Product Description

The beautiful woman appears to be just another corpse in the morgue. But when medical examiner Maura Isles looks down at the body, she gets the fright of her life. The corpse opens its eyes. Now very much alive, the woman is rushed to the hospital, where she murders a security guard and seizes hostages, one of whom is the heavily pregnant homicide detective Jane Rizzoli. But who is this woman, and what does she want? Only Jane can solve the mystery - if she survives the night.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #5242 in Books
• Published on: 2007-01-15
• Original language: English
• Binding: Paperback
• 464 pages

Amazon.co.uk Review
Tess Gerritsen’s Vanish sports precisely those qualities that her much-acclaimed Body Double had in profusion: razor-sharp plotting, tight and economical characterisation and (most of all) the inexorable capture of the reader’s attention as her grim plot disturbingly unfolds.

Of course, none of this will come as a surprise to long-term Gerritsen fans (an ever-growing legion)--The Surgeon rang some fascinating changes on the serial killer theme, with a threat from the grave terrifying a doctor, and )--The Apprentice, with its killer utilising medical acumen, took no prisoners. But Body Double was the ace in the hole, with resourceful cop Jane Rizzoli tracking down the murderer of her doppelganger. Jane Rizzoli, readers will be glad to hear, is back in Vanish.

Medical examiner Maura Isles is looking at another body in a slab. Not a new experience for her, but she’s in for another shock when the body opens its eyes and proves to be alive. And violence swiftly follows, as the mystery woman--strikingly beautiful--kills a security guard in the hospital she’s taken to, before capturing a group of hostages. One of them is a pregnant woman--Detective Jane Rizzoli, no less. And if Jane can find out what this lethal abductor wants, she may be able to save her own life--and those of the other hostages. But the clock is ticking.

One might argue that Gerritsen has played safe with this scenario in terms of ratcheting up the tension. After all, a hostage situation is always surefire, with its constant threat of impending violence. But the author (as ever) studiously avoid clichés, and ensures a palm-sweating experience for the reader. A good notion, too, to make Jane Rizzoli more vulnerable in this outing.

--Barry Forshaw

From the Publisher
Heavily pregnant homicide detective Jane Rizzoli finds herself on the wrong side of a hostage crisis in Tess Gerritsen's terrifying new bestseller.

From the Inside Flap
A blessed event becomes a nightmare for pregnant homicide detective Jane Rizzoli when she finds herself on the wrong side of a hostage crisis.

The nameless and beautiful woman appears to be just another corpse in the morgue. But when medical examiner Maura Isles unzips the body bag and looks down at what she’s been told is an apparent suicide, she gets the fright of her life.

The corpse opens its eyes.

Now very much alive, the ‘dead’ woman is rushed to the hospital where her next action shocks everyone. With cool precision, she murders a security guard and seizes hostages. One of those hostages is a very pregnant patient: Jane Rizzoli.

Who is this mysterious hostage-taker, and what does she want? As tense hours tick by, Maura joins forces with Jane’s husband, FBI agent Gabriel Dean, to track down the nameless woman’s identity.

But only Jane, trapped with the armed madwoman, holds the key to the mystery. And only she can solve it – if she survives the night.

Customer Reviews

You have GOT to read this one!
Dr. Maura Isles is doing paperwork on an autopsy late one night. She needs some information to continue and goes into the Cold Room to locate it. There, she hears a noise coming from one of the body bags. Upon opening it, Maura is horrified to discover that the woman is still alive! Shortly thereafter, Maura goes to the hospital to follow up on her Jane Doe. She enters Doe's room just in time to see Doe kill a security cop. Doe ends up barricading herself and six other people in the Diagnostic Imaging area.

Jane Rizzoli is a Homicide Detective with Boston Police Department. She is also about to deliver a baby. She naps on the exam table and wakes up to find herself one of six hostages. Then a stranger walks past the police and SWAT Team members without anyone noticing until it is too late. Doe and the stranger know each other. They are on the same side. Rizzoli's husband is FBI agent Gabriel Dean, who is outside the hospital worried about his wife. He becomes frantic when he learns that the stranger is a specially trained black-ops agent, Joseph Roke ... and Joe is NOT on the police's side this time. No one knows what these two, seemingly crazy people, could possibly have in common.

When the crisis is over, Dean, Rizzoli, and Maura cannot seem to drop all their unanswered questions. They begin their own investigation. Soon they realize that Doe and Roke may not have been crazy after all. Sometimes there are secrets so terrible that powerful people will stop at nothing to keep quiet.

***** You have GOT to read this one! Author Tess Gerritsen has created a story that I can only classify as a "Medical, Detective, & Political Thriller". This novel covers all of them. The scariest part about the story is that what it describes, the lost girls, is totally true. These girls ARE out there. And more are added to their numbers daily.

Make sure you do not begin reading this novel until you have a couple days off work with no pressing plans. Once you start reading, you will not be able to stop. Highly recommended reading. *****

Reviewed by Detra Fitch of Huntress Reviews.

Tess rolls on with another cracking story
There's a sense with Tess Gerritsen of waiting for a novel that doesn't live up to her usual standards. After all, you don't get any better than The Surgeon, and somehow she's managed to consistently deliver the goods with all the follow-up Rizzoli/Isles novels. Vanish has been eagerly awaited, and one could only hope it wasn't a let down.

Well, it's far from it. Vanish is one heck of a thriller, with the 'just one more chapter' feeling that has you racing to the end before you know it. You almost don't want it to end, because you've just spent the best part of the day caught up in it.

It's evident here that Tess Gerritsen has used Vanish to draw attention to politics and make the reader question the nature and validity of American policy with regard to terrorism. The book draws close parallels with real events, and one suspects that the seed of the plot has a strong link with actual happenings. But make no mistake about it. Vanish is first and foremost a work of fiction, and the latest in an increasingly excellent series.

Tess Gerritsen is onto a winner. She has likeable heroines in Jane Rizzoli and Maura Isles. She has the ability to leave the reader spellbound and compelled by the stories she creates, desperate to know what is going to happen next. And she is virtually unrivalled in the genre at the moment, having left a good deal of crime writers in her wake.

Read this book. Do it now.

Tess rolls on with another cracking story
There's a sense with Tess Gerritsen of waiting for a novel that doesn't live up to her usual standards. After all, you don't get any better than The Surgeon, and somehow she's managed to consistently deliver the goods with all the follow-up Rizzoli/Isles novels. Vanish has been eagerly awaited, and one could only hope it wasn't a let down.
Well, it's far from it. Vanish is one heck of a thriller, with the 'just one more chapter' feeling that has you racing to the end before you know it. You almost don't want it to end, because you've just spent the best part of the day caught up in it.

It's evident here that Tess Gerritsen has used Vanish to draw attention to politics and make the reader question the nature and validity of American policy with regard to terrorism. The book draws close parallels with real events, and one suspects that the seed of the plot has a strong link with actual happenings. But make no mistake about it. Vanish is first and foremost a work of fiction, and the latest in an increasingly excellent series.

Tess Gerritsen is onto a winner. She has likeable heroines in Jane Rizzoli and Maura Isles. She has the ability to leave the reader spellbound and compelled by the stories she creates, desperate to know what is going to happen next. And she is virtually unrivalled in the genre at the moment, having left a good deal of crime writers in her wake.

Read this book. Do it now.