Have been growing increasingly disappointed with the Kay Scarpetta series, and this one continues the trend. Without the context of the previous books of the series, the characters behave in pointless and confusing ways. Why are Marino and Kay angry at each other? What is the Academy? Who is Benton Wesley, and what on earth is Lucy's problem? Even with the history of the previous books, the characters are flat, and their behaviour bizarre without being interesting. Even the new characters, Joe, Dr Self, Hog and Basil, are dull and shallow. The lack of a credible back story, the overly complicated plot and the reliance on characterisation set out in previous books to explain behaviour in this book is just plain lazy. A novel is supposed to be able to stand in its own right as an independent work, not just as an episode in an ongoing soap opera. Who really cares about citrus canker, anyway?