Tess Gerritsen - I Know a Secret

Two separate homicides, at different locations, with unrelated victims, have more in common than

just being investigated by Boston PD detective Jane Rizzoli and medical examiner Maura Isles. In both cases, the bodies bear startling wounds—yet the actual cause of death is unknown. It’s a doubly challenging case for the cop and the coroner to be taking on, at a fraught time for both of them. As Jane struggles to save her mother from the crumbling marriage that threatens to bury her, Maura grapples with the imminent death of her own mother—infamous serial killer Amalthea Lank.
While Jane tends to her mother, there’s nothing Maura can do for Amalthea, except endure one final battle of wills with the woman whose shadow has haunted her all her life. Though succumbing to cancer, Amalthea hasn’t lost her taste for manipulating her estranged daughter—this time by dangling a cryptic clue about the two bizarre murders Maura and Jane are desperately trying to solve.
But whatever the dying convict knows is only a piece of the puzzle. Soon the investigation leads to a secretive young woman who survived a shocking abuse scandal, an independent horror film that may be rooted in reality, and a slew of martyred saints who died cruel and unusual deaths. And just when Rizzoli and Isles think they’ve cornered a devilish predator, the long-buried past rears its head—and threatens to engulf more innocent lives, including their own.

Comment: This is the latest installment of the Rizzoli and Isles series by incredible author Tess Gerritsen. The book was published last year but since my collection is in paperback, I've waited for this edition to be released.

In this 12th adventure, Jane and Maura have a new case of people being murdered and although at first it seemed nothing was in common between the deaths, some clues finally reveal the secret behind several situations and the truth is quite disturbing. But using method and dedication both ladies will find the truth and catch the villain before someone else innocent is killed too.

Tess Gerritsen is an amazing writer. Her books make sense because she has the medical knowledge for many things to make sense and to be well explained to the average reader. But she also has talent to portray things in such a way that everything seems it couldn't be presented any way else! I find this fascinating and she certainly knows how to put things in a good sequence.

Once again, two details stood out for me and made me really enjoy this story:

1) the mixing up of the murders investigation with the domestic lives of the protagonists. I know this annoys some hard core fans of thrillers but I love it, I really appreciate being a part of the main characters like this.

2) Everything we are told has two sides and this amazing author can write in such a way we are NOT supposed to take one instead of the other. We get all the information about things and we make up our mind in general and in relation to the context in hand. In this investigation we get to know a lot about the characters, about those who died, those who are key to understand them (like parents and friends) and it's truly a fascinating exercise to wonder about the psychology of all this. I think Tess Gerritsen is perfection incarnated in how she manages to convey things not in terms of morals or horror scenes but the whys, the hows, the details about this and that.

These two details combined make an incredible story and I really liked the way the author has taught us some things at the same time. The investigation isn't as secretive as others were (to my understanding) and I think one key detail was a little easy to predict from a certain point on, which retracted some impact from the end but it was interesting the same.

I'd actually say what this book lacked was a bigger oomph in the end. The villain was punished but there was a detail left in the air, a detail without a moral resolution that, despite interesting on its own, felt rather diminishing when thinking about the overall plot: yes, morally challenged people or sociopaths as one might prefer to call them can be harmless but there's a fine line and I think the author could have done something better regarding this.

Well, fans of the series can't complain I think for for a new reader this isn't the best book to start. ll the murder investigations are started and finished in most books but there are tons of things to read between the lines and I swear it's worth it to go through all of them!

Another winner, for the most part, for me.

Grade: 8/10

Tess Gerritsen - Life Support

Dr Toby Harper’s quiet night is disrupted when a severely ill man stumbles into ER. She suspects a viral brain infection. But shortly after trying to treat him, he disappears without a trace.
When a second person is admitted with the same symptoms, she starts to trace the deadly infection backwards. And begins to suspect foul play.
And that she may be on borrowed time . . . 

Comment: I'm a fan of Tess Gerritsen. Her books always surprise me, if not for the plot itself, at least by the way they are written. Many authors might have the knowledge to give medical or crime thrillers but that doesn't mean the fictional side of things could be told in a captivating way. Thankfully, Gerritsen is a master of both.

In this book we meet doctor Toby Harper, a woman in her late 30s that has a controlled life but is getting tired of her worries and when a new case threats her position at the hospital, everything seems to go even worse from then on. But Toby can't put aside her dedication as a doctor and she tries to do what she can to help her patients.

Bu when strange things start to show and cases mix up, can Toby really get past that? And what about the threat to her own home?

I love the pace of Gerritsen's books. She gives the information in the right moments which makes everything run smoothly and with apparent ease. I'm sure she did a lot of research and had to think about how to include everything timely but it seems so effortless, so easy, like anyone could have thought about this but Gerritsen does it with her eyes closed.

The story is very interesting. I don't usual look for medical thrillers but I've read them and it's a genre I wouldn't mind reading more of. In fact, this book got me in the mood and I'll try to buy one or two  by other authors in the future. The ideas are amazing and because medicine is such a large area that can be explored, the possibilities are endless. 

I had never heard of Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease before but the little details one gets as the plot moves along are intriguing and I wanted to know what would happen to the patients and why was that such an important part of the thriller part.

As usual, there are some hints about experiments that may be real or not but I was fascinated and morbidly captivated by the consequences of the disease and what would it be important for someone to use it on people or making someone have it. When the explanation comes it's shocking alright. One can't really be aware of the limits of ethics and science but is frightening things like this can be happening. Some details of the plot were so weirdly disgusting, especially when it was related to the character Molly. It's worrying if reality can have this, stuff we don't have the access to nor the knowledge if it's going on. This book reminded me of Brain by Robin Cook, a story with similar topics which impressed me a lot years ago.

As usual, the characters are greatly depicted by Gerritsen. Dr Harper is losing control, someone is after her reputation because she dared ask questions and her daily life and routines are getting out of control. It was suffocating to go through so many challenging moments along with the character. Amazing how the author can do this when her book is not on a first person narrator.

I liked the tiny bit of romance hint we got and this makes me hopeful for what we don't see after the book ends but I can always imagine and the author has given me the tool to do so.

I like the balance between medical things and the domestic side of the personal lives of the characters. We are not islands and we rarely have the luxury of just focusing on one thing at a time. Gerritsen does this perfectly.

Overall, I liked this book. I think some situations were slightly over the top and there's a certain lack of reality when it comes to some medical situations that I found difficult to ignore. I also think one or two situations were clearly too dramatic for plot purposes and didn't really offer much to the story.

I liked the main idea here, should we really want to postpone death, should we aspire for the fountain of youth? Is it really worth it and all the consequences that can come out of it? But it's a now topic, something our society can't brush aside. 

I recommend this book a lot.

Grade: 8/10

TBR Challenge: Tess Gerritsen - Die Again

When Boston homicide detective Jane Rizzoli and medical examiner Maura Isles are summoned to a

crime scene, they find a killing worthy of the most ferocious beast—right down to the claw marks on the corpse. But only the most sinister human hands could have left renowned big-game hunter and taxidermist Leon Gott gruesomely displayed like the once-proud animals whose heads adorn his walls. Did Gott unwittingly awaken a predator more dangerous than any he’s ever hunted?
Maura fears that this isn’t the killer’s first slaughter, and that it won’t be the last. After linking the crime to a series of unsolved homicides in wilderness areas across the country, she wonders if the answers might actually be found in a remote corner of Africa.
Six years earlier, a group of tourists on safari fell prey to a killer in their midst. Marooned deep in the bush of Botswana, with no means of communication and nothing but a rifle-toting guide for protection, the terrified tourists desperately hoped for rescue before their worst instincts—or the wild animals prowling in the shadows—could tear them apart. But the deadliest predator was already among them, and within a week, he walked away with the blood of all but one of them on his hands.
Now this killer has chosen Boston as his new hunting ground, and Rizzoli and Isles must find a way to lure him out of the shadows and into a cage. Even if it means dangling the bait no hunter can resist: the one victim who got away.

Comment: Another month, another TBR read to cross off the list. I picked this book by Gerritsen mostly because of the suspense in the "paranormal or romantic suspense" of October's theme. I did have some other books more appropriate but sincerely, Gerritsen writes wonderful books with a little bit of romance and lots of suspense so I just had to read it.

 

In this book, Rizzolli and Isles face a new case and a new adventure where they have to use their skills and knowledge to catch a murderer.

From Africa to Boston, the case seems to start with a group of people on their holidays in Botswana. But things go badly very soon. Back in Boston, Rizzolli has a new case, a taxidermist was killed in his own house and it seems someone wanted to make it look an animal did it. After consulting the city's zoo, Rizzolli and Isles start to get an idea of why the victim was killed that way. But then, an accident happens at the zoo and someone else dies. How can these deaths be connected to Africa? And why?

 

Once more, I was engrossed, engaged, entertained by another Rizzolli and Isles' installment. I really think the author has come a long way since her first romantic suspense novels. The more recent books, which would be more like thrillers or suspense books, are wonderful, so very balanced and logical and appealing, I can't described them good enough.

 

This story features another interesting theme in the author's choices of setting. The issue is wild animals and how they kill, how they plan their attacks and how without mercy they are. Even zoo animals would kill if allowed. I think it's an interesting thought because we assume that, just because they are in a cage and see those who feed them everyday, they wouldn't attack but that's not true. Interesting ideas the author inserts... and even the more surprising notions like the leopard man's theories expressed here add to the story and aren't used as just a means to make everything even weirder.

At some point I admit I started to suspect of the murderer's identity because a little detail never added up in my way of thinking. But the author does an amazing job in creating all the layers in the story, in presenting them slow and carefully so that we get the big picture one step at a time. The reasons for all the deaths, the amount of work it took... again, only someone madly genius could have done it and only someone as talented as Gerritsen could have written it in a way that is doesn't sound silly or pointless.

 

The characters are the basis of everything. Again, apart from the recurrent characters. the author has imagined fascinating characters to fulfill this story. I liked the personalities imagined, the connections between everyone, the complexity of everyone's actions and motives...really, the idea that a little detail could provoke all the bad things present here and that in real life the little details also lead us to bigger things...

I didn't become afraid of cats but I surely think about them differently, especially the big predators.

Rizzolli and Isles keep on being the amazing women we've been knowing. I liked seeing Jane with her husband, how much she cares about her mother - we see glimpses of that situation as well - and then Maura and her guilt over her awful mother who tries to manipulate her. I wonder how that will be developed. It's fascinating and amazing how the author can include such domestic and personal development scenes without making it out of place or unimportant. The balance in her books is exceptional.

 

All in all, without going into many details, this book is another wonderful installment in the series. I do have to point out one thing though. Not bad, just something that I can't put aside. One of the characters in Africa at some point has feelings for someone and we get little glimpses of it until she admits it. Then, in the end there's this bittersweet conclusion about the whole thing and the character thinks about how things would have been like, had she made a different choice. That notion left me thinking...sometimes we miss opportunities and we can just feel guilty over them and have a hard time processing. Somehow this aspect in this book made me a bit contemplative...

 

Anyway, I loved this book, I couldn't put it down and I liked even more how the author never tried to make her opinions matter most. This was all about the story and the readers take on it. Wonderful and I can't wait for more.

Grade: 9/10

Tess Gerritsen - Whistleblower

When Victor Holland came flying out of the night, he ran straight into the path of Catherine Weaver's car. Having uncovered a terrifying secret which leads all the way to Washington, Victor is running for his life - and from the men who will go to any lengths to silence him.

Comment: Since I found out about Tess Gerritsen I have never been disappointed with her books, even with those I found weren't as wonderful. Recently, a friend of mine started to read her romance novels, books she wrote and published before the success of the Rizzoli and Isles series and her stand alone mysteries which is the genre that brought her international fame. The romance novels are older than the mystery centered series and reflect not only the time when they were written but also the beginning of the author's career.

 

This is the story of Victor Holland, a scientist that finds out his lab is doing work on something they shouldn't and he wants to denounce them to the authorities with the help of a co worker. That person dies and Victor realizes he's in danger and the bosses don't want to the truth to be known. He runs away and the book starts precisely when Victor is running from the company's (sort of) hit man.

He is rescued on a road by Catherine, a woman driving home and that hits Victor when he shows up suddenly in front of her car. Although Victor tries to protect Catherine, she still gets herself involved in the process and somehow the killer after Victor finds out who she is.

From that moment on, many things happen one after the other that put Catherine and Victor in danger but also force them to be together and to admit the attraction between them.

 

This book reads just like an action movie. It seems this could the plot for any blockbuster, something to numb us for a couple of hours. To be honest, the action isn't that tricky or polished like her most recent books. I find amazing how far she's gone from this book that is so weak in terms of plot/characterization when compared to her recent work, so complex, layered and balanced. It's obvious how she improved over time and how good she's now.

 

In fact, the way this is written seems unbelievable almost that the same Gerritsen wrote this and such amazing books as the Rizzoli and Isles series, full of human complexities. I understand the passage of time but the same way I can't help living now and basing my opinions on who I am now, I also have to judge what I read based on that and not on what it would have been at that time. Nevertheless, even with that in mind, I admit some situations are classic Gerritsen, and my enjoyment came exactly from my wish to know what happened next. The action is fast paced and the characters were always doing something.

 

The problem is the lack of complexity in this story, everything is simple or happens in a very expected way. The characters behave as one would think but there's nothing special about them, they aren't as well explored as characters from her recent series, not only because of the amount of installments but because it's clear the author intended something simpler at this time. However, it's still difficult to go from something so amazing and that never lets us down to a book like this so simplistic and obviously naïve in certain aspects, namely the characters' actions.

 

The relationship between Catherine and Victor faces some obstacles and not only the running they're doing from the killer but I never felt they were in love, everything happened so fast that ended up looking unbelievable to me. Even the secondary characters seem so cliché that I didn't think they were that important in the whole scheme of things.

 

All in all, this is clearly an attempt of what nowadays is her trademark but not even faithful, devoted fans can say this is as amazing as other books that one simply can't put down. To be truthful, with this one, I had to tell myself to keep reading. It helped that it wasn't a long story but still, I thought had been born the perfect writer but this told me that she, as so many other people, had to improve her work no matter how talented she has always been.

I think I'll stick to her thriller/mysteries from now on...

Grade: 6/10

Tess Gerritsen - The Bone Garden

Present day: Julia Hamill has made a horrifying discovery on the grounds of her new home in rural

Massachusetts: a skull buried in the rocky soil-human, female, and, according to the trained eye of Boston medical examiner Maura Isles, scarred with the unmistakable marks of murder. But whoever this nameless woman was, and whatever befell her, is knowledge lost to another time. . . .
Boston, 1830: In order to pay for his education, Norris Marshall, a talented but penniless student at Boston Medical College, has joined the ranks of local "resurrectionists"-those who plunder graveyards and harvest the dead for sale on the black market. Yet even this ghoulish commerce pales beside the shocking murder of a nurse found mutilated on the university hospital grounds. And when a distinguished doctor meets the same grisly fate, Norris finds that trafficking in the illicit cadaver trade has made him a prime suspect. To prove his innocence, Norris must track down the only witness to have glimpsed the killer: Rose Connolly, a beautiful seamstress from the Boston slums who fears she may be the next victim.

Comment: This was one of the Christmas gifts I was offered last month. A friend of mine knows I'm a huge fan of this author and her choice was justified with the notion this author never disappoints. I certainly have loved all the books I've read by her so far, meaning this one was also quite welcome and that is why I decided for it to be the first of the year.

This book tells two stories, one in the present day and another in the 19th century when medical procedures weren't as developed as one might think.
The two stories connect when in the present day, Julia Hamil finds bones in her garden and throughout the story we know it must be from someone living there at the time the other plot takes place, but who was murdered there like the bones tell the forensic team?

I liked this book. My taste for this author's work wasn't lost this time but honestly I didn't expect it to. Still, I'm used to stories focused on current medical practices and forensics and it was quite the challenge to read the story line from the past and not be a bit exasperated by way things were done now that we know how things should be done in the correct way. I guess the slow pace of both story lines added to this feeling as well, after all, the two time stories are intercalated allowing the reader to follow the two stories more or less at the same pace.

The story form the past is dedicated to childbirth ideas and how the procedure was done in the 1800s. Things didn't follow the hygiene procedures of nowadays and the story features the start of that in those days. There's also a mystery and crime and poverty. All these things always a bit connected to the medical practice of childbirth and how to do a surgery. One thing I aways like about the author is how we can learn something and in this case the little lessons on 19th century medical practices on how to those things are quite the eye opener, amazing how far medicine was but now things are miles and miles away from those times and who knows what might happen in out own future's time, how will medicine evolute even more?
Anyway, the things happening in the past after a while start pointing out to quite the domestic side and when that part of the book reaches the end I couldn't help but feeling sad over how it ended up. I mean, nothing bad but one detail was so sad I couldn't help but feel sad over it.

Interestingly, in the present we learn many of these things from notes and letters the characters from the past wrote, or should I say, one of them did. This is how we learn of the destiny of the characters of the past. It was quite interesting to see the action in the parts dedicated to the past and also in the letters left until the present.
The present had a more sedate story, more quite and fast paced and still there's a little detail that made me think because it's not something the author usually does, an element I wasn't used to see in her pragmatic novels. But I guess it must have been the author's trick to balance the end from the past...in the end all ends well, so...balance.

I thin in the end this story was much more emotional than what I expected and in a way it touched situations the author doesn't always focus on. But I was still satisfied by the story lines and the mystery and the villain's identity and all the medical details included. The overall end was bittersweet for me but one medical lesson, very simple indeed, was quite the final deserved mention. Sometimes the simpler things can be the most important ones and this novel certainly focused on that.
Grade: 7/10

Tess Gerritsen - Last to Die

For the second time in his short life, Teddy Clock has survived a massacre. Two years ago, he barely escaped when his entire family was slaughtered. Now, at fourteen, in a hideous echo of the past, Teddy is the lone survivor of his foster family's mass murder. Orphaned once more, the traumatized teenager has nowhere to turn--until the Boston PD puts detective Jane Rizzoli on the case. Determined to protect this young man, Jane discovers that what seemed like a coincidence is instead just one horrifying part of a relentless killer's merciless mission.
Jane spirits Teddy to the exclusive Evensong boarding school, a sanctuary where young victims of violent crime learn the secrets and skills of survival in a dangerous world. But even behind locked gates, and surrounded by acres of sheltering Maine wilderness, Jane fears that Evensong's mysterious benefactors aren't the only ones watching. When strange blood-splattered dolls are found dangling from a tree, Jane knows that her instincts are dead on. And when she meets Will Yablonski and Claire Ward, students whose tragic pasts bear a shocking resemblance to Teddy's, it becomes chillingly clear that a circling predator has more than one victim in mind.
Joining forces with her trusted partner, medical examiner Maura Isles, Jane is determined to keep these orphans safe from harm. But an unspeakable secret dooms the children's fate--unless Jane and Maura can finally put an end to an obsessed killer's twisted quest. 

Comment: This is the latest installment in Tess Gerritsen's Rizzolli and Isles series. It's been out since last year but I've been waiting for the paperback edition as I've been buying them in that version and wanted to keep my Gerritsen collection that way.

This time, the adventure takes Maura to Evensong, the school where Julian is now. Julian is the boy who helped her in a previous book, Ice Cold, and now Maura feels a connection to him. In Boston, Jane is dealing with murders where there's always a surviving child. Three of those children are sent to Evensong and Jane goes there too. In the middle of all this, is there any other link between what is happening in Boston and Evensong school? Or is it all just coincidence?

Once again, I have absolutely no words of complaint about a book by this author. This book was 5 stars for me and I honestly thin that, at this point, there is no other writer who might compare with Gerritsen in writing this sort of novels. Her books are wonderfully done and perfect in the balance between mystery segments and character's personal development. Of course, there's always a thing here and there we could change but nothing to the point of ruining anything in the story.
Like always, Jane and Maura have interesting conversations and they are the motors in the stories. I like how their friendship evolves and it's not immune to some bumps. I was so glad to see them talking for real after something that happened before that put some strain on their relationship.Even better was to have the confirmation they are true friends. It's always enjoyable to see scenes with them and their closer "people", Jane's family and Anthony and Julian in Maura's case. The author doesn't stop reality just because of murder and I like this domestic side to a story that could be too strong emotionally.

The crime and mystery in the book are, as always, smart and not totally obvious. After a certain point it's very suspicious how things might have happened, but never would I guess what really happened to induce the main crime in this book and, like it happened in other books before, it's something not that far fetched to imagine, which only makes me more amazed at the author's talent to create the perfect atmosphere to an apparent tricky plot and making it simpler than it seemed. Usually with most authors it's the opposite, right?

The end is a surprise and, in my opinion, very appropriate. And still keeping some mystery, I loved it.
I really recommend this author to everyone, it's impossible not to like these novels, to say the least. It's truly one of my favorite authors ever!

Tess Gerritsen - The Silent Girl

Every crime scene tells a story. Some keep you awake at night. Others haunt your dreams. The grisly display homicide cop Jane Rizzoli finds in Boston's Chinatown will do both.
In the murky shadows of an alley lies a female's severed hand. On the tenement rooftop above is the corpse belonging to that hand, a red-haired woman dressed all in black, her head nearly severed. Two strands of silver hair -- not human -- cling to her body. They are Rizzoli's only clues, but they're enough for her and medical examiner Maura Isles to make the startling discovery: that this violent death had a chilling prequel.
Nineteen years earlier, a horrifying murder-suicide in a Chinatown restaurant left five people dead. But one woman connected to that massacre is still alive: a mysterious martial arts master who knows a secret she dares not tell, a secret that lives and breathes in the shadows of Chinatown. A secret that may not even be human. Now she's the target of someone, or something, deeply and relentlessly evil.
Cracking a crime resonating with bone-chilling echoes of an ancient Chinese legend, Rizzoli and Isles must outwit an unseen enemy with centuries of cunning -- and a swift, avenging blade.

Comment: Another book by this amazing author. She writes my favorite suspense books...I've repeated myself many times but this is it.
In this new book in the adventures of Rizzoli and Isles, they come across a crime in Chinatown. There's legends and stories around the plot based on that and the author has written a note in the end of the book saying it's a kind of homage to her mother's side of the family.
There was a awful murder-suicide in one restaurant in Chinatown 19 years ago and now a young Caucasian woman is found without her hand and she has a address in her pocket directing her to Chinatown. These two things don't have an apparent connection but because of a missing girl, we realize, chapter after chapter, that they do.

I loved the book. This author always delivers a good and solid story. Something we can follow and appreciate and with scenes from the lives of the two protagonists in there just to make the story more familiar, more realistic.
I like this because this makes Jane and Maura more human, more emotional and we can relate to them or at least to what they are faced against in their private lives. Jane has her parents divorce and Maura her posture as a professional threatened because a cop killed someone and she states facts when cops want recognition. It's a hard dilemma to go through but sometimes your conscience rules.
The story is very interesting and as always, evolves slowly but grows in intensity towards the end, which can be a bit predictable this time, but still amazingly nonetheless. You see there's two mysteries for the reader to investigate in the book: one of them is like I said, a bit predictable and the other one, like she always does, it's a surprise. The author does deliver.

I can't wait to read another book by Gerritsen, I hope it won't take very long...

Tess Gerritsen - Ice Cold

In Wyoming for a medical conference, Boston medical examiner Maura Isles joins a group of friends on a spur-of-the-moment ski trip. But when their SUV stalls on a snow-choked mountain road, they're stranded with no help in sight.
As night falls, the group seeks refuge from the blizzard in the remote village of Kingdom Come, where twelve eerily identical houses stand dark and abandoned. Something terrible has happened in Kingdom Come: Meals sit untouched on tables, cars are still parked in garages. The town's previous residents seem to have vanished into thin air, but footprints in the snow betray the presence of someone who still lurks in the cold darkness -- someone who is watching Maura and her friends.
Days later, Boston homicide detective Jane Rizzoli receives the grim news that Maura's charred body has been found in a mountain ravine. Shocked and grieving, Jane is determined to learn what happened to her friend. The investigation plunges Jane into the twisted history of Kingdom Come, where a gruesome discovery lies buried beneath the snow. As horrifying revelations come to light, Jane closes in on an enemy both powerful and merciless -- and the chilling truth about Maura's fate.

Comment: Another book by this author. I think I'm safe to admit that this author is currently my favourite in terms of suspense books. I think she's brilliant and her writing is pure perfection to me! Why? Because like I said before, she doesn't write from the villains' POV, she doesn't make me suffer through their perverted or psycothic minds and still her books are full of darker moments because of those characters. Besides, she writes wonderfully, I don't know if it's mainly her or if the editor's work is huge, but whichever way, the books just seem to flow easily when I'm reading them. I can confess I did read this whole book in one single day. Even with RL work to do!
The story...Maura Isles is away in a conference and as an impulse she decides to go on a trip with new friends but things start going wrong from the beginning. When they're in the middle of nowhere, with snow covering everything everywhere and one of them is deeply hurt with no apparent way of help coming their way, plus with a ghost city around them, things don't seem to be any worse, but they do get worse. And badly.
I'm once again amazed at this author's imagination, at the way she makes us think on a problem from a certain POV and then things change and that awful issue is actually due to a more simpler reason, it's brilliant! I read the book so fast, I just couldn't put it down, the rythmn of her novels, after they get going, it's great, it's fast and unpredictable. I always have a great time reading the books, even when the stories are harder for me to read (as it happened in Vanish), and I always end th book with the feeling it should have been bigger.
I have to thank a friend, she recommended these books to me, if it weren't for her, I wouldn't even know what I'd be missing!
For those who like thrillers, go for it, this author rocks!

Tess Gerritsen - The Keepsake

For untold years, the perfectly preserved mummy had lain forgotten in the dusty basement of Boston's Crispin Museum. Dubbed "Madam X," the recently rediscovered mummy is, to all appearances, an ancient Egyptian artifact. But medical examiner Maura Isles discovers a macabre message hidden within the corpse -- horrifying proof that this "centuries-old" relic is instead a modern-day murder victim. When the grisly remains of two other women are found, it becomes clear to Maura and Boston homicide detective Jane Rizzoli that a maniac is at large. Now Maura and Jane must unravel a murderer's twisted endgame before the Archaeology Killer adds another chilling artifact to his monstrous collection.

Comment: Another great book by this author. I don't think I've read anything by her that made me think badly of her power as a writer. She writes in a very clean, precise way. She goes to the point, she makes the reader think about this and that and she delivers. I'm very happy with her books, thrillers aren't my favourite books but in her case..perfect.
This book, once more, was done amazingly, all the pieces fitted together, it seemed she just...I don't know, started and finished, there isn't a page there that doesn't belong, that was wasted. I love this about her writing.
The storyline continues things in the recurrent protagonists' lives, we see a bit of their social circle interactions and feel intrigued.
The mystery in this story was intense and I confess, a time or two I was indeed afraid to be alone in the dark thinking about certain things. It's not Stephen King terror, but it suggests interestingly.
The "invited" characters in the story have interesting personalities, it was a story that gained life, very good.
I don't know what else to say about this author, she rocks and I'm so happy to have followed a friend's advice and started reading her.

Tess Gerritsen - The Mephisto Club

PECCAVI
The Latin phrase is scrawled in blood at the scene of a young woman's brutal murder: I HAVE SINNED. It's a chilling Christmas greeting for Boston medical examiner Maura Isles and Detective Jane Rizzoli, who swiftly link the victim to the sinister Mephisto Club, a cult of scholars who aim to prove that Satan himself exists among us. Then, with the grisly appearance of another corpse, it's clear that someone--or something--is indeed prowling the city. Soon the members of the club begin to fear the very subject of their study. Could the maniacal killer be one of their own--or have they inadvertently summoned an entity from the darkness? Delving deep into the most baffling case of their careers, Maura and Jane embark on a terrifying journey to the very heart of evil.

Comment: Another book by this author. In this one we follow Maura and Jane in the world of devil. Someone is leaving messages about evil things in murder's scenes and somehow all leads to Mephisto Club, a kind of soociety that wants to look for and banish evil.
I think this was a very crerpy book, not just because of the theme itself but mostly because of the air around the story, there's this sense of fear in the air. There were times I wouldn't want to be alone just thinking bout the story. I think this was quite well done by the author.
Another thing I liked was how good and continuous the characterization is, even after so many books. From book #1 we have details about the characters and how they think, their motivations and thoughts and one would say it didn't have to go on, but as their lives change, so does their inner emotions. there's always something new to learn about them and what hapens around makes them react. I think the author does a great job in her characterization.
Of course, blending this with interesting plots and suspense...it makes her books great ones.
Then we have the personal lives of the two main characters..there's always something happening to them and to those around them. In this book, Jane faces her parent's trouble in marriage and Maura starts a relationship with someone unsuitable. I think both themes are very good and provoke feelings in the reader, which makes us think. We can see things from out pov's and perhaps disagree or we can see it from the character's pov and feel it. I love how anything is black and white in this author's writing.
I liked this book a lot, not my favourite in the series, but it's very good. can't wait to read the next one.

Tess Gerritsen - Vanish

A nameless woman appears to be just another body at the morgue--until Boston medical examiner Maura Isles sees the corpse open its eyes. The now-frantic Jane Doe is rushed to the hospital, where with cool precision she shoots a security guard and seizes hostages, one of whom is pregnant homicide detective Jane Rizzoli. As the tense hours tick by, Maura joins forces with Jane's husband, FBI agent Gabriel Dean, to track down the killer's identity. But this case goes far deeper than just an ordinary hostage crisis, and Jane, trapped with the armed madwoman, is the only one who holds the key to the mystery.

Comment: Another book by this author. I really like the way she writes, simple, concise, to the point. But with enough flavour to make it perfect and also with interesting characters to make the books alive.
In this book we finally see Jane Rizzolli having her child. It's so good to follow a series where the characters lives go forward and we can see them agaian and again, we see their lives happening and normal things can have a special taste too.
However, the theme in this book is awful. It deals with human traffic, more specifically women that are going to be used in prostitution. It's horrible and it makes me feel so mad and hopeless that it does happen in real life in the world and people know about it but it still can't be stopped because there are people - if they can be called that - who use others like this, who ignore their rights and dignity in such a blatant way to gain money.
The book has the narrator voice and sometimes we see things from one of the abused woman's thoughts. It's terrible to read and I can't even imagine what it's like for them in reality, it seems unbelievable that there are human people doing this do other humans, so the book is both true and despairing. I think the author does a great job in portraying real things, and in this case it makes the theme so much more horrid.
So this book is a mixture of rancid reality and happiness, which makes it more of a challenge to read. I loved reading some parts while dreading to get to the others. It ends well, though and it's a clear message of hope because we all know in relaity things aren't like this.
Anyway, great job by the author in telling this story and making the reader feel things.

Tess Gerritsen - Body Double

Boston medical examiner Dr. Maura Isles is shocked to discover that the murdered woman looks exactly like her. For Maura, an only child, a DNA test confirms the startling fact: the mysterious doppelganger is in fact her twin sister. Now an already bizarre homicide investigation becomes a disturbing excursion into a past full of dark secrets and twisted truths. It is a journey that leads Maura to the mother she never knew--an icy and cunning woman who gave Maura life . . . and who just might have a plan to take it away.

Comment: This 4th book in the series featuring Rizzoli and Isles is very good and has a killer I didn't see coming. It's quite interesting that the whole book presents strong characters and plot and things seem to move in a very misterious way and then, in the end we find out the reasons for most things are..simple. Mudane. It's very refreshing to see it, actually.
Maura Isles finds out she has a twin sister, as she was adopted. After knowing who her parents are, we can understand some of her fears concerning her personlity but there's also personal things happening to her and we want to see it happening, not just a possibility. I'm eager to see it it will be like I think it will, based on what happens from book to book.
Jane Rizzoli is pregnant and has a good husband but the past is still just a mamory away. I was told she will have a deeper presence in the next book, I can't wait to see more.
Thw teo main characters are strong women and the way they think while solving the cases and facing their personal obstacles is very intriguing, the author has done a very good work in their characterization. I'm very pleased to have known the series and to have yet some books to read.

Tess Gerritsen - The Sinner

Not even the icy temperatures of a typical New England winter can match the bone-chilling scene of carnage discovered at the chapel of Our Lady of Divine Light. Within the cloistered convent lie two nuns -- one dead, one critically injured -- victims of an unspeakably savage attacker. The brutal crime appears to be without motive, but medical examiner Maura Isles's autopsy of the dead woman yields a shocking surprise: twenty-year-old Sister Camille gave birth before she was murdered. Then another body is found mutilated beyond recognition. Together, Isles and homicide detective Jane Rizzoli uncover an ancient horror that connects these terrible slaughters. As long-buried secrets come to light, Maura Isles finds herself drawn inexorably toward the heart of an investigation that strikes close to home -- and toward a dawning revelation about the killer's identity too shattering to consider.

Comment: I'm enjoying this author's books more and more. The author clearly intended to write deep thrillers, where there's lot of suspense and we don't know exactly what makes the killers do what they do. In this case, I think she was very smart in creating all the clues the detectives are discovering, in order to make us think something and in the end...I was surprised until the very end. I had an idea and it was close to it, but I didn't really see what was the killer's real motivation to commit those crimes. So, I guess the thriller part was again, well done, because it makes us think about everything going on.
Some people I talked to have said the details are too specified and someone without medical background has more difficulty to understand some technical things. Well, yes some things need to be read with more attention, but I didn't find them too harsh, I've read many medical thillers and although I don't really know how the procedure is or why it's done like that, it doesn't put me off, so I don't see why it's such a discussed topic.
I also like the books because the author puts in a certain dose of romance, not much, and most of it is implyied, but nevertheless, it's enough to entice. In this third book we see an evolution of one of the character's personal life from the last book and in th end we can't help smiling because of it. There's also more information about another protagonist and we get to see some tidbits of her childhood and ended marriage. I guess the author is giving small doses of their personal dilemmas to increase this sense of dicovery, to make us curious but not dumping everthing at once and thus, making us want to read more.
I, personally, am convinced to keep going.

2 More Mini Comments

For ages, the goddess Nemesis has sought divine vengeance against mortal man, as she awaits her chance for retaliation against Mount Olympus. Now, after making a deal with a dark wizard, she has reinvented herself as a female spy with her own sinister agenda....
Immortal warrior Kane Montague is as lethal as a scorpion -- like the one that marks his powerful form. As an assassin for MI6, he was an ace gun-for-hire until someone very close burned him. Now on the outs with his former colleagues, Kane knows all too well who's to blame: a sexy secret agent named Ilsa.
When their paths cross again, the passion between Kane and Ilsa is irresistible... and possibly lethal. But they soon realize that Ilsa is simply a pawn in a conspiracy aimed at the heart of the Zodiac Warriors. Can Kane trust her? Or is Ilsa the only one who can save him, body and soul?

Comment: In this second installment in the zodiac series, the author has managed to deepen the mythology parts, which I think just add more flavour to the series. It's all good to know what the heroes are doing but to know more about gods and the meaning of things is muc more fun.
The main couple in this book seemed to have more chemestry and their pasts and lives were more intriguing for me to know about.
I think this is a great ideia, about the warriors with characteristics from their zodiac signs, but they're described as a united group and so far, we still haven't met the majority of them. I wish that would happen. I'd gladly give up on the too much romance parts so I ould have more warriors and to see their lives together. Let's see what happens next. So far, I'm still curious and will keep reading.

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It is a boiling hot summer in Boston. Adding to the city's woes is a series of shocking crimes in which wealthy men are made to watch while their wives are brutalized--a sadistic demand that ends in death. The pattern suggests one man: serial killer Warren Hoyt, recently put behind bars. Police can only assume an acolyte is at large, a maniac basing his attacks on the twisted medical techniques of the madman he so admires. At least that's what Detective Jane Rizzoli thinks. Forced to reconfront the killer who scarred her--literally and figuratively--she is determined to finally end Hoyt's awful influence. But this time around, the vendetta is more vicious than she ever would have imagined.

Comment: I was so eager to read this book and I wasn't disappointed. The author created a gripping story, with most of the characters from the previous novel and we can see where their lives have gone to. I was very surprised to see the focus center on Jane and her live and I was told it will remain so. Grom now on, the personal parts of the books will be about her and another doctor. I hope I'll keep addicted to know more. The story was very well done, I couldn't stop reading and in evwry page something is revealed in a way that we keep sayng, one more page but then there's 10 more and we still say that. The end is a bit disturbing because it allows the reader to make assumptions about future things, which is very smart; we want to know more, so we'll have to read more. I'll read the next book the following month. This author remains a challenging, but good, one.

Tess Gerritsen - The Surgeon

He slips into their homes at night and walks silently into bedrooms where women lie sleeping, about to awake to a living nightmare. The precision of the killer's methods suggests he is a deranged man of medicine, propelling the Boston newspapers to name him "The Surgeon." The cops' only clue rests with the victim of a nearly identical crime. Two years ago, Dr. Catherine Cordell fought back and killed her attacker before he could complete his assault. Now this new killer is re-creating, with chilling accuracy, the details of Cordell's own ordeal. With every new murder he seems to be taunting her, cutting ever closer, from her hospital to her home. Her only comfort comes from Thomas Moore, the detective assigned to the case. But even Moore cannot protect Cordell from a brilliant hunter who somehow understands--and savors--the secret fears of every woman he kills....

Comment: This was the first book I've read by mrs Gerritsen. I was told she writes a good crime story with some elements of romance..so it was sold pretty easily to me.
I think the strongest point in the book is the mystery indeed. It was good to see the story develop and to look forward to see what else might happen. There were also some moments I thought things were too creepy and once I was reading before sleeping and I did have to close the book! The author knows what she's talking about and she has a talent to creat a good suspense.
The romance part..well, I've read better even when it's a crime book, but to be honest I didn't find it lacking because the small tidbits were juicy and left things to the imagination and sometimes less is better.
I was eager to read more about secondary characters and a friend has told me one of them features heavily in the following books, so I want to get them fast..I already order the next two.
I enjoyed the feel in the air surrounding the story and how it helped create the perfect atmosphere. I can't wait to read more.