Lethal Control: A Doctor Nora Kelly Mystery

A MYSTERIOUS BLUE PATIENT IS ABANDONED AT OAKLAND CITY HOSPITAL. Doctor Nora Kelly must outwit a powerful corporate adversary to diagnose her patient's illness and safeguard her community.


An anonymous blue patient is abandoned at the doorstep of Oakland City Hospital and cries out for her young daughter before passing out. Doctor Nora Kelly must struggle against the clock to diagnose her patient's life-threatening illness and mysterious discoloration. The task becomes more difficult when the patient awakens but refuses to speak with anyone on staff, fearing reprisals from immigration and child-protection authorities.

Nora suspects that her patient's illness is caused by exposure to toxic chemicals, and she worries that others in the community may be endangered as well. But the patient remains silent. Only after learning that Nora saved her life does she agree to answer Nora's burning questions-still, for a price. In return, Nora must deliver a confidential message to her daughter.

Nora's end of that bargain is the beginning of a perilous journey that leads to a homeless encampment at a decrepit local stadium site. With the help of her colleagues, she desperately searches for the daughter as she also discovers that other encampment residents have succumbed to toxic exposures. Her insistent attempts to prove the site's environmental contamination come up against powerful systemic forces and trigger dangerous personal consequences.

Editorial Reviews

"Scannell lifts the veil on the life-and-death struggles taking place both inside and around the edges of an urban hospital. A fast-paced drama of overlapping lives, conflicting emotions, and the threats posed by immigration, human trafficking, and environmental degradation." -Leslie Larson, author of Breaking Out of Bedlam


"With Lethal Control, Kate Scannell crafts a mystery threaded with social activism and environmental justice. In present-day Oakland, California, Nora Kelly is a doctor in a community hospital. When a number of desperately ill homeless people are brought into her care, Kelly is pulled into a web of intrigue surrounding the redevelopment of a local stadium site where her patients camp.With the aid of her colleagues, Kelly investigates the site's potential contamination. As the novel races toward its conclusion, she uncovers a decades-old conspiracy that interweaves many of Oakland's most pressing social problems, including homelessness, environmental racism and gentrification. Scannell excels at characterization, bringing a vibrancy to individuals from a wide range of backgrounds, from debutantes to homeless individuals... The plot is taut and engaging... Scannell's authorial gaze is remarkably compassionate, especially to those who have been discarded by society at large. In addition to being an intriguing mystery, the novel is a cry for social activism..." -BlueInk Review

Clarion Rating: 4 out of 5 Lethal Control is a physician-led mystery with a strong social message...This series title includes characters from a previous volume
their introductions here are light, but their personalities are still made apparent... And the book's mystery elements are punctuated with scenes of medical drama...These varying stories connect in the high-energy resolution, in which Nora's fears-and her willingness to push through them-are validated... -Foreword Clarion Reviews