I reviewed an earlier J. D. Robb book last year when only a few titles were published in the UK; there are now almost all of the twenty titles available from Piatkus. Seduction in Death is the thirteenth in the series and the heroine Detective Lieutenant Eve Dallas continues to pursue criminals with cold ferocity. Eve’s private life has become a more settled and happy one.
In this adventure Eve investigates female victims who have been seduced in an elaborate ritual based on a costly date rape drug and then murdered. The characters are well established and the detection clearly developed. It is more of a Whydunnit than a Whodunnit.
The series is set around 2058 in a futuristic society whose details are fascinating
although rather depressing. I think that to attempt to read all the futuristic
thrillers about Eve might get rather repetitious. The suspense of the tales
is well sustained by a mistress of the romantic suspense novel but the style
of the heroine and those around her remains fixed. She is combative, serious
and driven in her work - she can sweep all before her when faced with opposition.
She seems to have no other pastimes - apart from an active sex life - and she
remains haunted by her abused childhood.
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Jennifer Palmer
From the J.D. Robb output of Nora Roberts which numbers 20, Piatkus have 16
available in the UK. Except for one book (Remember When) which is a J.D.
Robb/Nora Roberts combination, all the titles of Eve Dallas books have In
Death preceded by a single word.