"the Silent Girl: A Rizzoli & Isles Novel" Review

A friend introduced me to Tess Gerritsen a few months ago and, since then, I have read virtually all her books. When she is at the top of her form as in The Surgeon and The Apprentice she as good as anyone and I think that Warren Hoyt - the serial killer in those two books - stacks up well against Hannibal Lechter. When she is not at the top of her form she is still pretty darn good.

Silent Girl is a thriller with many strands. There was a horrific mass killing at the Red Phoenix restaurant in Boston's Chinatown 19 years ago and a waiter was determined to have gone off his rocker, shot several patrons and then himself. But was it really a murder/suicide? Was there or was there not a witness and where is this witness now? This somehow ties in to a present day homicide victim - a beautiful woman whose hand is found on the ground and the rest of her body on a nearby roof. There is the beautiful woman in her fifties who runs a martial arts studio and has an even more beautiful acolyte. There is an Irish mafia Don who may or may not be interfering with the investigation. There is a Chinese origin detective who wants to advance to the homicide division. There are two, three and eventually six missing girls and somehow they, too, are part of this mystery. There is a veteran homicide detective who retired many years ago but somehow seems back in the game and he holds many key cards. The victims of that mass killing have their own secrets and these emerge as the story progresses.

Let me tell you what I LOVE about Tess Gerritsen. Her writing is superb. She is excellent in setting the scene and making you feel as if you are right there trembling in anticipation of the horror that will befall you. She is a doctor and there is complete authenticity in her description of forensic investigation. Maura Isles, the medical examiner who is a protagonist in many of her books including this one, is brilliant but also has her own flaws and is busy fighting her demons. Jane Rizzoli the Boston homicide cop who is the other protagonist has sharp instincts and is still proving herself. Both are very believable characters. Each of Tess' books are stand alone thrillers but she puts in enough hints and references to previous books that a loyal fan has a strong sense of continuity. Thus, for example, Maura, who was rescued by a wild teenager called Rat in Ice Cold, is now trying to understand Rat and be almost a foster mother to him in this book.

You learn a lot from Tess Gerritsen's books. She explains how the patient behind the scenes work leads to the external breakthroughs. One constant background character is Erin Volchko, the forensic scientist who takes trace evidence and determines startling facts. In this book, for instance, she determines that the woman with the severed hand was killed by a 500 year old sword. She also gives a brief history of sword manufacture that I found fascinating.

Gerritsen grabs you almost from the first page and takes you through unexpected twists and turns. You are in the middle of a chess game where the moves and counter moves come thick and fast and you are amazed at the thinking behind these.

So, why only four stars? because Gerritsen builds up to a crescendo and even throws in multiple surprises at the end, but she can't quite carry it off. The plausibility factor is not as good as it should be in a thriller that is so well constructed up to this point. There are also some loose ends but i will not mention these since they are spoilers.

I do recommend it. The ending is a let down only by the high standards Gerritsen set herself in the earlier books I mentioned. It still pretty good.