The mysterious death of diver Ted Eddings, an investigative reporter, and the murder of a morgue assistant driving her car lead medical examiner Kay Scarpetta, her niece, and police captain Pete Marino on the trail of a deadly supremacist group. 1,200,000 first printing. Lit Guild, Doubleday, & Mystery Guild Main. Patricia Cornwell's heroine Dr. Kay Scarpetta is back; this time to solve the mystery of the death of an Associated Press reporter who was killed while nosing about in a decommissioned navy yard. Scarpetta's involvement in the case leads her to be targeted for murder herself by a nasty little neo-fascist cult with delusions of grandeur that include a plan to "kill and maim, frighten, brainwash and torture" all who oppose their plan to rule the world. Helping Scarpetta is her niece Lucy, an F.B.I. agent whose computer expertise leads to a heart-stopping journey into cyberspace. On New Year's Eve, a scuba diver, identified as investigative reporter Ted Eddings, is found dead 30 feet below the surface of the Elizabeth River. Was Eddings hunting for Civil War relics or fishing for a bigger story in the Inactive Naval Ship Yard? An anonymous phone call reporting the death draws Virginia medical examiner Kay Scarpetta into the case. The murder of a morgue assistant driving Scarpetta's car and the discovery of radioactive material on the passenger side puts Scarpetta, her niece Lucy, and colleagues Wesley Benton and Pete Morino on the trail of a right-wing militia group who eventually seize a nuclear power plant. After the disappointing From Potter's Field (LJ 8/95), Cornwell's seventh novel is an improvement, though it is not quite as good as her earlier books. Her plot is still contrived, but her characters are more fully developed. Perhaps one day Cornwell will devote a novel to the troubled, complicated Lucy. For popular fiction collections. -?Wilda Williams, "Library Journal" Copyright 1996 Reed Business Information, Inc. Her publisher is giving it plenty of prepub hype, but Cornwell's latest crime novel is, frankly, disappointing. Her usually crisp prose and gripping plots have turned mushy, vague, and unsatisfying. In her latest case, the always savvy Dr. Kay Scarpetta investigates the death of a young reporter who has apparently drowned at Virginia's Inactive Navy Shipyard. Scarpetta suspects the death wasn't an accident, and in her effort to get to the bottom of the case, she soon finds herself and her loved ones the targets of violence. The plot quickly turns bizarre and nearly inexplicable: there's a Branch Davidian^-like cult with a plan to take over the world, the invasion of a nuclear power plant and the disruption of the entire Virginia power and electric system, a band of violence-prone Middle Eastern terrorists, and--oh, yes--the resurrection of Scarpetta's long-dormant love affair with FBI agent Benton Wesley. The story has Cornwell's trademark emphasis on detailed forensics and the requisite amounts of action and gore, but this time that's about all. Still, Cornwell's multitude of fans will probably forgive her for any weaknesses. When you're as hot as she is at the moment, bestsellerdom is almost an afterthought. Buy plenty--there's certain to be a huge demand. Emily Melton The fascination with monstrous evil that's run through Cornwell's recent work (From Potter's Field, 1995, etc.) blossoms with a vengeance when Virginia Chief Medical Examiner Dr. Kay Scarpetta is called out on New Year's Eve to examine the body of Ted Eddings, an investigative reporter killed during an unauthorized dive in Norfolk's Inactive Naval Ship Yard. The typically arresting opening sequences--which take Scarpetta from beneath the icy waters of the Elizabeth River to the morgue, where she makes a shocking discovery about the manner of Eddings's death--masterfully set up all the conflicts that follow, from Scarpetta's instant antipathy to the Chesapeake police detective who'll end up lodging a sexual harassment complaint against her to her uneasy examination of the Book of Hand, the Bible of radical New Zionist messiah Joel Hand. And the momentum builds through a second murder, as usual unnervingly close to Scarpetta (has any series heroine ever survived so many deaths by proxy?). It's not till Scarpetta joins her brainy FBI niece Lucy and her tormented FBI lover Benton Wesley, who's leaving his wife but still can't commit himself to Scarpetta, to run the New Zionists' nefarious, incredible plot to ground and flush them out of their hidey-hole that Cornwell's apocalyptic moralizing turns shrill and unconvincing. Full marks, as always, for the gripping forensic detail and beleaguered Scarpetta's legendary toughness. It's only the sketchy, unbelievable villains who ring hollow. (First printing of 1,000,000; $750,000 ad/promo budget; Literary Guild main selection; Mystery Guild main selection) -- Copyright ©1996, Kirkus Associates, LP. All rights reserved. If the opening scenes ... don't grab you, then you'r