I've no idea how I came by this book, the first I've read by Gerritsen. It's a slow-burn thriller that frequently lapses into body horror as members of the adolescent population of a Maine lakeside town erupt into unpredictable violence.

As the town's doctor Claire Elliott races to find the cause of this aggression, red herrings and false trails pop up every so often, only to be demolished by scientific evidence and the latest savage teen attack.

It's all highly-crafted, the emphasis on scientific method is refreshing, and it all gets jolly exciting towards the end, but this book never truly engaged me. All the characters just seem to whine a lot. Secondary mysteries - which police officer is leaking information to the press, or who is writing poison pen letters about Claire Elliott - are either trivial, or just left unresolved. There's a troublemaking reporter who fades out of the story without even causing much in the way of trouble. When Claire and another character see a "phenomenon" in the lake, Claire comments that she's seen something like this before, but then seems completely surprised the next time the subject comes up.

The resolution, when it comes, seeks to contrive a human villain behind a natural outbreak, and it feels so tacked-on that you have to wonder whether Gerritsen's publisher insisted on it. The villain in question is highly unconvincing and frankly half-hearted, and also whines a lot, though at least has the decency to keep it to their interior monologues.

If you like your thrillers tinged with a little horror, there's a lot to enjoy in Bloodstream's atmospheric wintry Maine adventure, but it's probably not worth going out of your way searching for a copy.