Still Life with Crows
 |
|
| Author |
Lincoln Child, Douglas Preston |
|---|---|
| Country | United States |
| Language | English |
| Series | Aloysius Pendergast |
| Genre | Thriller, science fiction |
| Publisher | Grand Central Publishing |
|
Publication date
|
July 1, 2003 |
| Media type | Print, e-book, audiobook |
| Pages | 480 pp. |
| ISBN | |
| OCLC | 51088139 |
| 813/.54 21 | |
| LC Class | PS3566.R3982 S7 2003 |
| Preceded by | The Cabinet of Curiosities |
| Followed by | Brimstone |
Still Life with Crows is a thriller novel by American authors Douglas Preston and Lincoln Child, released on July 1, 2003 by Grand Central Publishing. It is the fourth novel (behind Relic (1995), Reliquary (1997) and The Cabinet of Curiosities (2002)) to feature FBI Special Agent Pendergast as protagonist.
Agent Pendergast visits Medicine Creek, Kansas after a gruesome murder occurs. With the help of local teenaged misfit Corrie Swanson, he continues to investigate as more citizens are killed. Pendergast is soon led to believe that the murderer must be a member of the community. He soon discovers that the murders are connected to an old curse.
A mutilated corpse is found in a cornfield in Medicine Creek, Kansas, drawing Agent Pendergast there. Since he is technically on vacation, he has no official status or resources, and is barely tolerated by the local Sheriff, Hazen.
The victim, a petty con artist and relic hunter named Sheila Swegg, was found naked in a clearing, with her neck broken. A grisly tableau around the body, consisting of crows impaled on arrows, indicates the work of a serial killer. Pendergast surprises the police when he notices that the arrows are genuine 19th century Cheyenne artifacts, and moreover are almost impossibly well-preserved.
Pendergast shares some of these details with the editor of the town newspaper, in exchange for an overview of the town and its population. Based on his information, the editor produces a somewhat sensationalist news story, associating the murder with a local town legend, "The Curse of the Forty-Fives."
But Pendergast upsets both the Sheriff and the editor with his opinion that the killer is local to Medicine Creek, for the simple reason that the town is so isolated that no one could have entered the area from outside without being seen.
Finding it inconvenient to conduct his investigations on foot, Pendergast hires a local teenager, Corrie Swanson, to chauffeur him around in her battered AMC Gremlin. Corrie, a Goth who lives alone with her alcoholic mother, is the town misfit, who has frequently been arrested for loitering. Though she is suspicious of Pendergast, she eagerly accepts his offer of $100 a day, just for her driving skills and the benefit of her familiarity with the town.
...
Wikipedia