When a girl's dead body is found in a toy box, forensic physician and pathologist Anya Crichton joins the police hunt in her home state of Tasmania for the child's missing mother and sister. Staying with her increasingly erratic mother, Dr Jocelyn Reynolds, Anya fears the long shadow of her sister Miriam's disappearance has finally driven her mother past the brink of sanity. But Anya soon discovers that Jocelyn is keeping a deadly secret. When tests conclude a virulent strain of food poisoning was responsible for the child's death, the outbreak begins to spread. Anya pairs up with Internal Affairs detective Oliver Parke to unravel the sinister connections between the fatal epidemic, a covered - up study, the shady deals of a multinational corporation and the alleged murder of a local scientist. Anya has strayed into a high - stakes game so dangerous the players will kill to keep it quiet. With time running short, Anya must uncover the truth before she is silenced - permanently. PRAISE FOR KATHRYN FOX 'A compelling talent' Jeffrey Deaver 'Fox is a medical practitioner who has used her interest in forensic medicine to turn thriller writer and is one of the best in the international forensic genre'