Bitter Instinct

by Robert W. Walker

Book Overview

FBI Medical Examiner Dr. Jessica Coran is investigating a series of bizarre murders attributed to the Poet. His calling card is human skin engraved with toxic ink and verse. For Jessica, the most baffling aspect of the crimes is that no victim shows signs of resistance, or even fear. Only she has the insight to read between the Poet's lines-and to stop him before his final stroke of insane genius.

• Format: Mass Market Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0515135690
• ISBN13: 9780515135695
• Release Date: March 2003
• Publisher: Jove Books
• Length: 400 Pages
• Weight: 1.54 lbs.
• Dimensions: 1.1" x 4.3" x 7.0"

Customer Reviews

This instinct is very bitter indeed!

I have throughly enjoyed the instinct series so far. This latest novel is no exception. Jessica is in London, looking for a vicious killer, no surprise there, however, JT gets left behind on an interesting John Doe case. The tattooed man has no identity, only his tattoos, which JT tries to track him down on. This time, we don't know the identity of the killer and this makes the story much more thrilling. A real whodunit! I can't wait for the next one!Thanks for reading!**Pandora

WALKER IS BETTER THAN SANDFORD & KELLERMAN!

Robert W. Walker is a fascinating author. I feel that he is one of the best suspense novelists there is. Every one of his Instinct novels and Edge novels are fun, exhilirating, and worthwile to read. FBI Agent Dr. Jessica Coran is a well-developed character, who is enjoyable and exciting to read about. In "Bitter Instinct," there is a killer on the loose who is dubbed as The Poet. At the beginning of the novel, in Philadelphia, he has already killed three victims. Engraved with a sharp pen, the Poet poisons his victims and then writes a few lines of poetry on their back. The Philadelphia police are stumped and ask for the help of Jessica Coran. As Coran and her psychic agent, Kim Desinor, try to capture this sadistic killer, they have to be on the lookout for their own lives. After investigating for days and coming up with no leads, they get a call from a dean the local college who claims to know the identity of the killer. Is this prestigious professor a killer? Is it someone not affiliated with college? Or is it the dean herself? "Bitter Instinct" is an amazing novel with twists and turns everywhere. If you are going to read one suspense novel this summer, then read "Bitter Instinct."

Chilling medical thriller

He calls himself the Poet. His targets trust him so much so they cooperate as he engraves a piece of his epic verse on their backs. His victims are unaware that the ink is poison and soon leads to a swift, painless death. The Poet believes that his victims are angels who must return home so that when every one of them are finally gone, he will be transferred into an angel too.After the third similar death, the Philadelphia police realize they have made no progress in catching this serial killer that leaves a calling card. The FBI sends two agents, medical examiner Dr. Jessica Coran and psychic expert Kim Desinow, to join the local task force. They quickly learn that the young have taken to having poetry written on their backs as a form of twisted homage. This makes tracing clues that much more difficult as this counterculture phenomena hides the culprit's trail behind wrong suspects. As the murder count rises, the City of Brotherly Love Task Force finds little to feel friendly about as they fail to gain any ground on identifying the murderer.BITTER INSTINCT is a very frightening police thriller that shows the difficulty in catching a destructive individual when society adopts him as a hero. Robert W. Walker combines the best of Cornwell with Koontz in this psychological terror investigative novel. The heroine is quite good as a person struggling to profile a "popular" killer whose camouflage is inadvertently developed by the teens of the city. Mr. Walker has another captivating novel that readers will fully appreciate.Harriet Klausner