Type of bind: Hardcover
Dewey Decimal Number: 813.54
EAN num: 9780671553012
ISBN number: 0671553011
Label: Atria
Manufacturer: Atria
Quantity: 1
Page Count: 352
Printing Date: September 01, 1996
Publishing house: Atria
Sale Popularity Level: 695072
Studio: Atria
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Product Description:
In a novel of harrowing suspense and brilliantly crafted plot twists, author Tess Gerritsen draws on her years of experience as a doctor to deliver an explosive thriller that makes her an indisputable star. HARVEST vividly portrays a young woman doctor challenging a world where medical miracles and greed fuel a lethal conspiracy-and the bright lights of the O.R. conceal the ultimate corruption of genius. Unerringly authentic, with scalpel-sharp characterizations that rival Patricia Cornwell's HARVEST is an astounding debut....
HARVEST
TESS GERRITSEN
For Dr. Abby DiMatteo, the road to Boston's Bayside Hospital began with a tragic accident-and the desperate, awful weeks that followed as she watched her little brother, Pete, lose his battle to live. Despite her small-town roots and lack of money, Abby pushed through college and medical school, each achievement strengthening her ambition to reach higher. Now, immersed in the grinding fatigue of her second year as a surgical resident, she's elated when the hospital's elite cardiac transplant team taps her as a potential recruit.
But Abby soon makes an anguished, crucial decision that jeopardizes her entire career. A car crash victim's healthy heart is ready to be harvested; it is immediately cross-matched to a wealthy private patient, forty-six-year-old Nina Voss. Abby and chief resident Vivian Chao hatch a bold plan to make sure that the transplant goes instead to a dying seventeen-year-old boy who is also a perfect match.
The repercussions are powerful and swift; Dr. Chao resigns, bowing under the combined fury of the hospital's top staff and Nina Voss's outraged husband. Abby is shaken but unrepentant-until she meets the frail, tormented Nina. Then a new heart for Nina Voss suddenly appears, her transplant is completed, and Abby makes a terrible discovery. The donor records have been falsified-Nina's heart has not come through the proper channels.
Defying Bayside Hospital's demands for silence, Abby, with Vivian Chao's help, plunges into an investigation that reveals an intricate, and murderous, chain of deceptions. Every move Abby makes spawns a vicious backlash... and, in a ship anchored in the stagnant waters of Boston Harbor, a final, grisly discovery lies waiting....
As compelling as the best Michael Crichton of Michael Palmer, more provocative than tomorrow's headlines, HARVEST is a mesmerizing read-and Tess Gerritsen proves herself to be a new master of first-class suspense fiction.
Amazon.com Review:
When Robin Cook wrote Coma in 1977, the idea of hospital patients being incubated for their vital organs sounded like science fiction. Twenty years later, this gripping thriller about a thriving international grey market in human hearts, livers and kidneys could come from tomorrow's 'Nightline.' Author Gerritsen was an internist before she switched her energies to writing, and her experience shows in every scene. When young surgical resident Dr. Abby DiMatteo assists at her very first 'harvest' (the removal of living organs from a patient declared legally brain dead) at Boston's posh Bayside Hospital, 'she felt vaguely nauseated by the whine of the blade, the smell of bone dust,' neither of which seem to bother the veterans. It's obviously a personal memory being mined for good fictional purposes. (Gerritsen wrote paperback romance novels before Harvest: Check out her Keeper of the Bride and Thief of Hearts.)
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Rated by buyers 
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Harvest is excellent. I couldn't put the book down. Also, Gerritsen weaves the theme of social class beautifully. This one is a real page turner and I am eager to read her other books.
Rated by buyers 
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Suspenseful, intriging. Made me think that with tons of people on donor lists, I should be an organ donor.
Rated by buyers -
I was very impressed! I have just ordered two more of her books. The end was a complete surprise for me!
Rated by buyers -
This was a well-written book: suspenseful plot, plenty of velocity. As another reviewer has stated here, this is not Gerritsen's very first novel, but it is the one the propelled her to fame and so is often mistakenly assumed to be her "first." Prior to this, she wrote romance. And since the sucess of Harvest, she has written quite a few thrillers that have clearly garnered her a loyal and enthusiastic following.
That said, there is really only a small slice of Gerritson's novels that appeal to me. Her Jane Rizzoli series holds absolutely no fascination for me, because following the exploits of a serial killer for six or seven books - or even two pages - isn't my idea of fun. As I commented in my review of one of Patricia Cornwell's books, there are just some places in the human psyche that I refuse to contemplate. The mind of a serial killer is one of them.
Nor do her romance novels interest me. So that leaves basically her medical thrillers such as Gravity, Harvest, Life Support, and a couple others.
The plot of this book is quite simple: Russian orphans are bought and sold for the sole purpose of harvesting their organs. But figuring out who the bad guys are and then catching them takes 300+ pages and makes for a fun read. And, I couldn't help but think that the heroine in this story was patterned after Gerritson herself to a certain degree. I kept imagining the female equivalent of a guy in midlife crises who writes a book that draws on inside knowledge gained during his career, while making himself into an uber-hero. Frankly, that's the problem with creating a protagonist who shares too much in common with the author (gender, profession, age, and in Gerritson's case -- minority ethnicity). Your readers are left to wonder just how much of the lead character is a subconcious projection of "I coulda been a contender" and how much is truly fiction. It's the same nagging question I have whenever I read a Lisa Scottoline novel and then flip between her desciption of the heroine and the picture of Lisa on the dust jacket. Hmmm.
Admittedly, Gerritson's experience as a practicing M.D. gave her obvious mastery of the technical details requisite in a medical thriller and lends them plenty of authenticity. And, I find her plots and dialog to be head and shoulders above Robin Cook -- a guy who can't manage to write believable dialog or create a non-stereotypical character to save his life. So it's nice to have something besides Cook if you want a medical thriller.
My only real gripe about Gerritson is that in several of her books she feels compelled to take a cheap shot at Christians. Funny, if she were to single out any other religion there would be howls of protest, or - God forbid - if she were to pick on a "minority" group of some kind and treat them with the stereotypical approach she takes to Christians, she'd be villified. But because it is an idiotic charicature of a follower of Christ, rather than Islam, Buddhism, Judaism, or Hinduism, she's given a free pass.
She clearly has a chip on her shoulder and it diminished my respect for an otherwise very talented storyteller.
Rated by buyers -
a well written book with a topical story line.A good author to read if you want a fast moving,gripping book
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