Prodigal son. Colleen McCullough. 2012.

Holloman, Connecticut, 1969. A lethal toxin, extracted from the blowfish, is stolen from a laboratory at Chubb University. It kills within minutes and leaves no trace behind, and worried biochemist Dr Millie Hunter reports the theft at once to her father, Medical Examiner, Dr Patrick O’Donnell.

Patrick’s cousin, Captain Carmine Delmonico, is quick off the mark when the bodies start to mount up. A sudden death at a dinner party followed by another at a black-tie event seems at first to be linked only by the poison and the presence of Dr Jim Hunter, a scientist on the brink of greatness. 

What would cause Hunter to risk it all now? Is he being framed for murder - and if so, by whom? Carmine and his detectives must follow the trail through the University town’s crowd of eccentrics, no matter how close to home it may lead.