Book Review: The Sinner by Tess Gerritsen

Within the walls of a cloistered convent, a scene of unspeakable carnage is discovered. On the snow lie two nuns, one dead, one critically injured- victims of a seemingly motiveless, brutally savage attack. 

As medical examiner Maura Isles autopsy of the murder victim yields a shocking surprise, the case takes a sudden and disturbing twist. The body of another woman has been found. And someone has gone to a lot of trouble to remove her face, hands and feet. 

As long buried secrets are revealed so Dr Isles and homicide detective Jane Rizzoli find themselves part of an investigation that leads to an awful, dawning realisation of the killer's identity.

I only discovered Tess Gerritsen this year and I think that The Sinner is my favourite so far of the Rizzoli and Isles series. I read this on a 10 hour flight between Heathrow and Miami and it was the perfect book to keep me distracted.
I felt that The Sinner focused in more detail on Rizzoli and Isles and I learnt more about the two female characters in this book than I did in the previous two.
The murder at the convent is completely shocking, one nun is dead and another critically injured. The violence inflicted in to these two women of God shocks everybody. The fact that the attack took place in a cloistered convent is even more alarming, these two women should have felt completely safe but somebody got in and shattered that forever.
Jane Rizzoli is leading the case and feels the huge burden of catching this highly dangerous killer. She is sickened by the crime scene and cannot believe where her investigation takes her. Rizzoli's personal life infringes on the job too, Gabriel Dean makes an appearance in the last third of the book and Jane has to finally admit that he may be more than a passing interest.
Dr Maura Isles in many ways holds the key to the investigation. Her post-mortems reveal vital clues as to  what happened to the nuns. When the third body is found, Maura initially thinks that is bears no connection to the convent killing. When she investigates further, she could not begin to imagine the ways in which the victims are linked. Dr Isles also has her personal life to content with in the form of her ex-husband Victor turning up after three years apart. She has a real mix of emotions; she realises how much she has missed him but then begins to question why he has suddenly decided to make an appearance.
Tess Gerritsen once again impressed me with her powerful story-telling skills. I think that a lot of crime/thriller books can be quite predictable but Gerritsen keeps you guessing right to the very end. I have the next book in the series, Body Double to read soon and I can't wait to see what these two women get up to next.
As I have said before, I would highly recommend Tess Gerritsen's books, she is right up there as my Queen of Crime!