In 1894 France, Madeleine Karno hopes to
follow in her father’s footsteps as a pathologist. She is passionate about
medicine and especially about science and how it can help the dead 'speak.' When
a young girl is found lifeless outside her own home, the autopsy can find no
evidence of murder; however, the discovery of tiny mites in her nostrils leads
Madeleine and her father on a lengthy investigation involving the girl’s family,
a priest, abused children, and a convent school that has a three-hundred year
tradition of keeping wolves.
By the end, the story is littered with
corpses, each needing careful pathological inspection. Madeleine is chillingly threatened, but she lives and justice
prevails.