicide. The deceased assailant's motives are unknown, and the mystery sends Broussard digging into his family's past. Meanwhile, criminal psychologist Kit Franklyn finds herself being deputized when an NOPD slowdown forces the brass to bolster the ranks. Assigned to track down a missing woman, Franklyn's case leads her right into Broussard's investigation. Now, the two will have to depend on each other like never before if they are going to uncover the dark family secrets that are about to threaten both of their lives. "Andy and Kit are a match made in mystery heaven." —The Clarion-Ledger

Kit Franklyn, lately drowning in personal doubts about her life and career, thinks that investigating the corpse she found in the garden of her new home will be the perfect distraction. Together with her boss, the loveable and unconventional chief medical examiner Andy Broussard, she sets out to solve this case that's growing colder by the minute. Though they identify the body as a missing hooker, now dead for twenty seven years, all hope of conviction seems lost—until the unorthodox duo link the body and two recent murders to a group of local, wealthy physicians.

Andy Broussard, the plump and proud New Orleans medical examiner, obviously loves food. Less apparent to the casual observer is his hatred of murderers. Together with his gorgeous sidekick, psychologist Kit Franklyn, the two make a powerful, although improbable, mystery solving duo. Among the dead collected in 'The Big Easy' floodwaters after hurricane Katrina are three nude female bodies, all caught in the same brush tangle, none with water in their lungs. No water. Broussard knows this was not an act of God; not the work of Katrina. There's a killer on the loose and by God, Broussard means to find him. But Broussard has perhaps the biggest challenge of his colourful career. The city and all its records are destroyed, practically the entire population is scattered, the police force has no offices and many of the rank and file (who haven't defected) are homeless. And if that's not bad enough, Broussard discovers that the bodies were all once frozen solid, completely obliterating...

Strange lesions found in the brain of a dead man have forensic pathologist Andy Broussard stumped. Even more baffling are the corpse's fingerprints. They belong to Ronald Cicero, a lifer at Angola State Prison... an inmate the warden insists is still there. Broussard sends psychologist Kit Franklyn to find out who is locked up in Cicero's cell. But an astonishing discovery at the jail and an attempt on her life almost has Kit sleeping with the crawfish in a bayou swamp. And Broussard, making a brilliant deduction about another murder, may soon be digging his own grave.