The Surgeon

Who can match the character development and killer pacing of Tess Gerritsen’s Rizzoli & Isles books? Her characters are best friends who understand and accept each other’s flaws completely. I love the menacing characters who stalk the BFF duo and the baggage the two have to overcome to keep up with the fight.

Her pacing is stellar, and her dialogue is perfect. I adore her treatment of stalkers—very creepy. While these characters do not have to travel through the jungle, forest, or cave—the city streets, elements, crime scenes, and killers are worthy foes.

The Surgeon is the first book in Gerritsen’s immensely popular Rizzoli and Isles series.

Detective Jane Rizzoli is a cop’s cop with a huge chip on her shoulder from years of working in a patriarchy.

As a homicide detective, she has seen it all, which is why it’s all the more chilling when the serial killer she’s chasing begins to worm his way under her skin.

Gerritsen is a physician, so her medical descriptions are accurate and clinical, and again, serve to accentuate the horror of the crimes her antagonist is perpetrating.

Even as a man, I was able to… show more.

I am always interested in reading serial killer stories, and this one was fantastic. The way Gerritsen pulls you into the fictional story is truly captivating. You develop a mixture of emotions, empathy, at what happens to the victims, anger, at the killer for what he/she puts the victims through, anxiety, wondering if the killer will ever be stopped, and shock at the fact one victim survived a previous attack, and is going through the same nightmare again! A true psychological thriller!