The Bone Collector

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--to solve this latest brain-twister: a serial killer with a method to his madness. In thriller fashion, the killer's crimes are described in detail, as is the technological equipment Rhyme uses to examine evidence, including an energy-dispersive X-ray unit and a mass spectrometer.

Every fictional detective has his or her gimmick, from Sherlock Holmes's violin to Nero Wolfe's orchids, and Rhyme is no exception. He is a quadriplegic who can move only a single finger. Gadget enthusiasts will enjoy reading about Lincoln Rhyme's tools; other readers might wish for more plausible characters and less focus on technology.