Vanish Hardcover – August 23, 2005 by Tess Gerritsen
Book 5 of 13: Rizzoli & Isles
 
A blessed event becomes a nightmare for pregnant homicide detective Jane Rizzoli when she finds herself on the wrong side of a hostage crisis in this timely and relentless new thriller from the New York Times bestselling author of Body Double.

A nameless, beautiful woman appears to be just another corpse in the morgue. An apparent suicide, she lies on a gurney, awaiting the dissecting scalpel of medical examiner Maura Isles. But when Maura unzips the body bag and looks down at the body, she gets the fright of her life. The corpse opens its eyes.

Very much alive, the woman is rushed to the hospital, where with shockingly cool precision, she murders a security guard and seizes hostages . . . one of them a pregnant patient, Jane Rizzoli.

Who is this violent, desperate soul, and what does she want? As the tense hours tick by, Maura joins forces with Jane’s husband, FBI agent Gabriel Dean, to track down the mysterious killer’s identity. When federal agents suddenly appear on the scene, Maura and Gabriel realize that they are dealing with a case that goes far deeper than just an ordinary hostage crisis.

Only Jane, trapped with the armed madwoman, holds the key to the mystery. And only she can solve it–if she survives the night.
 
From Publishers Weekly
Retired internist Gerritsen serves up another prescription for bad dreams in her latest thriller to feature Boston medical examiner Maura Isles and homicide detective Jane Rizzoli (Body Double). The catalogue of terrors this time out includes sexual slavery, hostage-taking and torture; there are also government bad guys, post–9/11 red herrings and a heart-tugging cadre of young Eastern European women known only by their first names. Fierce Olena, thought dead, wakes up in Maura's morgue, recovers in the hospital, and—with the help of a mysterious colleague—takes a group of hostages, including Jane, who's about to give birth. Jane's husband, FBI agent Gabriel Dean, tries to reason with the hostage-takers, and learns that Olena wants publicity to bring down the Washington bigwig responsible for sexually enslaving, then murdering, her friends. Maura feels a frisson for Tribune columnist Peter Lukas, and he seems to be the guy to tell the story, but readers will quickly apprehend that he's playing both sides. As usual, the medical details are vivid and read authentic, while the action is just this side of super-hero comic exaggeration. Does it work? The book clubs say yes: Doubleday, Literary Guild, and Mystery Guild have all made it a main selection; the bestseller lists can't be far behind. (Aug.)
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From Booklist
Dr. Maura Isles has barely had time to recover from the startling revelations about her family in ody Double (2004) when she discovers one of the corpses in her morgue is very much alive. The young woman is rushed off to the hospital, where the doctors are able to save her life. Maura pays the young woman a visit only to witness the woman grab a security guard's gun, shoot the man, and take Maura hostage. Maura manages to escape, and the woman flees into the bowels of the hospital, where she takes six other people hostage, including Detective Jane Rizzoli, who is about to give birth. The woman refuses to communicate with the police, but she manages to get a signal out through a local radio station to a man who slips past the police barricade to join her in the hospital. Jane's husband, FBI agent Gabriel Dean, becomes very suspicious when the situation attracts the attention of the highest levels of government. Hoping to save his wife, Gabriel begins his own investigation and is startled when he uncovers a shocking conspiracy. Drawing on current events, Gerritsen's latest novel is a tense, taut thriller that grabs readers from the get-go and never lets up. Kristine Huntley
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