The Bone Collector [by] Jeffrey Deaver
[New York
0-451-18845-4; $6.99
Lincoln Rhyme has become a classic thriller hero, and this book is one of the quintessential novels in this genre. It is the first of the series, and doesn’t pull any punches. It is shocking, brutal, and extremely absorbing – a real page-turner.
Lincoln Rhyme, the former head of NYPD Forensics, was the nation’s foremost criminologist – a man who could work a crime scene, reading the clues left behind, and come up with a perfect profile of the killer. But a horrendous accident – a building fell on him in the line of duty – has made him a quadriplegic, a man who can only move his left ring finger. He is now a great mind, strapped to his bed, mulish and sarcastic, hiding from a life he no longer wants to live.
But his attention is drawn to a new crime, just committed. His old partner comes calling with a file, which he wants Rhyme to take a look at and explain to him. A corpse is found buried alongside a virtually deserted West Side railroad track, its bloody hand rising from the dirt. It belonged to a man who got into a cab at the airport and never got out. Reluctantly, Lincoln Rhyme abandons retirement to track down a clever killer.
He is also attracted to the gutsy patrol officer who secures the crime scene by stopping traffic not only on the two adjacent, and well-travelled streets, but also on the Amtrak line that goes past the body.
Amelia Sachs has been walking a beat, which plays havoc with her arthritis, but she is looking forward to a new position with the NYPD’s Publicity Department, when she is hijacked by Rhyme for his team. Her chutzpah reminds him of himself, and he begins to train her to be his eyes, ears, hands and legs – he teaches her to work the scene of the crime.
The victim of this first heinous crime had a colleague, a woman, who had gotten into the cab at the airport with him. She is still missing, although her diamond ring is on the first victim’s finger. Rhyme directs Amelia to find not only the physical evidence left at the crime scene by a very careful criminal, but also the specific and ingenious clues he has left behind to help them find his next victim — if Rhyme can decipher them in time.
The woman is found, but they are too late – she is dead, scalded by the steam sent back through the system by the City of New York
The killer is obsessed with the past, and has called a couple of the victims by names which are not theirs. His safe house is a brownstone-and-marble Federal-style building. He seems to specialize in basements and tunnels in the old parts of the city. By putting together a chart of things they know about him, they discover more and more about the person they call the Bone Collector. Still, when the villain is finally unmasked, it is a shock. There are incredible twists and turns in this story, and both Sachs and Rhyme are put in incredible danger before the Collector is put out of business.
In the process, Rhyme finds that he still loves the exacting work that he used to love more than anything else. He has been tempted by the thoughts of suicide, but turned from that by the actions of his team, and especially his new partner. There is still a savory quality to life that he has found lacking up until now, but now Lincoln Rhyme and Amelia Sachs will work together again to solve the forensic puzzles that come their way – at least 9 more books to date.
This is a gripping tale, told by an expert storyteller, complete with a glossary of forensic vocabulary (from the 4th edition of Rhymes’ book) so that you won’t get lost. Highly recommended, but not for the squeamish. ~ lss-r
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This book belongs to my husband, who graciously let me read it.
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