I have a secret.
And someone wants to make sure I never tell . . .
In a house decorated with horror movie posters, a young woman’s body is found. She lies on her bed, two bloodied objects clutched in her palm. Detective Jane Rizzoli and Forensic Pathologist Maura Isles are called to the murder scene, but even faced with this gruesome sight they are unable to identify the immediate cause of death.
Their investigation leads them to a high-profile murder case that was seemingly solved years before. But when another body is found in horrific circumstances, the link between the two victims is clear. Was the wrong person sent to prison? Is the real killer out there right now, picking off new targets?
One woman knows the killer is coming for her next. She’s the only one who can help Rizzoli and Isles catch him.
But she has a secret that she has to keep.
This is the 12th book in the fabulous Rizzoli and Isles series. I do love Tess Gerritsen’s books and this series especially. She is consistently excellent; her books have pace and fire and they have great characters. In this book Jane is dealing not only with a series of pretty macabre murders neatly woven around a horror story, but she is also trying to deal with her parent’s rocky marriage. Maura, too, has personal issues to deal with, some of which impact on the case.
Forensics comes to the fore again in this book, when Maura is faced with trying to identify the cause of death in the victims and it is always fascinating to learn something new about the ways in which a death without trace (or at least hardly any trace) can be inflicted.
Two victims are found dead in pretty weird circumstances; one, a young woman, is found dead at home surrounded by horror posters. The second, a young man, is found on a pier with three arrows in his chest.
As Jane says to psychologist Zucker, “I think we’re wading into some deep, dark psychological shit here.”
What stumps the pair to begin with is not just the difficulty of establishing cause of death but also of finding a link between the victims. When Maura begins to realise the symbolism of the murders, it still takes detailed deliberate police work to go back in time and find what each victim had in common.
Jane finds a possible link to an earlier death, previously ruled an accidental fire. Then a third person goes missing.
Maura’s biological mother, Amalthea Lank (such a great name) is meanwhile seriously ill in hospital, but that does not stop her trying to get into Maura’s head by insinuating she knows something about the crimes that Maura and Jane are investigating.
Their investigation leads them to an infamous trial that was twenty years in the past. Three people were convicted, only one is left alive and he has recently been let out after serving his sentence. Jane is convinced she has her killer, but can she prove it?
Jane needs the help of one woman who is trying to hide because she knows she is the killer’s next victim. But that woman is also keeping secrets of her own.
Tess writes the kind of books you want to read in one sitting – this one was no different – and already I am hungry for the next one.
She has a vivid and somewhat grotesque imagination and I loved the way that she was able to relate the deaths to other deaths of a biblical nature. I smiled, too, at the nod to one of the great horror and thriller film-makers in her choice of victim’s name.
I Know A Secret is a really good, dark, page turning read. Beautifully plotted with a strong mix of murder and relationship dynamics, it sings on the page as you frantically work your way to the end of the book.
Highly enjoyable and highly recommended.
I Know A Secret is published by Random House – Transworld Digital on 10th August 2017
About Tess Gerritsen
Bestselling author Tess Gerritsen is also a physician, and she brings to her novels her first-hand knowledge of emergency and autopsy rooms. But her interests span far more than medical topics. As an anthropology student at Stanford University, she catalogued centuries-old human remains, and she continues to travel the world driven by her fascination with ancient cultures and bizarre natural phenomena. She started off her writing career with romance novels, now published by Mira. But in 1996 she switched to writing thrillers with her novel HARVEST, inspired by the anger she felt about the illegal trade in human organs. It was her first New York Times bestseller. Since then she has become an internationally bestselling author of crime novels, and her thriller series starring Boston detective Jane Rizzoli and medical examiner Maura Isles is the basis for the hit television series “Rizzoli & isles.” She lives with her husband in Maine. For more information on Tess Gerritsen and her novels, visit her website.
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