ReadersRoom.com takes a minute to revisit
Tess Gerritsen

ReadersRoom: Tess Gerritsen -- hello and welcome to One Year After at ReadersRoom.com. It is a pleasure to speak with you today!

Tess Gerritsen: Thank you for having me again!

ReadersRoom: One year ago, you did our first Coffee chat here at ReadersRoom -- thank you! So, could you tell our readers what you've been up to this last year?

Tess Gerritsen: I've been continuing the series started in The Surgeon, and have written Body Double, which comes out this August 17. Also, I went on the road last September to promote The Sinner.

ReadersRoom: Well, let's start with Body Double. Could you tell us a bit about that?

Tess Gerritsen: It was inspired by an experience I had in the autopsy room last year, in which I suddenly had the horrifying thought: what would it be like to observe my OWN autopsy? So I came up with a scenario in which Maura Isles, the medical examiner, comes home one evening to find a crime scene in her front yard. A dead woman's been found shot in a car - and the woman looks exactly like Maura. During the autopsy later, Maura discovers so many eerie similarities -- same blood type, same birth date, and she discovers she had a family she never knew about - a rather sick family, actually.

ReadersRoom: Interesting plot line -- and I understand that you just finished the book last week!

Tess Gerritsen: Yep, I was writing furiously all the way till the end. Because I don't outline my plots ahead of time, sometimes I don't know how they finish until I actually get to the end of the book. Anyway, the book is now off to the editor, and I'm enjoying a bit of a rest.

ReadersRoom: I'm wondering -- do you take much of a break between novels, or are you already gearing up to start the next bestseller?

Tess Gerritsen: I allow myself maybe a week, and then I start thinking about what the next book is going to be.

ReadersRoom: So the ideas must already be percolating! Let's move backwards to The Sinner for a moment. For anyone who missed our Coffee chat with you, could you tell our readers a bit about that?

Tess Gerritsen: Yep, I have an interesting premise -- one I can't really talk about yet! But I always look for ideas that really give me an emotional reaction. The Sinner is about a murder in a Boston convent -- two nuns are found attacked in the chapel. The clues lead Maura Isles to discover that the disease leprosy is involved in the mystery. I'd always wanted to write a mystery involving leprosy, and I finally found a way to weave it into a book.

ReadersRoom: This is a question from one of our readers -- Dana from Tulsa: Do you have any plans to leave your series for a while and write a standalone book?

Tess Gerritsen: I think I'll probably write at least one more book in the series, and then I'll sit back and think about it. I do miss writing standalones -- they give you a little "vacation" from the lives of your main characters, and let you go further a field to different topics.

ReadersRoom: Would you ever consider returning to romance?

Tess Gerritsen: I try to weave a little romance into my books now, but as for going back to straight romance, I think it'd be hard since my readers now identify me as a suspense author.

ReadersRoom: Your novels are all very well researched. Do you draw exclusively from your own experiences, or do you do "special" research for each novel -- and what form does that research take?

Tess Gerritsen: It depends on the novel. In Gravity, for instance, I had to do months of special research involving NASA and the space program. For my current novels, I need to do research in forensics. Even the medical aspects require looking up a number of things. I have a huge library of medical and forensic textbooks on my shelf. But the most important element of authenticity is getting the jargon right -- having doctors actually talk like doctors. Since I'm a doctor, that part, at least, is easy!

ReadersRoom: And when you write, do your premises ever change based on your research? Does what you learn ever change the storyline you started out with?

Tess Gerritsen: My stories are constantly changing in mid-stream! Sometimes I'll discover something on research that twists the story in an entirely new direction, In Gravity, for instance, I had painted my heroine into a corner and there was no way out of it alive. But I went back through my volumes of research and discovered an escape hatch for her -- so tragedy turned into triumph instead.

ReadersRoom: So, what is next for Tess Gerritsen?

Tess Gerritsen: I expect to be on the road again this fall for Body Double, plus work on the next book. I've just signed another two-book contract with Ballantine, and I've been very happy with them!

ReadersRoom: And when your tour schedule is firmed out, readers can find out where you will be by going to www.tessgerritsen.com?

Tess Gerritsen: Yep, it'll be posted on my Web site probably in late July.

ReadersRoom: Finally, one year after -- is there anything you would like to say to your readers?

Tess Gerritsen: Just a great big THANK YOU for all the wonderful notes and enthusiasm!

ReadersRoom: Tess Gerritsen -- I cannot tell you how much we appreciate you kicking off One Year After the way you started our Coffee Chats. Thank you, and all the best with Body Double!

Tess Gerritsen: Thank you!



Copyright 2004 by ReadersRoom, LLC. All rights reserved.