The Sinner (Jane Rizzoli, Book 3)

by Tess Gerritsen

2004

Status

Available

Publication

Ballantine Books (2004), Edition: Reprint, 355 pages

Description

Fiction. Mystery. Suspense. Thriller. HTML:This ebook edition contains a special preview of Tess Gerritsenâ??s I Know a Secret. Not even the icy temperatures of a typical New England winter can match the bone-chilling scene of carnage discovered at the chapel of Our Lady of Divine Light. Within the cloistered convent lie two nunsâ??one dead, one critically injuredâ??victims of an unspeakably savage attacker. The brutal crime appears to be without motive, but medical examiner Maura Islesâ??s autopsy of the dead woman yields a shocking surprise: Twenty-year-old Sister Camille gave birth before she was murdered. Then another body is found, mutilated beyond recognition. Together, Isles and homicide detective Jane Rizzoli uncover an ancient horror that connects these terrible slaughters. As long-buried secrets come to light, Maura Isles finds herself drawn inexorably toward the heart of an investigation that strikes close to homeâ??and toward a dawning revelation about the killerâ??s identity too shatt… (more)

User reviews

LibraryThing member emhromp2
One of my friends lent this book to me, because she couldn't get through it. I still don't understand that! The story starts with a man who wanders through a deserted place in India, and then it switches to a crime scene in the USA, where one nun is killed and the other badly injured. A very good
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story ensues, with a clever ending, as I am used to with Tess Gerritsen.
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LibraryThing member CloggieDownunder
The Sinner is the 3rd in Tess Gerritsen’s Rizzoli/Isles series. The action starts with a murder and an attempted murder in a convent of aging nuns. The murder victim is a young novice about to take her final vows, but during the autopsy Maura Isles finds that the novice has recently given birth.
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Another body turns up, a shooting victim without a face, hands or feet, and with some unusual nodules on the skin. Yet another body, this time in Providence, Rhode Island, shot with the same gun, brings FBI Agent Gabriel Dean into the investigation. Gradually, Rizzoli and Iles piece together the mystery. Rizzoli is somewhat distracted by a development involving Agent Dean, and Iles is similarly distracted by the reappearance of her ex-husband, Victor Banks. Whilst the first two novels were told through Rizzoli or Moore, much of this story is told from the point of view of Maura Iles. Once again, a great plot with a few twists. Gerritsen manages to include aid organisations, leprosy, chemical disasters and miracles in the subject mix. Another excellent read!
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LibraryThing member MsBeautiful
Interesting Mystery/Thriller, well written
LibraryThing member TerriBooks
The third of the Rizzoli and Isles series, and the one I like best so far. The mystery story was more intricate than the previous two, and more fun to follow as the two characters followed the twists and turns. For the first time Jane and Maura actually worked together and began to connect with
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each other more as partners. I also liked the development of their personal stories and am looking forward to seeing how those progress.
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LibraryThing member dbhutch
Gerritsen outdoes herself yet again in another of her series of crime thrillers with Rizzoli and Isles. Set in Boston, Isles gets called out to handle a death at a convent, where she finds Rizolli, a dead nun, and one who is severely injured. Cause of death, homicide. While autopsying the nun, she
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gets another call, on a run down abandoned restaurant, where a woman has had her hands and feet cut off, and her face removed. To make things worse for our crime solvers, Ilses's ex-husband is in town and trying to patch things up, and Rizzoli thinks she might be pregnant. Oddly as things progress, the 2 deaths are tied together, the FBI gets involved, the case has international imp[locations, and both women end up testing their faith.
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LibraryThing member mojacobs
A quick easy read, one of the early Jane Rizolli - Maura Isles books. Good for a few escapist evenings.
LibraryThing member LivelyLady
Murder in a cloistered convent brings Jane Rizzoli into this investigation. When a murdered nun is found to have recently given birth, Rizzoli must come to terms with her personal life and situation. Very good story, with twists and turns to the end.
LibraryThing member krissa
OK, this is only my third, but probably my favorite Gerritsen book so far. This one is refreshing. The first two were very similar, and although they were good, it started to feel like it went on for too long. The Sinner is very layered, and a lot of interesting things are going on at once. In this
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book we get to know Maura Isles better. Much of the story is told from her point of view. I like the way we saw her personality, and her past. I also like that the author isn't trying to introduce a whole bunch of new characters to us in the first book of a series, and trying to jam in a whole bunch of back story. She is taking her time and spreading them out. Or maybe she didn't know where it was going when she started. Either way, it makes it a very comfortable pace for the reader. My pet peeve in this one was that at points it seems like Isles fancies herself the cop. She goes off half cocked, following leads or hunches. It not only irritated me, but was distracting at times. In a cozy mystery, I would believe that. For an intelligent, educated woman, it seemed a little hard to swallow. I thought the ending of this one was great. There is wrap-up of both the personal and mystery story lines. And you know I like a neat, all ends tied, ending.
After reading this one, I have trouble choosing who I like more, Rizzoli or Isles.
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LibraryThing member ComicGirl178
Kind of a filler in the series. The mystery took a back set, to moving the characters forward. Still enjoyable, I'm looking forward to the next book in the series.
LibraryThing member AnneCurrin
Good continuation of a series.
LibraryThing member delphimo
Gerritsen writes a detailed and thorough murder mystery that has the reader on the edge of the couch hoping to reach the end. This escapade involves nuns, lepers, babies, and ex husbands as Tess and Maura must make choices about love and work. For some reason, I never associated lepers with India,
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and never fully understood the disease. Gerritsen explains the progression of the disease and the places where it sill exists. Gerritsen also delves into the community of an aging convent to show what happens to these women that have dedicated a life to God. Gerritsen explores many topics that seem taboo, such as a mother's devotion to a specific child. I am enjoying Gerritsen's novel and am reminded of the writing of Patricia Cornwell.
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LibraryThing member bjmitch
My copy of this book is a 2004 paperback edition of one of the Rizzoli and Isles series. Maybe you've watched the TNT television channel show starring the characters in which, for a change, I think the casting people really nailed it. And the characters are what makes this series so addicting to
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me. We have Rizzoli the cop, Isles the pathologist, the Rizzoli family who are as Italian as they come, and the incidental characters in the stories who usually ring true with me.

This story is unusual in that the first victims are nuns in a cloistered convent. The older one is still alive but the younger one is not only dead, she has recently given birth. Since these nuns shun contact with the outside world, this presents quite a mystery. It certainly wasn't a virgin birth. The next victim, found in an abandoned restaurant populated only by cockroaches and rats, has no face, hands, or feet. The face and hands could have been removed to prevent identification, but the feet? And what are those lesions all over her body?

Meanwhile, Maura Isles' ex-husband suddenly shows up in Boston and is trying hard to insinuate himself back into her life. And Jane Rizzoli has a problem she has never faced and never wanted to. What to do? This mix of personal and professional mysteries are engrossing enough to keep you turning the pages. Have I tempted you yet?

Gerritsen writes an excellent series of novels. I always look forward to finding a new one to me and the time to read it.

Highly recommended for mystery lovers
Source: friend
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LibraryThing member Barb_H
Overall I enjoyed the book. I liked getting to know Isles better, finally, and even Rizzoli became much more human and brought to life. I think there was maybe a little too much time spent on personal stories instead of the nitty, gritty homicide case solving suspense. I'm hoping that now that the
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characters stories are more fleshed out, the rest of the books in the series will get back to more suspense and thrills with the cases they are trying to solve.
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LibraryThing member slvoight
Rizzoli and Isles are investigating the murder and the attempted murder of two nuns in a chapel on the ground of a cloistered abbey. The nuns are suppose to stay removed from the outside world so who could have gained access and done this horrible crime?
Dr Isles ex shows up during the investigation
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after 3 years, is this just a chance of fate or is there another reason he is in town? Lots of twists and turns!
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LibraryThing member Balthazar-Lawson
I really enjoyed this book as it had a lot of character development for the series two characters. It was much better the previous two books, except for the ending. With crime books I find that too often the perpetrators always bring themselves to the investigation and thus get caught. It's not a
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case of the investigators investigating and find the perpetrator. Aside from this point, the book is good read.
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LibraryThing member DanieXJ
I'm not against romance story lines in mysteries. They can give the characters depth and make the book more than just about death. But I detest story lines in novels (and in TV and movies too) that are forced or seem forced on the page. From the beginning of the Gabriel/Rizzoli 'relationship' it
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has seemed forced. Like Gerritsen wanted to take the 'ugly girl with smarts and spunk' and have the dashing FBI hunk fall for her. (In a tittery voice 'oh who knows why he'd ever love someone who's not a model'. Ack. Sorry, end of my personal sarcasm).

And, then in this novel (I won't spoil exactly what it is) something else happens and my first thought was, 'C'mon, the third book? Really? We've barely gotten to know this character for herself and that's the curve you're throwing at the reader?'

Anyway, it was a fine read for the most part. A solid mystery with good and unexpected twists along the way. I still don't like many of the characters and don't care how Gerritsen writes it, I still can't stand Jane's brother Frankie. I get that in real life a whole lot of people just don't have any redeeming qualities at all, but this is fiction and in fiction most great books need some sort of half way likable character for the reader to identify with. I haven't found one of those characters in this series yet.
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LibraryThing member Kaysbooks
After the first two installments of the R&I-series things shift from the Rizzoli point-of-view and her Nemesis, the surgeon, to Maura Isles. Finally those detectives find their balance.
This time a young nun and an old one get killed in a convent. What appears to be the doing of a mad man slowly
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turns to something else while new layers of the past are revealed. In the meantime Jane Rizzoli has to deal with the question if she could ever be a fit mother who could deal with the father of her unborn child, while Maura Isles is confronted with her ex-husband who wants to reconciliate. And although she stills find herself attracted to him, she gets the impression that he is not completely honest with her.
To make things even more difficult, a clergyman of the convent stirs up certain feelings, too, but he could be part of the murder scheme.
And while the private lifes of R&I get more into focus in this murder plot, the thrill and excitement don´t loose their grip on myself as a reader.
So, this is the best of the first three R&I-detectives, I think, and I am already looking forward to part 4.
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LibraryThing member wyvernfriend
This is the third story in the Isles/Rizoli series and while interesting, it seems to have lost a certain something for me. The characters seem to have lost themselves into angst and forgotten some of the core character points. It's unusual in a series for characters to move to being more cardboard
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rather than revealing more of themselves in the story, but this is what I can see in this story.

It's the story of two dead nuns, one of them is found to have recently had a child and the torturous circumstances. Each clue brings some more interesting twists but the personal stories of Rizzoli and Isles just didn't grab me.
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LibraryThing member Darrol
Ok. I guess. The leprosy angle was good, but the Catholic and Chemical Industry part was not so good.
LibraryThing member MHanover10
The more I get into this series the more I like it. This time someone has killed a couple nuns at an abbey and a faceless leper woman. How are they connected? Are they connected? And what happened in India? And why is Isles' ex-husband Victor in town? This book takes you on several twists and turns
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and I had no clue who the murderer was until the very end. Tess does a great job keeping you guessing and not making it obvious what has happened. I like that this one was more about Dr. Isles. I'm enjoying listening to the audio books so much that I don't want to leave my car and head into work. I've also sat in my car in the garage trying to finish a CD causing my dog frustration. Can't help it, this series is really good. On to book four!
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LibraryThing member MarjoleinL
A young nun gets killed in the cloister. Soon there are found a lot of mysteries around this young lady. Why was she killed? What did the little girl see?

It was a great book. I didn't read the Rizzoli books in order, so with every book I read I understand a lot more about Rizzoli, her relationship
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with Gabriel Dean and her daughter.
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LibraryThing member ladypembroke
Good book. Still trying to get used to the changes from TV show.
LibraryThing member skinglist
One dead nun, one on life support. An unidentifiable murder victim nick named "Rat Lady". So many possible sinners. All tied together in a logical and conceivable bow near the story's end.The leper victim plot seems familiar but not so much that it's crime novel trope.
I've only read a handful of
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the R&I books and it's interesting to see how many "facts" were changed in the series.
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LibraryThing member DaffiMere
Well written. The more I read, the more I didn't want this book to end!
LibraryThing member SmithfieldJones
It always comes down to the characters: if you don't like them -- heroes and villains, alike; if you don't care what happens to them, the plot can be the best ever written and the book will not pass mustard. Great characters, good plot.

Language

Original language

English

Original publication date

2003-08-19

Physical description

355 p.; 4.21 inches

ISBN

0345458923 / 9780345458926

Barcode

1600337
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