Part of Series
Forensic psychiatrist Jo Beckett's specialty is the psychological autopsy- an investigation into a person's life to determine whether a death was natural, accidental, suicide, or homicide. She calls herself a dead=shrinker instead of a head-shrinker: The silence of her "patients" is a key part of the job's attraction. When Jo is asked to do a psychological autopsy on a living person-one with a suspect memory who can't be trusted to participate in his own medical care-she knows all her skills will be put to the test. Jo is called to the scene of an aircraft inbound from London to help deal with a passenger who is behaving erratically. She figures out that he's got anterograde amnesia, and can't form new memories. Jo finds herself racing to save a patient who can walk and talk and yet can't help Jo figure out just what happened to him. For every cryptic clue he is able to drag up from his memory, Jo has to sift through a dozen nonsensical statements. Suddenly a string of clues arises, something to do with a superdeadly biological agent code-named "Slick," a missing wife and son, and a secret partnership gone horribly wrong. Jo realizes her patient's addled mind may hold the key to preventing something terrible from happening in her beloved San Francisco. In order to prevent it, she will have to get deeper into the life of a patient than she ever has before, hoping the truth emerges from the fog of his mind in time to save her city-and herself.
Author
Meg Gardiner is the #1 New York Times bestselling author of sixteen thrillers. Heat 2, her latest novel, is a prequel/sequel to the film Heat, co-authored with the film’s writer/director, Michael Mann. Booklist’s starred review calls it “Riveting… the fully fleshed human stories support and even transcend the often-breathtaking action.” The Associated Press says, “Slick as a Neil McCauley heist and as intense as a Vincent Hanna chase, ‘Heat 2’ is just dynamite.” It debuted at #1 on the NYT best seller list. UNSUB, the first novel in her series featuring FBI agent Caitlin Hendrix, won the 2018 Barry Award for Best Thriller. The Dark Corners of the Night, the most recent UNSUB thriller, was bought by Amazon Studios for development as an hour-long television drama. Meg is the author of the Evan Delaney series, the Jo Beckett novels, and several stand alones. China Lake won the 2009 Edgar award for Best Paperback Original. The Nightmare Thief won the 2012 Audie Award for Thriller/Suspense audiobook of the year. Phantom Instinct was one of O, the Oprah magazine's "Best Books of Summer." Meg was born in Oklahoma and raised in Santa Barbara, California. A graduate of Stanford Law School, she practiced law in Los Angeles and taught writing at the University of California Santa Barbara. She's also a three-time Jeopardy! champion. She lives in Austin, Texas. Find Meg on Facebook: Facebook.com/MegGardinerBooks Twitter: @MegGardiner1 and Instagram: @Meggardiner1. Series: * UNSUB * Evan Delaney * Jo Beckett
