Ms. Bristol's Reader's Journal

McCaleb had just gone to the LAPD to discuss the case with the lead detectives.  He was really angry about how they treated him.  He got in his cab from the police station and went to the convenient store where Gloria Rivers was killed.  He purchased a Hershey’s bar, just like Gloria did in her final moments of life.  He looked around and noticed the scared woman behind the counter.  Along with Gloria, the owner of the store, Mr. Kang, was also killed.  McCaleb realized that it was probably his widow who was standing behind the counter running the store now.  She stood in the same place where her husband bled to death.  After he returned home, he called his friend, a reporter at The Los Angeles Times, to find out more information on the shooting at the convenient store.  He discovered that there was another homicide/robbery at an ATM that may have been linked to the Gloria Rivers case.

McCaleb told his cardiologist that he was thinking about taking on the Rivers case.  She advised him against it because after the heart transplant he is supposed to lay low and recover fully before allowing himself to get stressed out.  He informed his doctor that the reason he wanted to pursue this was because he would be solving the murder of his heart donor.  Dr. Fox, McCaleb’s cardiologist, was very surprised to hear that he knew who the donor was.  That information was supposed to be kept confidential.  Even the hospital doesn’t know who the donor was.  He tells her that he has to pursue this because he feels somewhat guilty for having Gloria’s heart.  He tells Dr. Fox that it wasn’t just some accident that she died.  She was killed in a senseless and horrible way.  He feels guilty, but still Dr. Fox advises against his pursuit of justice for the sake of his own health.  She wants to make sure that he doesn’t waste the opportunity to live a healthy life because he wouldn’t be getting another heart if this one failed.

Graciella Rivers, the sister of the robbery victim, Gloria Rivers, visits former FBI agent Terrell McCaleb on his boat at the marina in Los Angeles.  She had read an article in the paper about his heart transplant and realized that it was her sister’s heart that saved his life.  Her sister was shot from behind in a convenient store robbery on her way home from work.  The police have let the case go cold, so Graciella approached McCaleb to ask him for his help in finding her sister’s killer.  At first, he declines her request, but then she shares with him that it is Gloria’s heart that keeps him alive.  She showed him a picture of Gloria with her small son and McCaleb decided he would look into it, making no promises that he would be able to solve the crime.

I chose the book Blood Work by Michael Connelly.  This story is about former FBI agent Terrell McCaleb who receives a heart transplant after his retirement from the Bureau.  One day a lady named Graciella Rivers come to him on his boat and asks McCaleb to help her find the man who killed her sister in a convenient store robbery.  He is reluctant to help her until he finds out that the heart he received that saved his life came from Graciella’s sister, Gloria.  McCaleb makes it his mission to find the man who committed this horrible crime.