Kidman and Curtis compare themselves to ‘Scarpetta’ characters
Nicole Kidman and Jamie Lee Curtis reveal how they match and differ from their Scarpetta characters.
Patricia Cornwell spent much of her career working in a morgue. She wanders through a corpse farm full of decomposing corpses. She tattooed a turkey she bought at a grocery store to see how it would fade after death.
The author of Kay Scarpetta’s novels is known for turning herself into forensic science for her research, but this time she’ll be dissecting her own life.
If you’ve ever wondered what kind of mental fortitude it takes to spend all day dealing with violent crime, real or imagined, her memoir may be the answer. True Crime (now available from Grand Central Publishing) follows the author from his mentally unstable childhood, to his tenure as a police reporter, to the peak of his career as a thriller writer.
Patricia Cornwell runs towards fear in the style of ‘True Crime’
Cornwell’s mother suffered from episodes of psychotic depression and sent her to a psychiatric hospital while Cornwell and her siblings lived with abusive foster parents. Cornwell learned from his mother at an early age that the world was dangerous. “She always predicted what would hurt or kill us,” she writes.
Life would prove this to Cornwell again and again. She revealed that she was sexually abused when she was five years old, and later raped and drugged by a police officer in her early adulthood. She wrote that TV and radio host Larry King pressed his hand against her crotch during the flight.
For Cornwell, writing is cathartic, and he likes to tackle his fears head-on. She’s afraid of sharks, so she says she naturally reads every article she finds about sharks. She thinks about the dangers that lurk around her. Scaffolding that can fall, escalators that can be torn apart.
“Most people are on autopilot and just wandering off into the unknown,” Cornwell said. “There’s a difference between being cautious and being afraid. Fear is very dangerous. You don’t want to be ruled by fear. A life ruled by fear is doomed, because it prevents you from doing anything you need to do to achieve success and purpose.”
The same research lens applies to her trauma. In Scarpetta’s first book, Postmortem, a police reporter is raped by a district attorney. Although details have changed, the plot was largely inspired by Cornwell’s own rape while she was a reporter for the Charlotte Observer. In hindsight, writing about it was a “therapeutic act,” she says.
Patricia Cornwell takes a scalpel to childhood abuse, eating disorders and intergenerational trauma
Cornwell’s childhood memories are unusually detailed. But it’s not her fictional talent that comes into play here. Much of “True Crime” comes from a manuscript Cornwell wrote when she was 19, a “thinly veiled” autobiography about her eating disorder. She submitted about 300 pages for her university thesis, put it in a box, and never read it again.
When she reread the book in her 60s, she discarded the language but retained a vivid memory.
“Without Patsy Daniels (her maiden name) from way back when, I wouldn’t be writing this book today, and without Patricia Cornwell, her work would never have seen the light of day,” says Cornwell. “The best part about it was that I felt like I went back and saved the child.
“I was surprised at what I realized at the time and how to explain it. And I found it to be quite humbling. I had more respect for the young person who was there, who I didn’t think was any good at anything.”
A childhood in limbo is also brought into painful focus here. Cornwell introduces readers to her parents’ rocky relationship (“They were practically destroying each other,” she says) and her mother’s struggles with her mental health. In one case, the mother gathered up all of her children’s clothes and belongings and threw them into a fire before being admitted to the hospital.
“This is not just my story,” Cornwell says with the eyes of a journalist and mystery writer. She traces her family tree to explain her mother’s mental health issues and investigates her grandfather and great-grandfather, who fell to their deaths under somewhat mysterious circumstances. The family tragedy affected the next generation. Cornwell did not have children because she feared the “abandonment, loss and fear” she felt from her parents would be transmitted to her.
Cornwell is an individual. She is dealing with a stalker. She said she felt “uneasy” having her personal life under the microscope, but “it’s important to do what you have to do, even if it’s a little scary.”
“If anyone was destined for disaster or failure, it was me, to be honest, but it didn’t turn out that way. So it should give hope in your own story to others, especially artists and dreamers, and people who feel hopeless because they keep failing at what they want to do. I understand that feeling.”
A look back at Scarpetta at Nicole Kidman’s new show
Scarpetta fans will enjoy a trip down memory lane with “True Crime.” When Scarpetta debuted earlier this year, the film finally hit the silver screen starring Nicole Kidman. But getting there wasn’t easy.
Cornwell reminisces about Kay Scarpetta wannabes, including Susan Sarandon, Jodie Foster, and Demi Moore. Cornwell has regrets about Moore. Although Moore did her best to prepare for the role of Scarpetta, the film adaptation failed. Around the same time, Cornwell overturned his car on the highway and was charged with drunk driving. Cornwell canceled a study visit with Moore to the FBI Academy.
“I said I needed to understand why I didn’t die,” she writes. “All I had in mind was the movie.”
It wasn’t until she became friends with Jamie Lee Curtis that the film adaptation passed the screenplay stage. Curtis wanted Kidman for the role.
“I thought it was great, but at the same time I really didn’t believe it. I didn’t believe it would happen,” Cornwell says. “Every step of the way, I kept waiting for the problem to go away. I didn’t believe it was going to happen until we actually started filming. And until it actually aired, I kept wondering if something was going to go wrong, because it always does.”
Cornwell praises Amazon Prime for being a “book-centric” studio that stays true to beloved books like Scarpetta. And Kidman is “immersed” in the world of forensic science, Cornwell said.
“Welcome to my scary world, this is not for the faint of heart,” says Cornwell. “It’s not an easy role. And like I said, the person who was going to do this had to deal with 36 years of fans. It was a very tall order, but she pulled it off.”
With all of his attention now focused on Scarpetta, it’s hard to imagine that there was ever a time when Cornwell considered quitting the bestseller. After her 2016 book Chaos, she took a five-year hiatus. Amid the pandemic, Cornwell was struck by inspiration. She tried to call the hero out of his hiding place.
“‘I’m wondering if you would like to work on a case together again,’ I ventured. ‘It depends on what it is,'[Scarpetta]replied, implying that it had better be a good one,” Cornwell wrote.
Autopsy was published in 2021. Since then, Cornwell has published a steady stream of books each year. If she were to retire from Scarpetta once and for all, she would be making a major change in direction. Cornwell had always wanted to ride a rocket for research. Scarpetta might be able to do some good research on the moon.
“She’s going to do that. Someone’s going to die there. They’re going to need people,” Cornwell says.
Claire Mulroy is USA TODAY’s books reporter, covering hot releases, chatting with authors, and diving into reading culture. please find her on instagramsubscribe to our weekly magazine book newsletter Or tell her what you’re reading cmulroy@usatoday.com.
