Essays
Writing Tips: It Is Okay to Change Paths
Tess Gerritsen is the bestselling author of several suspense novels including her Rizzoli & Isles series.
Long before I became a doctor, I was a writer. At the age of seven I wrote my first suspense novel, about a blue zebra named Mickey who was warned never to go into the jungle. Naturally, Mickey went into the jungle. I bound the pages together with needle and thread and proudly announced to my father that I had found my future career. I was going to write books!
My father said that was no way to make a living. And that’s how I ended up in medical school instead.
Although it delayed my childhood dream of becoming a novelist, I never once regretted studying medicine. I’m fascinated by science. I enjoyed meeting people from all walks of life — doctors treat every- one, from bankers to the homeless. But my passion to write never left me, and when I went on maternity leave and finally had a chance to complete my first novel, I realized that writing was what I was really meant to do. Even though I’d made an occupational detour, those eleven years of medical training turned out to be the best education a writer could hope for.
I finally used my medical knowledge in my tenth novel, the medical thriller Harvest. To my surprise, Harvest hit the New York Times bestseller list. Up till then, I had assumed that readers didn’t care if medical scenes were realistic, but Harvest taught me that, yes, readers are interested in what doctors do and think. My literary agent told me: “Readers want to know secrets.” They want to peek behind the O.R. and autopsy room doors. They want to know what doctors won’t tell them. All the years I’d spent learning to be a doctor meant I could write with the level of authenticity readers are searching for.
Since then, I’ve tried to provide just those details. Have you ever wanted to know the physics be- hind why a plane or car crash kills you? I revealed that secret in Gravity. Ever wondered if you could buy your way to a higher spot on the organ transplant list? In Harvest, I revealed how it’s possible. In The Bone Garden I described how to amputate a limb without anesthesia; in Ice Cold, I described death by nerve gas; and in Playing With Fire, I explored the baffling behavior of patients with partial complex seizures.
Over the years, as I’ve described autopsies, E.R.s, crime scenes, and even resuscitation in space, I’ve exhibited the doctor’s point of view. I know how panicked a doctor feels as a life drains away beneath his hands, and the thrill of hearing a silent monitor suddenly start to beep with a renewed heartbeat. I also understand the logical manner in which doctors approach problems, how they must sift the subjective from the objective, and try to tease out the facts from the emotions.
All the years I’d spent learning to be a doctor meant I could write with the level of authenticity readers are searching for.
In my Rizzoli and Isles crime series, medical examiner Dr. Maura Isles gives us the doctor’s point of view. When she and Jane investigate a murder, no matter how disturbing the crime scene may be, Maura thinks like a doctor. Like a surgeon faced with an exsanguinating patient, Maura must suppress her horror and get to work. Others may think she’s cold- blooded or robotic, but that’s how Maura stays in control: by staying focused and doing her job.
I no longer practice medicine, but when I sit down to write a novel I sometimes imagine I’m once again donning a doctor’s gloves and white coat, this time as Maura Isles, my alter ego. Over the course of eleven books, I’ve grafted much of my own personality onto Maura. She and I are fascinated by science, we graduated from the same universities, and shared the same major. We both play the piano, drive the same car, even favor the same wine. In a world that’s far too chaotic and unpredictable, we both search for logical explanations.
In fiction, at least, Maura can find them.
