Rating: 
Summary: I'm in love!
Review: The moment I sat down and opened this book I fell in love. There are not many writers like Gerritsen, the kind of writer who creates characters you fall in love with and want to see them again and again. It has been a couple months since I read this book and my memory is the complete opposite of an elephant's so I do not remember the names of characters but I do remember being totally and completely enthralled.
I was interested in how much there was to the story. You can think you know everything there is to know all you want as long as you want but the truth is you are surprised time after time again. The killer is surprisingly intelligent and the way he picks his victims is amazing and appalling. I hope to see many more books from this talented writer.
Rating:
Summary: A Compulsive read
Review: This is one of those books that you keep saying to yourself "Just one more chapter and then I'll go to sleep", only it's 2:00 am and you have to go to work the next day.Extremely well paced and riveting - a real nail-biter. Highly recommended!
Rating:
Summary: This book should come with valium!
Review: Dr. Gerritsen is quickly becoming one of my favorite authors whose books consistently keeps me up late at night! A fast read that's hard to put down, THE SURGEON thrills even during the in-between parts. It's also a disturbing book that deals with various aspects of rape. Sure, we cheer for Catherine who has found the inner strength to not let the trauma of rape take over her life. Yet you can't help but feel for those who, years later, are still haunted by their ordeal. In our PC/New Age society, it's a relief to read an honest account that isn't afraid to call a victim a victim. Definitely one of the best thrillers of 2001!
Rating:
Summary: Fantastic Medical Thriller
Review: Tess Gerritsen is closing in on Michael Crichton as one of my favorite authors. In this work she leads you through the maze of a serial killer's mind as he closes in on his prize victim. Another "can't put it down" book by Gerritsen that I would strongly recommend.
Rating:
Summary: Today They Will Know We Are Back
Review: "The Surgeon" is not a novel that has any intention of giving the reader an easy moment. From the beginning of the story, as first we pay a visit to the cold mind of a serial killer, are swept into the autopsy of his latest victim, only to find ourselves in the middle of an operating room emergency, the reader is granted no respite. The killer tortures the victims, first binding them, performing a waking hysterectomy, and then, after keeping them alive for a time, slashing their throats. Now Boston detectives Thomas Moore and Jane Rizzoli are unwilling partners in a grizzly murder case. Rizzoli discovers that the killer's modus operandi has occurred once before in Savannah, Georgia. While the crimes are nearly identical there is one hitch. The last victim of the Savannah killer not only survived, but killed her tormentor. Survived to heal, leave Savannah and move to Boston where she practices as a surgeon and member of an emergency team. Dr. Catherine Cordell finds herself dealing again with a horror from her past she thought was over. It is not long before it is clear that Catherine Cordell is the real objective of the killer, now known as the Surgeon. The killer's trail of victims defies all police efforts to identify a murderer, who seems to have risen from the dead. The increasing menace to Dr. Cordell plays against her halting relationship with Moore and Rizzoli's almost compulsive antagonism. Compared to the all too human character if his opponents, the Surgeon always appears supremely cold and efficient. As apt to dwell on Greek myth as he his to exult over his victims. Few characters come across as completely healthy in this tale. Moore is recovering from the tragic loss of his wife, Rizzoli believes she is pitted against the entire male police establishment and Cordell struggles to free herself from the darkness that seized her in Savannah. Gerritsen deserves the credit for deploying a cast like this, and then managing to avoid giving in completely to the bleakness that haunts noir fiction. She does this with some flare, mixing in procedural, forensic and emergency room medicine in counterpoint to the primary plot. I do feel it necessary to mention that the tale is not at all simply a grim tale of slaughter. It deals with some very serious issues. Gerritsen confronts the aftereffects of rape directly, and in very uncomfortable fashion. Those of us who have been taught to belittle or deny how devastating this kind of personal invasion really is may have a tough time dealing with these passages. I found Gerritsen's frankness illuminating but unsettling, as I think most readers will. In retrospect I believe this may be the best suspense/serial killer novel of the 2001 crop. Although there have been some close competitors. I do not normally follow medical suspense, so I don't know how well it compares in that genre. But I can't imagine it being far from the top on most reviewers lists. While I am not normally a reader of medical thrillers, I intend to investigate more of Gerritsen's work. Marc Ruby for The Mystery Reader
Rating:
Summary: A very good medical thriller!
Review: Mr Gerritsen at her usual best. This book was hard to put down. It's full of suspense and holds your attention. I highly recommend.
Rating:
Summary: Nightmares Guaranteed
Review: Usually, a well-written thriller gets me hooked in the first few pages, and holds my interest throughout. This one grabbed me by the throat, shook me to the core, and violated my sleep. If one reviews the plot only, "The Surgeon" sounds like just another good offering in the serial-killer-stalks-victim genre. But it is so much more. The story follows Boston surgeon Catherine Cordell, a beautiful and brilliant doctor who fled her native South two years previously after a violent assault in which she murdered her rapist. Suddenly, the rapist seems to have risen from the dead--and is stalking Cordell relentlessly.
As he closes in on his prey, he commits a string of appallingly gruesome rape/mutilation murders on several women--again, the exact MO of the man Cordell murdered two years previously. The cops are baffled. Is this a copycat murderer? If so, how can this man know the heretofore hidden details of the previous killer's style? Every detail, down to the last horrific display of the victims, is identical to that of the previous murderer. Police detective Moore, a decent and good man, still mourning his wife who died of cancer, and a hard-bitten female cop with an impossible chip on her shoulder, team up to stop the killer before he commits any more atrocities. But therein lies the problem: The killer seems to be invisible. Despite the very bloody and unspeakable mayhem he wreaks, he leaves no trace of himself: no DNA, no fingerprints, nothing. He simply seems to vanish into thin air. But WE know this murderer. We don't know who he is, but we are privy to the chilling and insane entries into his private journal. And in this way we become part of his sick fantasies, as unwilling to do so as his intended prize: Catherine Cordell. "The Surgeon" is the first and only book of its genre to ever give me nightmares. Like the victims in the story, I was drawn into the killer's horrible mind and could not escape until the last page was over. I recommend this book as a classic of its kind: superb writing, tense, nail-biting suspense, and a mystery that never falters.
Rating: 
Summary: Think Silence of the Lambs
Review: Ok, so I admit that was a pretty misleading Title for this review. I guess the final action scene at the end of a female cop walking into a darkened room with the antagonist waiting to spring at her just brought back memories of the film. It's been a few months since I read this book, but the plot elements still stand out (a good thing). I liked the way this author adds detail to the forensics findings/pathology reports so that the lay reader (like me) can understand the significance of a procedure or medical test performed. I don't know why I'm so forgiving about the hackneyed theme of a lone female detective who doesn't have a life but does her darndest to put up with harrassment and misclaimed credit for her work in order to show the world. I guess it just works in this book. There are several relationships and source of conflict in this book between Dr. Corday, Detective Moore; that of love and conflict of interest. Between Moore and the tomboy cop (I forget her name); that of a crush and admiration.
Rating:
Summary: Clever medical thriller
Review: With her medical thriller, Harvest, Tess Gerritsen gained a broad fan base with her superb plotting, realistic characters, and detailed description. Four books later, she can still spin a chilling tale, proving that she's here to stay. The Surgeon is probably her second-best novel, surpassed only by Harvest. The plot revolves aound Dr. Cordell, a Boston doctor. Years ago, Cordell lived in Georgia, where she put an end to a brutal killing spree when the murderer came after her. Now, in Boston, someone is killing women in the same fashon. Could Cordell have killed the wrong man, or is someone trying to re-create the events that scarred her life forever? With the help of Detective Moore from the Boston police department, she must confront the ghosts of her past in order to stay alive. Gerritsen has written a winning novel with The Surgeon, and deserves much praise. Definitely worth your time and money.
Rating:
Summary: Exceptionally close to the mark!!!
Review: There are quite a few books that attempt to put you in the driver's seat of the action AND be technically accurate. This is one of those books. The story is about a serial killer (The Surgeon)and a surviving victim of a dead serial killer. The story begins similar to most murder/serial killer stories, but almost immediately takes you on a fast hairpin turn. Serial killers almost without exception have their own unique signature when they commit their crimes, but why does the Surgeon have the virtually exact same signature of a dead serial killer? The Surgeon has intimate knowledge of the dead serial killer's methods. Why? Tess Gerritsen leads you along the path of a very plausible scenario of this serial crime with many unique detours along the way and the techincal aspects of this book are exceptional. I have experience in both the medical and law enforcement field and can find little to no flaws with the interaction of the characters and situations. Very good reading, I highly reccommend this selection.
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