Forensic psychiatrist Jo Beckett's specialty is the psychological
autopsy--an investigation into a person's life to determine whether a
death was natural, accidental, suicide, or homicide. She calls herself a
deadshrinker instead of a headshrinker: The silence of her "patients" is
a key part of the job's attraction. When Jo is asked to do a
psychological autopsy on a living person--one with a suspect memory who
can't be trusted to participate in his own medical care--she knows all
her skills will be put to the test.
Jo is called to the scene of an aircraft inbound from London to help
deal with a passenger who is behaving erratically. She figures out that
he's got anteretrograde amnesia, and can't form new memories. As his
thoughts drift away like tendrils of smoke, Jo finds herself racing to
save a patient who can walk and talk yet can't help her figure out just
what happened to him. For every cryptic clue he is able to drag up from
his memory, Jo has to sift through a dozen nonsensical statements.
Suddenly a string of clues arises--something to do with a superdeadly
biological agent code-named "Slick," missing people, and a secret
partnership gone horribly wrong. Jo realizes her patient's addled mind
may hold the key to preventing something terrible from happening in her
beloved San Francisco. In order to prevent it, she will have to get
deeper into the life of a patient than she ever has before, hoping the
truth emerges from the fog of his mind in time to save her city--and
herself.
