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Harvest / Life Support
Tess Gerritsen joined the front ranks of thriller writers with her "New York Times" bestseller, "Harvest." Now she weaves utter medical authenticity into another novel of gripping suspense, as a dedicated woman doctor probes too deeply into the cause of a lethal, mystifying outbreak.
The overnight ER rotation at Springer Hospital suits Dr. Toby Harper just fine -- until its calm is shattered by a man Toby admits one quiet night. Delirious and in critical condition from a possible viral infection of the brain, he barely responds to treatment...and then he disappears without a trace. But before Toby can find her missing patient, a second case occurs, revealing a chilling evidence of an infection that can only be spread through direct tissue exchange. Soon Toby's on a trail that winds from a pregnant sixteen-year-old prostitute to an unexpected tragedy in her own home. Only then does she discover the an evil, deadly design to the frightening epidemic.
The overnight ER rotation at Springer Hospital suits Dr. Toby Harper just fine -- until its calm is shattered by a man Toby admits one quiet night. Delirious and in critical condition from a possible viral infection of the brain, he barely responds to treatment...and then he disappears without a trace. But before Toby can find her missing patient, a second case occurs, revealing a chilling evidence of an infection that can only be spread through direct tissue exchange. Soon Toby's on a trail that winds from a pregnant sixteen-year-old prostitute to an unexpected tragedy in her own home. Only then does she discover the an evil, deadly design to the frightening epidemic.
372 pages, Paperback
First published January 1, 2002
10 people are currently reading
585 people want to read
About the author
Tess Gerritsen
206 books21.2k followersInternationally bestselling author Tess Gerritsen took an unusual route to a writing career. A graduate of Stanford University, Tess went on to medical school at the University of California, San Francisco, where she was awarded her M.D.
While on maternity leave from her work as a physician, she began to write fiction. In 1987, her first novel was published. Call After Midnight, a romantic thriller, was followed by eight more romantic suspense novels. She also wrote a screenplay, "Adrift", which aired as a 1993 CBS Movie of the Week starring Kate Jackson.
Tess's first medical thriller, Harvest, was released in hardcover in 1996, and it marked her debut on the New York Times bestseller list. Her suspense novels since then have been: Life Support (1997), Bloodstream (1998), Gravity (1999), The Surgeon (2001), The Apprentice (2002), The Sinner (2003), Body Double (2004), Vanish (2005), The Mephisto Club (2006), and The Bone Garden (2007). Her books have been translated into 31 languages, and more than 15 million copies have been sold around the world.
As well as being a New York Times bestselling author, she has also been a #1 bestseller in both Germany and the UK. She has won both the Nero Wolfe Award (for Vanish) and the Rita Award (for The Surgeon.) Critics around the world have praised her novels as "Pulse-pounding fun" (Philadelphia Inquirer), "Scary and brilliant" (Toronto Globe and Mail), and "Polished, riveting prose" (Chicago Tribune). Publisher Weekly has dubbed her the "medical suspense queen".
Now retired from medicine, she writes full time. She lives in Maine.
While on maternity leave from her work as a physician, she began to write fiction. In 1987, her first novel was published. Call After Midnight, a romantic thriller, was followed by eight more romantic suspense novels. She also wrote a screenplay, "Adrift", which aired as a 1993 CBS Movie of the Week starring Kate Jackson.
Tess's first medical thriller, Harvest, was released in hardcover in 1996, and it marked her debut on the New York Times bestseller list. Her suspense novels since then have been: Life Support (1997), Bloodstream (1998), Gravity (1999), The Surgeon (2001), The Apprentice (2002), The Sinner (2003), Body Double (2004), Vanish (2005), The Mephisto Club (2006), and The Bone Garden (2007). Her books have been translated into 31 languages, and more than 15 million copies have been sold around the world.
As well as being a New York Times bestselling author, she has also been a #1 bestseller in both Germany and the UK. She has won both the Nero Wolfe Award (for Vanish) and the Rita Award (for The Surgeon.) Critics around the world have praised her novels as "Pulse-pounding fun" (Philadelphia Inquirer), "Scary and brilliant" (Toronto Globe and Mail), and "Polished, riveting prose" (Chicago Tribune). Publisher Weekly has dubbed her the "medical suspense queen".
Now retired from medicine, she writes full time. She lives in Maine.
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Displaying 1 - 28 of 28 reviews
June 4, 2024
Heart-pounding thriller about —yes, harvesting organs. The novel was published in 1996, so I think the topic was fairly new, outside of Robin Cook’s “Coma.”
I really cared about the protagonist, Dr. Abby DiMatteo. She’s a resident in a Boston hospital. She has a promising career ahead of her and a handsome fiancée. What could possibly go wrong?
Everything!
I really cared about the protagonist, Dr. Abby DiMatteo. She’s a resident in a Boston hospital. She has a promising career ahead of her and a handsome fiancée. What could possibly go wrong?
Everything!
May 17, 2020
3.5
I enjoyed R&I more tbh
I enjoyed R&I more tbh
September 30, 2025
This was twisted
March 3, 2017
This is a review of the Harvest portion of this book.
I found this book in the cupboard and it was time to either read it or give it away, bundled as it is with "Life Support", it takes up a lot of room. The premise didn't interest me much, or I would have picked it up sooner, but to my surprise, I was very engaged with this story. I wanted a more complete ending, however. The author set it up so you could imagine a few results, I guess, but I could see where a happy ending would go, so why not give it to me? Not a reason to knock off a star, though.
Now I'm going to happily start Life Support.
I finished Life Support today. It was good too, but I liked Harvest better. Probably liked that ambiguous ending better than the rushed ending of this one. The romantic angle didn't do a lot for me, but I am a dried up old woman. This book had plenty of edge of your seat action, and good development of secondary characters. I'm not sorry I spent time reading this, and if I come across another interesting title by this author, I will pick it up.
I found this book in the cupboard and it was time to either read it or give it away, bundled as it is with "Life Support", it takes up a lot of room. The premise didn't interest me much, or I would have picked it up sooner, but to my surprise, I was very engaged with this story. I wanted a more complete ending, however. The author set it up so you could imagine a few results, I guess, but I could see where a happy ending would go, so why not give it to me? Not a reason to knock off a star, though.
Now I'm going to happily start Life Support.
I finished Life Support today. It was good too, but I liked Harvest better. Probably liked that ambiguous ending better than the rushed ending of this one. The romantic angle didn't do a lot for me, but I am a dried up old woman. This book had plenty of edge of your seat action, and good development of secondary characters. I'm not sorry I spent time reading this, and if I come across another interesting title by this author, I will pick it up.
June 16, 2016
boek 2 was diagnose besmet en was ook weer erg spannend met een aantal onverwachte wendingen. deze ging over een arts die erachter komt dat een aantal oudere mensen die in een luxe verzorgingstehuis wonen een hormonenkuur krijgen met gevaarlijke gevolgen.
vind de boeken van Tess gerritsen erg spannend en goed en absoluut niet voorspelbaar.
vind de boeken van Tess gerritsen erg spannend en goed en absoluut niet voorspelbaar.
December 12, 2012
Hartslag:
Ik vond het weer een goede thriller van Gerritsen, maar toch iets minder dan die uit de serie rond Isles en Rizzoli. Het verhaal zat nog redelijk goed in mekaar, maar toch had ik wel wat voorzien waar het ging op uitdraaien.
Ik vond het weer een goede thriller van Gerritsen, maar toch iets minder dan die uit de serie rond Isles en Rizzoli. Het verhaal zat nog redelijk goed in mekaar, maar toch had ik wel wat voorzien waar het ging op uitdraaien.
April 1, 2025
Twee boeken in een. Beide met een medisch thema en als locatie het ziekenhuis. Beide verhalen indrukwekkend. Het eerste verhaal komt meer reëel over en zou zo in de echte wereld kunnen voorkomen. Bij het tweede verhaal lijkt me dat iets minder. Kortom beide verhalen waren zeker spannend en meeslepend!
October 27, 2024
Gerritsen uses her medical background to create a thriller involving an infectious outbreak. Dr Abby DiMatteo, a resident in a Boston hospital, has a promising career and a handsome fiancée, but becomes involved and must investigate the misuse of organ donors.
April 5, 2019
2,5*
Voorspelbaar, platte personages, en ontzettend gekunstelde situaties om het verhaal in gang te houden.
Voorspelbaar, platte personages, en ontzettend gekunstelde situaties om het verhaal in gang te houden.
March 2, 2020
Leuk boek, goed verhaal. Wel veel medische termen.
March 23, 2022
Beide boeken zijn goed geschreven en spannend. Leuk bedacht, aanrader voor wie van medische thrillers houdt
April 12, 2022
Lekker boek
June 17, 2022
Twee hele spannende boeken. Ondanks dat het door dezelfde schrijfster is geschreven zijn de boeken compleet anders. Spannend van het begin tot het einde
August 1, 2023
Tess Geritsen is altijd goed, kan me niet goed herinneren waar dit over ging tho
July 17, 2025
Gerritsen is such a great writer. Both stories were so chilling, as both could be true stories. Great books.
August 23, 2014
Hartslag:
Abby DiMatteo, arts i.o., is blij te mogen werken met het beroemde transplantatieteam van Bayside. Maar haar carrière loopt in gevaar als ze een donorhart toewijst aan een onverzekerde jongen in plaats van aan een rijke privé-patiënte. Als Nina Voss opeens een donorhart krijgt dan begint DiMatteo te twijfelen. Als DiMatteo op onderzoek uit gaat, is ze niet voorbereid op het verraad. Daarnaast is ze haar leven niet meer zeker.
---
Een verhaal dat me in het begin niet pakte en waar ik veel moeite mee had. Het verhaal zet je wel aan het denken over donorschap. Het is de afgelopen weken/maanden weer veel in het nieuws geweest en er wordt weer veel over gepraat. Er wordt echter niets aan gedaan. Als je dan dit boek leest besef je dat er met geld veel gekocht kan worden, maar dat geld ook veel kapot kan maken. Lastig is dat het verhaal niet lekker loopt. Door verandering in schrijfstijl (daar lijkt het op) loopt het verhaal opeens wel beter en dan voel je ook beter de spanning door de woorden heen. Hoe het verder gaat met de hoofdrolspelers blijft in het midden
===
Diagnose besmet:
Toby Harper, arts op de 1e hulp van Springer Ziekenhuis, werkt 's nachts om overdag voor haar dementerende moeder te kunnen zorgen. Tijdens haar dienst krijgt ze echter met een patiënt te maken van wie ze denkt dat hij toevallen heeft. Als hij door de drukte op de 1e hulp uit het oog wordt verloren en Harper een andere patiënt krijgt met dezelfde symptomen, blijkt al snel dat er meer aan de hand is. Harper heeft zich echter vergist in haar tegenstander en merkt al snel dat haar vertrouwde wereld instort.
---
Een goed geschreven verhaal dat soms lastig te volgen is door de medische termen die worden gebruikt. Het is een losstaand verhaal en anders dan de verhalen met Rizzoli en Isles. Het is echter niet slechter en laat zien dat Gerritsen ook andere hoofdpersonen kan creëren.
Jammer is wel dat vrij vroeg in het verhaal al doorschemert wie de dader is.
Het boek is dusdanig geschreven dat het als een trein wegleest. Het is alleen niet aan te raden om het te lezen als je een zwakke maag hebt.
---
Abby DiMatteo, arts i.o., is blij te mogen werken met het beroemde transplantatieteam van Bayside. Maar haar carrière loopt in gevaar als ze een donorhart toewijst aan een onverzekerde jongen in plaats van aan een rijke privé-patiënte. Als Nina Voss opeens een donorhart krijgt dan begint DiMatteo te twijfelen. Als DiMatteo op onderzoek uit gaat, is ze niet voorbereid op het verraad. Daarnaast is ze haar leven niet meer zeker.
---
Een verhaal dat me in het begin niet pakte en waar ik veel moeite mee had. Het verhaal zet je wel aan het denken over donorschap. Het is de afgelopen weken/maanden weer veel in het nieuws geweest en er wordt weer veel over gepraat. Er wordt echter niets aan gedaan. Als je dan dit boek leest besef je dat er met geld veel gekocht kan worden, maar dat geld ook veel kapot kan maken. Lastig is dat het verhaal niet lekker loopt. Door verandering in schrijfstijl (daar lijkt het op) loopt het verhaal opeens wel beter en dan voel je ook beter de spanning door de woorden heen. Hoe het verder gaat met de hoofdrolspelers blijft in het midden
===
Diagnose besmet:
Toby Harper, arts op de 1e hulp van Springer Ziekenhuis, werkt 's nachts om overdag voor haar dementerende moeder te kunnen zorgen. Tijdens haar dienst krijgt ze echter met een patiënt te maken van wie ze denkt dat hij toevallen heeft. Als hij door de drukte op de 1e hulp uit het oog wordt verloren en Harper een andere patiënt krijgt met dezelfde symptomen, blijkt al snel dat er meer aan de hand is. Harper heeft zich echter vergist in haar tegenstander en merkt al snel dat haar vertrouwde wereld instort.
---
Een goed geschreven verhaal dat soms lastig te volgen is door de medische termen die worden gebruikt. Het is een losstaand verhaal en anders dan de verhalen met Rizzoli en Isles. Het is echter niet slechter en laat zien dat Gerritsen ook andere hoofdpersonen kan creëren.
Jammer is wel dat vrij vroeg in het verhaal al doorschemert wie de dader is.
Het boek is dusdanig geschreven dat het als een trein wegleest. Het is alleen niet aan te raden om het te lezen als je een zwakke maag hebt.
---
February 5, 2016
Those who love mysteries involving hospitals, doctors and murders , will love Tess Gerritsen's " Life Support " ! This is one of those books that will hook you from the first couple of pages. Then again if hospitals and doctors scare you, do not pick up this book.
Toby Harper is a physician at Springer Hospital in Newton, Mass, working the night shift when there are a couple of strange incidents with patients from an exclusive retirement home, Brant Hill. These appear to be relatively healthy older citizens who develop weird symptoms and go down hill rapidly. The connections to Brant Hill have Harper and a couple of associates puzzled.
Toby has plenty on 'her plate' , caring for a mother who has Alzheimers and a sister too busy with her family to help Toby out very much. Toby has to hire a nighttime sitter to stay with her mother. She really doesn't have much of a life besides her medical one. When one of her patients escapes from the hospital running naked into the night, the pressure on Toby really mounts!
Toby does have some allies on her side, but the pressure on her as she tries to solve the mystery keeps climbing . As she gathers information the verdict on the nature of the disease points to a rare disease named Creutzfeldt-Jakob . Forces opposed to Toby finding out anything about the source of the disease are starting to put in motion discrediting accusations about Toby.
There is one caveat that I have to state. The book was terrific for 90% of the read but I personally was not happy about how all the loose ends were tied by at end. But that's just me !
Toby Harper is a physician at Springer Hospital in Newton, Mass, working the night shift when there are a couple of strange incidents with patients from an exclusive retirement home, Brant Hill. These appear to be relatively healthy older citizens who develop weird symptoms and go down hill rapidly. The connections to Brant Hill have Harper and a couple of associates puzzled.
Toby has plenty on 'her plate' , caring for a mother who has Alzheimers and a sister too busy with her family to help Toby out very much. Toby has to hire a nighttime sitter to stay with her mother. She really doesn't have much of a life besides her medical one. When one of her patients escapes from the hospital running naked into the night, the pressure on Toby really mounts!
Toby does have some allies on her side, but the pressure on her as she tries to solve the mystery keeps climbing . As she gathers information the verdict on the nature of the disease points to a rare disease named Creutzfeldt-Jakob . Forces opposed to Toby finding out anything about the source of the disease are starting to put in motion discrediting accusations about Toby.
There is one caveat that I have to state. The book was terrific for 90% of the read but I personally was not happy about how all the loose ends were tied by at end. But that's just me !
April 21, 2011
READ IN DUTCH
I had heard a lot about Tess Gerritsen, but I had never read anything written by her before I read 'Harvest / Life Support'. It was also the first time I read a 'medical thriller', a genre which made me curious.
First Harvest. Abby gets a job by a very important transplantteam but she fell into disstatisfaction by the others when she decides to give a new heart to an uninsured boy instead of an insured woman. Then suddenly there is a new heart available for the woman. But, who's heart is it and how did it come in the hospital?
I thought the idea was quite interesting, but it took me a long time to finish the book. I can't really say what the problem was, and I liked the way she wrote the story, but somehow there was something that stopped me from reading. Right now I'm planning to read 'Bloodstream' very soon, so I hope I will read the one faster.
Last but definitely not least Life Support. A group of old men gets a strange disease and no one knows how they got this disease. It happens to be that all of them entered in a project with life prolonging hormones. It seems like there is something wrong with the experiment?
The writing style of this book is the same as Harvest, but somehow I thought this book to be more readable. At least I read this book much faster than I read Harvest and I actually thought that this story was more interesting. But that, of course, is a matter of opinion. As I said, I'm planning to read more of her books soon.
I had heard a lot about Tess Gerritsen, but I had never read anything written by her before I read 'Harvest / Life Support'. It was also the first time I read a 'medical thriller', a genre which made me curious.
First Harvest. Abby gets a job by a very important transplantteam but she fell into disstatisfaction by the others when she decides to give a new heart to an uninsured boy instead of an insured woman. Then suddenly there is a new heart available for the woman. But, who's heart is it and how did it come in the hospital?
I thought the idea was quite interesting, but it took me a long time to finish the book. I can't really say what the problem was, and I liked the way she wrote the story, but somehow there was something that stopped me from reading. Right now I'm planning to read 'Bloodstream' very soon, so I hope I will read the one faster.
Last but definitely not least Life Support. A group of old men gets a strange disease and no one knows how they got this disease. It happens to be that all of them entered in a project with life prolonging hormones. It seems like there is something wrong with the experiment?
The writing style of this book is the same as Harvest, but somehow I thought this book to be more readable. At least I read this book much faster than I read Harvest and I actually thought that this story was more interesting. But that, of course, is a matter of opinion. As I said, I'm planning to read more of her books soon.
April 22, 2013
In tegenstelling tot "Diagnose Besmet" komt "Hartslag" erg traag op gang. Jammer, want de rest van het verhaal was erg spannend. Deze omnibus was mijn eerste kennismaking met medische thrillers: zo nu en dan wel heel veel jargon, maar als je daar overheenleest, houdt je twee verhalen over die je zo snel mogelijk uit wilt lezen.
April 19, 2015
Different people start having unusual symptoms. Dr. Stanley Mackie goes nuts doing an appendectomy. Molly Picken is a young hooker who becomes pregnant and her story is followed in the book. Toby, an ER doctor, becomes involved in these people's lives but no one believes the crimes she uncovers.
August 5, 2015
Two novels, Harvest was her first, a wicked book about using disenfranchised people as unwitting organ donors, and the second, life support, about attempts to push the envelope of immortality. Pretty good, launched her career.
Read
May 4, 2012mystery to the very end
July 27, 2012
Iedere keer als ik weer een deel van de Rizzoli en Isles serie heb gelezen, kan ik niet wachten tot het volgende deel. De boeken zijn iedere keer weer goed en spannend tot het einde!
May 30, 2015
Pretty good. Held my interest.
May 25, 2016
een dokter op onderzoek ... leuk boek!
July 31, 2016
Gerritsen schrijft vooral voor de Amerikaanse televisie, zo lijkt het. Alleen nog het script schrijven. Beetje te Amerikaans, maar wel goed te lezen.
September 18, 2016
Both stories were fun quick engaging page turners, but the storyline was so far fetched I can't do 4 stars...
November 9, 2016
Hoe verder je in het boek en verhaal kwam, hoe spannender dat het werdt.
Displaying 1 - 28 of 28 reviews