SOURCE: Scott, Mary. “The Knives are Out.” New Statesman & Society 8, no. 374 (13 October 1995): 32–33.

In the following review, Scott offers a mixed assessment of From Potter's Field, comparing the novel to Minette Walters's The Dark Room.

Gault is a pathological killer who arranges his dead victims in surreal poses. Dr Kay Scarpetta is a pathologist. Their cat and mouse game is brought to its conclusion in Patricia Cornwell's latest novel [From Potter's Field].

Why does Gault kill? Psychiatrist Anna tells Dr Kay “you are his mother and he brings you what he kills.” Why does Dr Kay, a qualified lawyer and doctor, persist in her quite horrid chosen field? “I don't know,” she confesses. Dr Kay is an enigma. Her life outside the morgue is near to non-existent. A dying mother she doesn't visit; a lesbian niece more interested in computers than her aunt; a married man with whom she...