#HolidayInDeath #MemoryInDeath #MidnightInDeath #JDRobb #SusanEricksen @BrillianceAudi1
With December 25 just a few days away, I find myself thinking of one of my favorite characters who also stars in one of my favorite series: Lieutenant Eve Dallas, a woman with an indomitable spirit and almost limitless courage who is terrified of Christmas. What to do? What to give? And why all the decorations and the parties? Why does she have to dress up and be made up and wear impossibly high heels when she needs to be standing for the dead and chasing bad guys? Some of the most delightful moments I’ve spent with this very special character have been during the holiday season as I squirm with her while she tries to understand the festivities surrounding a time of year that is a total mystery to her. So, just as I offered Festive in Death to you last Christmas, I’m recommending three more In Death books with storylines during the holiday season.
Holiday in Death finds Eve investigating a killer who is observing Christmas with a carol that is familiar to most of us, The Twelve Days of Christmas, except instead of singing the familiar song, the killer is ritualistically murdering individuals who have nothing in common except membership in a particular dating service. After each grisly murder, he leaves behind an appropriate symbol associated with the song. Meanwhile, Roarke is planning a celebration to end all celebrations and Eve is more intimidated by the party than the killer!
Midnight in Death is one of the short books that falls between the longer books in the series. Chronologically, the story occurs right after Holiday in Death. Eve and Roark have barely finished opening gifts when she is called out on another case involving a serial killer she put behind bars several years ago who has escaped from prison and decided to complete his Christmas shopping list by giving the gift of death to everyone involved in his capture and conviction. This deadly list includes Eve and her dear friend, Dr. Charlotte Mira.
Memory in Death once more finds our Eve wrestling with the Christmas season. It opens with Eve investigating a holiday reveler in a red suit who plunges 37 stories and gives new meaning to the term “sidewalk Santa”. The plunge continues when Eve returns to the station and finds her foster mother, Trudy Lombard, waiting. Armed with secrets from Eve’s past and bent on blackmail, Trudy doesn’t realize who she is dealing with in Roarke. When she winds up dead, Eve and Roarke must find her killer if for no other reason than to prove they had nothing to do with her death. The storyline uncovers painful details of Eve’s childhood in the foster care system and gives readers a poignant insight into why it takes baby steps for Eve to deal with love, family, and relationships.
If you haven’t completed your Christmas shopping and if you have a reader or listener on your list, treat them to this series. And it will be OK to start with the holiday books. Although I have enjoyed following the series in order, enough detail is given in each book for them to stand alone. As in all the books, the inimitable Susan Ericksen, who is the voice of the series, brings the characters to life.
Merry Christmas to all my readers and listeners and your families and Happy Listening in 2017!
Series Purchase Links
Amazon | Barnes & Noble
About J. D. Robb
With a phenomenal career full of bestsellers, Nora Roberts was ready for a new writing challenge. As her agent put it, like Pepsi, Diet Pepsi, and caffeine-free Pepsi, a pseudonym offered her the opportunity to reach a new and different group of readers. The first futuristic suspense J. D. Robb book, Naked in Death, was published in paperback in 1995, and readers were immediately drawn to Eve Dallas, a tough cop with a dark past, and her even more mysterious love interest, Roarke.
The series quickly gained attention, great reviews, and devoted readers. Since the debut of Loyalty in Death (the ninth In Death book) on Halloween 1999 on the New York Times bestseller list, every J. D. Robb title has been a New York Times bestseller. While fans had their suspicions, it wasn’t until the twelfth book in the series, Betrayal in Death (2001), that the publisher fully revealed that J. D. Robb was a pseudonym for bestselling powerhouse Nora Roberts. Unmasked, Nora Roberts fans who hadn’t yet picked up one of the Robb books were quickly playing catch-up.
Robb’s peers in the mystery world are fans as well, with accolades for the In Death series from such blockbuster authors as Stephen King, Jonathan Kellerman, Dennis Lehane, Kathy Reichs, Lisa Scottoline, Janet Evanovich, David Baldacci, Harlan Coben, Robert B. Parker, Ridley Pearson, Linda Fairstein, and Andrew Gross.
The In Death books are perpetual bestsellers, and frequently share the bestseller list with other Nora Roberts novels. J. D. Robb publishes two hardcover In Death books per year, with the occasional stand-alone original In Death story featured in an anthology.
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