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Tess Gerritsen Biography, Books, and Similar Authors

Author Biography  | Interview  | Books by this Author  | Read-Alikes

Tess Gerritsen
Photo © Brian Velenchenko

Tess Gerritsen

Tess Gerritsen Biography

International bestselling author Tess Gerritsen took an unusual route to a writing career. A Stanford University graduate, Tess went on to gain her MD at the University of California, San Francisco. While on maternity leave as a physician, she began to write fiction. She published her first novel in 1987 and has since sold over forty million copies of books in forty countries, winning the Nero Wolfe Award and the RITA Award. Her novels have been top-three US bestsellers and number one bestsellers abroad. Critics worldwide praise her novels as "pulse-pounding fun" (Philadelphia Inquirer), "scary and brilliant" (Toronto Globe and Mail), and "polished, riveting prose" (Chicago Tribune). Publishers Weekly has dubbed her the "medical suspense queen." Her series featuring homicide detective Jane Rizzoli and medical examiner Maura Isles inspired the TNT television series Rizzoli & Isles, starring Angie Harmon and Sasha Alexander. Now retired from medicine, she lives in Maine and writes full time.

Tess Gerritsen's website

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Interview

Tess Gerritsen talks about doctors, nightmares, food and the criminal mind

When Tess Gerritsen arrived at the Istanbul Book Fair last month, there were hundreds of fans lined up to greet her, plus an entourage of security guards. That was just for openers. The physician-turned-bestselling author, whose crime novels have been translated into some three dozen languages, is no stranger to fame. "Now I sort of understand what it's like to be a rock star," she says. "It was sort of overwhelming."

Back home in quiet, scenic Camden, Gerritsen reflects on the Rizzoli & Isles series that has propelled her career to Turkey and beyond, and from the page to the small screen. Along with her books, TNT's Rizzoli & Isles has made the duo of homicide detective Jane Rizzoli and medical examiner Maura Isles into household names – a sort of Cagney & Lacey for the new millennium.

In Gerritsen's new thriller, Die Again, Jane and Maura piece together links between the grisly murder of a big game hunter in Boston and the disappearance, years earlier, of a tourist group on safari. As usual, Gerritsen has created a nail-biter that's not for the squeamish, although she herself is unfazed by the graphic details that come with the territory. As she might say, it's all in a day's work...

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Books by this Author

Books by Tess Gerritsen at BookBrowse
The Spy Coast jacket Playing with Fire jacket The Silent Girl jacket Ice Cold jacket
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Read-Alikes

All the books below are recommended as read-alikes for Tess Gerritsen but some maybe more relevant to you than others depending on which books by the author you have read and enjoyed. So look for the suggested read-alikes by title linked on the right.
How we choose read-alikes

  • Patricia Cornwell

    Patricia Cornwell

    New York Times bestselling novelist Patricia Daniels Cornwell is the only woman in the United States to receive England's coveted Gold Dagger, widely considered to be the most prestigious crime-writing award in the ... (more)

    If you enjoyed:
    The Apprentice

    Try:
    Blow Fly
    by Patricia Cornwell

  • Jonathan Kellerman

    Jonathan Kellerman

    Jonathan Kellerman is one of the world's most popular authors. He has brought his expertise as a clinical psychologist to numerous bestselling tales of suspense (which have been translated into two dozen languages), including... (more)

    If you enjoyed:
    The Apprentice

    Try:
    Monster
    by Jonathan Kellerman

We recommend 3 similar authors

View all 3 Read-Alikes

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Top Picks

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    Following the success of her debut novel, If We Were Villains, M. L. Rio's latest book is the quasi-...
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