The hero of Jeffery Deaver's thriller The Bone Collector is Lincoln Rhyme, a forensic scientist known to his peers as "the world's foremost criminalist". Rhyme will need all his reason--and his considerable stock of high-tech tools--about him to solve this latest brain-twister: a serial killer with method to his madness. In tried and true thriller fashion, the killer's crimes are described in lurid detail, as is the astounding technological equipment with which Rhyme examines the evidence--everything from an energy-dispersive x-ray unit to a mass spectrometer.Every fictional detective has his or her gimmick, from Sherlock Holmes's violin to Nero Wolf's orchids, and Rhyme is no exception. He is a quadriplegic who can move nothing but a single finger. Gadget-philes will be in seventh heaven reading about Lincoln Rhyme's tools; other readers might feel the book could do with a few more plausible characters and a little less technology. --Amazon.com
Lincoln Rhyme and Amelia Sachs Series
The series follows brilliant forensic expert Lincoln Rhyme and his partner, detective Amelia Sachs, as they solve complex crimes using scientific methods and deductive reasoning. Their stories often take place in New York and involve thrilling chases and psychological drama. Rhyme, who is paralyzed, relies on Sachs to assist him in the field. Together, they face various dangerous adversaries and uncover dark secrets.
Recommended Reading Order
NYPD criminalist Lincoln Rhyme joins his beautiful protégé, Amelia Sachs, in the hunt for the Coffin Dancer -- an ingenious killer who changes appearance even faster than he adds to his trail of victims. They have only one clue: the madman has a tattoo of the Grim Reaper waltzing with a woman. Rhyme must rely on his wits and intuition to track the elusive murderer through New York City -- knowing they have only forty-eight hours before the Coffin Dancer strikes again.
The empty chair
- 512 pages
- 18 hours of reading
Renowned criminalist Lincoln Rhyme faces his ultimate opponent: a kidnapper and murderer dubbed the Insect Boy. But Rhyme is in for a surprise when he learns that catching a criminal is one thing...and keeping him is another. Now Rhyme, in North Carolina to undergo risky spinal cord surgery, finds himself hunting a ruthless killer in the heart of a southern swampland -- and going head-to-head with his protégé, Amelia Sachs, in a rivalry that tests the limits of both their expertise and their love.
The Stone Monkey
- 528 pages
- 19 hours of reading
Lincoln and Amelia are recruited to track down a cargo ship carrying two dozen illegal Chinese immigrants, as well as the notorious human smuggler and killer known as the Ghost. But when the capture goes disastrously wrong, Lincoln and Amelia find themselves in a race to stop the Ghost before he can track down and murder the two surviving families who have vanished deep into the labyrinthine world of New York City's Chinese community. Over the next forty-eight hours the Ghost ruthlessly hunts for the families while Rhyme, aided by a policeman from mainland China, struggles to find them before they die and Sachs pursues a very different kind of policework - forming a connection with one of the immigrants that may have consequences going to the core of her relationship with her partner and lover, Lincoln Rhyme.
The vanished man
- 416 pages
- 15 hours of reading
A killer flees the scene of a homicide at a prestigious Manhattan music school and locks himself in a classroom. Within minutes, the police have him surrounded. Then a scream rings out, followed by a gunshot. The police break down the door. The room is empty. Lincoln Rhyme and Amelia Sachs are brought in to help with the high-profile investigation. For the ambitious Sachs, solving the case could earn her a promotion. For the quadriplegic Rhyme, it means relying on his prot�g�e to ferret out a master illusionist they've dubbed 'the conjurer', who baits them with gruesome murders that become more diabolical with each fresh crime. As the fatalities rise and the minutes tick down, Rhyme and Sachs must move beyond the smoke and mirrors to prevent a terrifying act of vengeance that could become the greatest vanishing act of all.
The twelfth card
- 544 pages
- 20 hours of reading
Geneva Settle is a bright young high school student from Harlem writing a paper about one of her ancestors, a former slave called Charles Singleton. Geneva is also the target of a ruthless professional killer. Criminalist Lincoln Rhyme and his policewoman partner Amelia Sachs are called into the case, working frantically to anticipate where the hired gun will strike next and how to stop him, all the while trying to get to the truth of Charles Singleton, and the reason that Geneva has been targeted. For Charles Singleton had a secret – a secret that may strike at the very heart of the United States constitution, and have disastrous consequences for human rights today. And Sachs is going to have to search a crime scene that’s 140 years old before she can stop the killer.
The Cold Moon
- 544 pages
- 20 hours of reading
It's the night of the full Cold Moon - the month of December according to the lunar calendar. A young man is found dead in lower Manhattan, the first in a series of victims of a ruthless killer calling himself the Watchmaker. His obsession with time drives the Watchmaker to plan the murders with the precision of fine timepieces, and the victims die prolonged deaths while an eerie clock ticks away their last minutes on earth. Amelia is not only Lincoln's eyes and ears at crime scenes on the Watchmaker case, but she's now running her own homicide investigation - her first case as lead detective. The policewoman's unwavering efforts in pursuing the killers of a businessman, who left behind a wife and son, sets into motion clockwork gears of its own, with consequences reaching to people and events that will endanger not only many lives but Lincoln's and Amelia's future together.
Rhyme's cousin has been arrested for murder. The evidence clearly shows he did it, but Rhyme agrees to check things out. It turns out that the cousin along with other people has been wrongly convicted because the true killer knows every single detail about the lives of the victims he kills and the men he sets up to take the fall for those crimes. This allows him to get close to the victims under false pretenses, murder or rape, and escape safely. And then he sets up others to take the fall for his crimes, planting incontrovertible evidence... Rhyme, Sachs and the rest of the team have to find out who at the huge, ominous data mining company is getting access to this information. Meanwhile the villain--known only by a number to us--realizes he's being pursued and turns his knowledge of data and information into a weapon. Oh, and lest things seem too delicate, he also gets information through good old-fashioned murder and torture too...
The burning wire
- 462 pages
- 17 hours of reading
New York is being held to ransom. Manhattan's electricity grid has been the victim of a horrific attack . . . and more are planned. While the FBI and Homeland Security try to determine who's behind the carnage, Lincoln Rhyme and Amelia Sachs race to decode the forensics in order to prevent the next assault. But all is not what it seems. Electricity can be as lethal as it is vital, and Lincoln Rhyme soon finds he's up against a merciless killer with a unique weapon - one that can be found in everyone's home and office. And in the meantime, one of the few criminals to have ever slipped Rhyme's net is under surveillance in Mexico. The deadly assassin known as the Watchmaker has set his murderous sights on innocent victims, whose identity is as yet unknown . . . Lincoln Rhyme must race against the clock, juggling the two investigations, as they hurtle headlong toward their deadly outcomes.
Lincoln Rhyme: The Kill Room
- 484 pages
- 17 hours of reading
Renowned investigator and forensics expert Lincoln Rhyme is drafted to investigate the sniper-killing of a U.S. citizen in the Bahamas. While his partner, Amelia Sachs, traces the victim's steps in Manhattan, Rhyme leaves the city to pursue the sniper himself.
In his classic thriller The Bone Collector, Jeffery Deaver introduced readers to Lincoln Rhyme-the nation's most renowned investigator and forensic detective. Now, a new killer is on the loose: a criminal inspired by the Bone Collector. And Rhyme must untangle the twisted web of clues before the killer targets more victims-or Rhyme himself. THE SKIN COLLECTOR The killer's methods are terrifying. He stalks the basements and underground passageways of New York City. He tattoos his victims' flesh with cryptic messages, using a tattoo gun loaded with poison, resulting in an agonizing, painful death. When a connection is made to the Bone Collector-the serial killer who terrorized New York more than a decade ago-Lincoln Rhyme and Amelia Sachs are immediately drawn into the case. Rhyme, Sachs, and the NYPD must race against time to answer the many questions the investigation uncovers: Whom will the killer attack next? What is the message behind the victims' tattoos? Does the killer's own inking--a fanged centipede sporting a woman's face--hold any significance? And what is his ultimate mission? As time runs out, Rhyme discovers that the past has returned to haunt him in the most troubling way imaginable...
Number one bestselling author and master of suspense Jeffery Deaver returns with the twelfth Lincoln Rhyme thriller.
Forensic detective Lincoln Rhyme is back with his most harrowing case yet in this newest installment of Jeffrey Deaver's New York Times bestselling series. A businessman snatched from an Upper East Side street in broad daylight. A miniature hangman's noose left at the scene. A nine-year-old girl, the only witness to the crime. With a crime scene this puzzling, forensic expertise of the highest order is absolutely essential. Lincoln Rhyme and Amelia Sachs are called in to investigate. Soon the case takes a stranger turn: a recording surfaces of the victim being slowly hanged, his desperate gasps the backdrop to an eerie piece of music. The video is marked as the work of The Composer... Despite their best efforts, the suspect gets away. So when a similar kidnapping occurs on a dusty road outside Naples, Italy, Rhyme and Sachs don't hesitate to rejoin the hunt. But the search is now a complex case of international cooperation--and not all those involved may be who they seem. Sachs and Rhyme find themselves playing a dangerous game, with lives all across the globe hanging in the balance.
The Cutting Edge
- 448 pages
- 16 hours of reading
Lincoln Rhyme is back - and he and Amelia Sachs must contend with a killer who seems to be targeting couples just as they start out on their lives together. Now a NBC TV series.
