All That Remains

All That Remains is a crime novel by Patricia Cornwell, published in 1992. It is the third installment of the series featuring Dr. Kay Scarpetta, the chief medical examiner of Virginia. The book is closely based on the Colonial Parkway Killer, a suspected serial killer believed to have murdered eight people in Virginia in the 1980s, cases that remained unsolved for decades.

The story begins when Scarpetta is called to the latest crime scene linked to a killer who stalks young couples in Richmond. The bodies are missing and clues are scarce. The investigation, involving FBI profiler Benton Wesley and Lieutenant Pete Marino, grows complicated by the suspicion that the disappearance of one victim, the daughter of a senior national drug policy official, may have political motives. Together with crime reporter Abby Turnbull, who believes authorities are concealing something, Scarpetta reconstructs the victims' final hours and pursues a local man whose license plate she traces to a stolen vehicle. Theories also point to a rogue operative tied to a nearby training camp.

The novel blends forensic procedure, with its attention to ballistic and DNA evidence, and a plot of institutional intrigue. Its publication helped establish Cornwell as a major figure in the genre, and the series became a bestselling success. Over the following decades the real investigation into the Colonial Parkway murders was revived: in January 2024, DNA of Alan Wade Wilmer Sr. was confirmed to match evidence from one of the scenes, though the case was still ongoing. Because the novel is so closely tied to those events, many readers long believed the crimes had been solved, prompting other writers to publish new investigations of the case.