She later attempts to kill the Virals in the cellar of Claybourne Manor. She had Karsten murdered at the Viral's bunker after he tried to defend them. She is described as having long auburn hair and green eyes. Hannah Wythe – She was Chance Claybourne's girlfriend.When unknown enemies threatened to kill the Virals, Karsten stayed behind so the others could get away, and he was killed. Dr Karsten is often annoyed that Tory and her friends come to Loggerhead and makes life difficult for them. By mixing two types of parvovirus (one that infects humans and another that infects dogs), he created a new strand called PARVOVIRUS XPB-19. However, while trying to find a mechanism to weaken the canine strain, he accidentally created a new type of parvovirus which had the potential to infect humans.

Dr Karsten is described by Tory as 'Late fifties, skinny, glasses, dark, thinning hair worn in the ever-popular comb-over.' Dr Karsten was being paid by Candela Pharmaceuticals to research a cure for canine parvovirus or, failing that, to create a new 'designer virus' that only a Candela product could cure. Karsten - Professor and Department Chair at Charleston University College of Veterinary Medicine Head Administrator at LIRI (Loggerhead Island Research Institute). They are called 'over imaginative children' and the police leave it at that.īeing curious, Tory and her friends want to find out who committed the murder using their powers, they crack the case.Īdditional to the recurring characters of the series, the following characters appear. They manage to escape, but the next time they visit (with their parents and a police officer), the skeleton has been replaced with monkey bones. Someone shoots at them, forcing them to run. Meanwhile, they discover a skeleton, which proves to be that of the daughter of the owner of the dog-tag. Karsten, who was funded by a company which belongs to Chance Claybourne's Dad. They acquire the infection while saving a wolfdog being used for illegal experiments by Dr. Their powers include super strength, speed and senses. Tory and her friends, Hiram (mostly known as Hi), Ben, and Shelton, find a rusted dog tag dating from the Vietnam War era on Loggerhead Island trying to identify its owner leads them to an unsolved murder and infection by an experimental virus that gives them special powers, which they describe as 'flaring'. It is the first of Reichs's novels to be written specifically for a young-adult audience. Virals is the first novel in the Virals series of novels for young adults written by the American forensic anthropologist and crime writer, Kathy Reichs, and her son Brendan Reichs, featuring Tory Brennan, great-niece of Temperance Brennan.