Tess Gerritsen "Autopsy"

Author: Tess Gerritsen Original title: Vanish First edition: 2005 Medical theme: the work of a medical examiner Description:  Dr. Maura Isles is having a rough day at work. Eight autopsies in a single day is definitely too much; after six, having already worked overtime, she decides to go home. However, she hears a noise in the morgue. One of the bags is moving... It turns out there is a young girl locked inside. She had been brought in eight hours earlier, pulled from the water with no signs of life—she was presumed drowned. The "resurrected" girl is taken to the ICU at the hospital across the street, and representatives from all the media begin calling Maura, the medical examiner. The patient’s test results show high levels of phenobarbital and alcohol in her blood. Dr. Isles decides to visit the woman responsible for all the commotion at the hospital. However, the woman kills a guard, takes the medical examiner hostage, and eventually escapes on her own toward the diagnostic department, where she terrorizes six other people. She calls a local radio station and quotes Caesar’s words before crossing the Rubicon: “The die is cast.” An undeniable strength of the book is its very detailed descriptions of autopsy techniques—though, on the other hand, for those who have had the opportunity to attend a few autopsies, they likely won’t offer much that’s new. Besides that, I found the idea of placing a radio transmitter in coffins interesting, so that the buried person could contact the outside world in case they woke up;)