Body of Evidence (Cornwell)

Discussion Questions 
Use our LitLovers Book Club Resources; they can help with discussions for any book:

• How to Discuss a Book (helpful discussion tips)
• Generic Discussion Questions—Fiction and Nonfiction
• Read-Think-Talk (a guided reading chart)

Also, consider these LitLovers talking points to help get a discussion started for Body of Evidence:

1. Why does the Richmond police department respond in such a cavalier manner to Beryl Madison's call for help? Might they have responded differently had the caller been a male...say, with a heart attack?

2. Did you sniff out the red herrings, or did you fall for them? Red herrings are clues that look promising but turn out to be dead-ends or, even worse, throw you off track. How cleverly were the clues—both real clues and trick ones—laid out in the story line? At what point did you begin to catch on—or did you?

3. What about the actual murderer, who doesn't enter the story until later. Some readers feel that was cheating, a sort of deus ex machina solution. Or do you feel that's an unfair criticism—despite a late entrance, Cornwell integrates the murderer seamlessly into the plot line ?

4. How does Kay's personal life cause turmoil in her career? Do you feel there are times when she compromises her professional life? If so, is that evidence of a major flaw, a peculiarly female weakness, or is it simply being human?

5. Are the passages on forensics interesting or too highly detailed? What about the trip to the FBI Academy's behavioral science unit? Why does Kay go and what does Kay she learn there? Was the trip of interest to you as a reader?

6. Did you enjoy the fast-paced action...or feel Cornwell was pushing too hard. Too many twists and turns to be believable or just enough to be truly suspenseful?

7. What's the title's double meaning refer to?

8. You might also check out the questions for Cornwell's Postmortem—some of them can apply to his mystery as well.

(Questions by LitLovers. Please feel free to use them, online or off, with attribution. Thanks.)

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