Review - - Bride of the Shadow King

Bride of the Shadow King

by Sylvia Mercedes

Publisher: Ace Books

Release Date: November 12, 2024

Reviewed by Nancy

 

Though she is the oldest daughter, Princess Faraine lives in the background, shunned from court and kept out of sight. She’s told her gods-gift makes her a liability to the crown, and has learned to give place to her beautiful, favored younger sister in all things.

When the handsome and enigmatic Shadow King comes seeking a bride, Faraine is not surprised that her sister is his choice.

King Vor is not eager to take a human bride, but he is willing to do what is necessary for the sake of his people. When he meets the lively Princess Ilsevel, he quickly agrees to a marriage arrangement. 

So why can’t he get the haunting eyes of her older sister out of his head?

 

Nancy’s Thoughts: 

Bride of the Shadow King is the first of three romantasy novels under a series banner of the same title. The forbidden love romance is nearly flawless, and the worldbuilding is different and intriguing despite occasional sparse descriptions. 

Princess Faraine, the heroine, has been banished to a distant convent far from the court of Gavaria, her homeland, because she inadvertently wrecked her father’s plan to marry her to a prince she loathed. We meet her as she is returning home to convince her sister Ilsevel, who has locked herself in a tower and is throwing crockery at anyone who approaches, that she must marry the Shadow King, Vor, for the good of their kingdom. They’re at war with Prince Ruaven, a fae, and they need the fierce soldiers of the trolde realm. Vor needs the human magic to vanquish the deadly beings intruding into his kingdom. 

Prince Ruaven’s fae attack Faraine’s entourage. Faraine isn’t trained to fight, but she displays courage and determination to survive in the face of these lethal foes. Her party is outnumbered and suffering casualties at a rapid pace. Fortunately, the trolde king and his escort, who are en route to Gavaria so he can woo Ilsevel, come across the battle and wade in. They rescue Faraine and her brother. 

Faraine has the gift of sensing the emotions of those around her. She can also affect their emotions. To keep the flood of feelings she senses from overwhelming her, she has a crystal necklace she grips to help her stay centered. Despite the carnage of the fight surrounding her and Vor, all she picks up from him is calm. That has tremendous appeal for her. He admires her poise and finds the hint of song he senses around her intriguing. 

Faraine knows, however, that her father, King Lorangar, would not want her to become friendly with Vor. Lorangar intends Vor to wed the lovely Ilsevel. Faraine has been summoned home only to convince her sister to go along with this plan. 

After they arrive at Beldroth, the Gavarian king’s palace, Vor remains intrigued by Faraine and seeks her out. She feels drawn to him but gently discourages his interest, which could lead him to prefer her to Ilsevel. Her father would be furious at the mere idea. 

The push/pull of their shared attraction is well done. Faraine’s fear of offending her father is understandable in context and sets up the situation that leads to disaster later in the story. Discouraged from pursuing her, Vor turns his attention to Ilsevel. Faraine continues to intrigue him, but he needs this alliance to gain access to human magic. If that means he must court only Ilsevel, he will do so. 

Both Vor and Faraine are resolved to do their duty despite the personal cost, but they aren’t whiny about it. Their matter-of-face acceptance of the situation despite their disappointment is sympathetic, and I was rooting for them both. 

The betrothal goes forward. Faraine returns to her convent. Vor resolves to put his feelings for Faraine aside, stop thinking of her, and devote himself to Ilsevel. After Vor returns to his own realm to prepare for his bride, who’s going on a pre-wedding pilgrimage, tragedy strikes. I won’t spoil the story by saying what happens, only that King Larongar’s focus on Ilsevel and his refusal to trust Vor lead to a sequence of dire events that sweep up Faraine, Vor, and his court. 

The supporting characters are individuals with layers, not cookie-cutter figures. A character who isn’t especially sympathetic in the beginning of the story comes into her own by the end, and I’m now interested to see what happens to her in the next two books. 

All that is great, so readers may wonder why I’m giving the book 4.5 stars instead of five. It’s because there were too many stoppers for me. Otherworldly creatures aren’t fully described, unfamiliar terms aren’t explained, and I don’t know why I what the problem is that leads to Prince Ruaven’s incursions except I’m told he’s the bad guy—and not much else. There’s a big inconsistency about the rules of travel between realms at a crucial moment. 

Every time I hit an unfamiliar term in a book, it stops me unless its meaning is obvious from context. Every time I encounter an unfamiliar creature, I need a description to get a visual in my head. Without it, I don’t have a clear picture of the action in the scene and am frustrated. If I’m stopping to wonder about the meaning of a term or the appearance of a creature, I’m not reading the story. I’m pulled out of it. 

The trolde kingdom is a brilliant concept, and the characters we meet there are well-drawn and varied. The landscapes are nicely done, with clear, detailed imagery and contrasts between the Under Realm and Gavaria. The problems I had were in smaller moments. Because I hit so many points where I wanted more—a couple of adjectives, a short phrase—to give me a picture, I often felt frustrated. 

The following are just a few examples. 

Casualties need “an ugghra healer,” but what is that? What sets them apart from other healers? Or is there even a difference? 

The trolde ride shadowy creatures called morleths, which are interdimensional and can manifest from shadows, which is really cool. For description, though, we’re told they have sinuous, barbed tails and snort smoke or sparks. They have fur over scales on their withers and flanks. All that’s great, but we don’t know what shape or size their heads or bodies are or how tall they are or how many legs they have. Presumably they have at least four since people sit on their backs, but it could be six or even, like Odin’s legendary mount, Sleipnir, eight. 

There are numerous references to roag poison. Is that the creature or the plant that produces the poison? If so, what kind of creature or plant is it? I’m assuming roag doesn’t mean poison because that would be redundant. 

At the point when Vor’s bride is about to cross into his lands, the Under Realm, her attendants make a big fuss about the rule that she can only take with her what he has given her. She therefore wears a new gown he sent for her. A companion lies to the trolde woman in attendance about something  the bride wants to take having been a gift from Vor, so she gets to take that. Yet the bride wears a veil she brought from home and no one says anything about that. 

For some readers, a cool-sounding term and a vague description suffice, and that’s fine. But I need more. Rating this book overall, I give the romance plot a five and the worldbuilding a four, solely I was so often stopped by needing more explanation. 

The story moves at a good pace except from the bits I stumbled over, and it kept my interest. Despite the stumbles, I would’ve continued reading even if I hadn’t committed to review the book. 

The story ends on a cliffhanger. That isn’t an issue for me, but readers who prefer a complete story may want to wait until the next two books are released to read this one. 

4.5 stars 

~Nancy

 

Review - - A Tribute of Fire

A Tribute of Fire

by Sariah Wilson

The Eye of the Goddess - Book 1

Publisher: Montlake

Release Date: November 1, 2024

Reviewed by Nancy

 

Lia is the princess of Locris, a dying desert nation cursed centuries ago by an earth goddess—one still worshipped by the thriving and adversarial nation of Ilion. Every year, Ilion offers the goddess a sacrifice: two Locrian maidens forced to compete in a life-and-death race to reach her temple. In a millennium, no maiden has made it out of Ilion alive. This year, Lia is one of the hunted.

An education in battle gives her a fighting chance, but the challenges are greater than she feared: Lia’s beloved but untrained sister Quynh has been put in the path of danger. The winding streets of Ilion itself have been transformed into a labyrinthine maze of countless choices and dead ends. And if the risks weren’t significant enough, Lia is reluctantly drawn to the commandingly attractive Jason, an Ilionian sailor she loathes to trust and desires like no man before.

The tribute game is on. It’s up to Lia to lift the goddess’s curse, restore Locris to its former glory, and change the fate of every young woman destined to follow in her path.

Nancy’s Thoughts:

A Tribute of Fire offers an intriguing blend of epic fantasy, action adventure, and steamy romance. The story opens with Lia, the central character, training to survive the race in Ilion. If she can reach the temple, she’ll be safe, and she’ll have a chance to save her drought-ridden, starving homeland. Legend says an artifact known as the goddess’s eye is hidden in the temple. If Lia can obtain it, she can save her people and possibly end the sacrificial tradition. While other maidens pray not to be chosen as one of the two sacrifices, she makes arrangements that will ensure she’s picked. 

Lia’s courage and determination had me rooting for her instantly. The odds against her surviving the race are staggering, but her plan is her country’s only hope. 

She has more to deal with than the race, though. She is betrothed to a prince of Ilion, so she must manage to be chosen for the race and to run it without anyone from Ilion realizing she is the prince’s betrothed. While that may seem unlikely, Wilson sets up the situation so it’s believable.

Another complication tangles Lia’s plans when she meets Jason, a handsome sailor from Ilion, in her family’s palace garden. They are both stricken with immediate and compelling attraction that has them making out in the palace garden. While this may not be a problem for some readers, it was for me. I’m not a fan of irresistible lust, and having Lia making out with this unknown guy in the garden when she knows she shouldn’t bothered me a lot. Even though she feels they’re destined for each other, she loses her head with this stranger.

Their attraction worked better for me as the story continued because Jason does a lot to help her and Quynh on the journey across the sea to Ilion. He and Lia gradually come to know each other as she seeks the goddess’s eye and he helps her, adding relationship layers that are not just physical attraction. They also meet in their dreams, in steamy, romantic scenes that are very well done.

Jason’s help is sometimes mixed, though, as when he gives Lia a cryptic warning about the dangers of a situation. Because of her military training, Lia shrugs off this warning. Instead of being more specific, which might’ve made her wary, he lets her go ahead. She runs into trouble, and that left me feeling he’d let her down.

They have a big confrontation at the end of the story, one he engineers and has known is coming for a while. Yet he does nothing in the runup to it that might sap any of her anger and, in the moment, seems not to understand her feelings of betrayal. He also has an irresistible card he can play, one he could’ve played at any time. But he didn’t. That left me wondering why he hadn’t acted sooner.

The story world is based on Greek culture, including its myths and legends. The settings are detailed enough to feel real, but Wilson skillfully avoids overwhelming the reader with descriptive detail. After I finished the book, I read the author’s note, which said the sacrifice and the race come from Greek history. I’m a history nerd, so I think that is really cool. While I was reading, though, I found the similarities to Greek myths in a story not apparently set in Greece distracting. I kept stopping to compare the similarities with the Greek myths I’d read. This also is something that may not bother other readers.

The supporting characters are primarily women, including those in Lia’s adelphia, a group like sisters. Wilson does a good job of differentiating them, and the way she builds and demonstrates their loyalty to each other is beautifully done. The other women are also well drawn and interesting, as is their closed society.

The story overall is smoothly written and moves at a good pace, and the world is well drawn. The characters are engaging, though I did have problems with some of their choices.

Despite my reservations, I recommend this book with the caveat that it does end on a cliffhanger.

3.5 stars

~Nancy

Review - - Passions in Death

Passions in Death

by J.D. Robb

Publisher: St. Martin's Press

Release Date: September 3, 2024

Reviewed by Nancy 

 

On a hot August night, Lt. Eve Dallas and her husband, Roarke, speed through the streets of Manhattan to the Down and Dirty club, where a joyful, boisterous pre-wedding girls’ night out has turned into a murder scene. One of the brides lies in a pool of blood, garroted in a private room where she was preparing a surprise for her fiancée—two scrimped and saved-for tickets to Hawaii.
Despite the dozens of people present, useful witnesses are hard to come by. It all brings back some bad memories for Eve who once suffered an assault in the very same room—but she’d been able to fight back and survive. She’d gotten justice. And now she needs to provide some for poor young Erin.
Eve knows that the level of violence and the apparent premeditation involved suggest a volatile mix of hidden, heated passion and ice-cold calculation. This is a crime that can be countered only by hard detective work and relentless dedication—and Eve will not stop until she finds the killer who destroyed this couple’s dreams before the honeymoon even began…

 

Nancy’s Thoughts: 

Passions in Death delivers the tightly plotted murder mystery and engaging characters readers have come to expect from J.D. Robb’s series. This story is different, though, in that it also examines the different facets of friendship, healthy and not so. 

When Eve enters the crime scene, she finds Erin Albright’s body and a satchel containing items she later learns were part of an intended surprise for the other bride, Shauna Hunnicutt. Erin had intended to fulfill her fiancée’s longtime dream of a trip to Hawaii by giving it to her as a honeymoon. 

Since Erin couldn’t bring the satchel in without ruining her surprise, someone she trusted must’ve done so. Everyone in Erin’s friend group and Shauna’s denies having known about it. Someone must be lying. But who? And why? 

As Eve, Roarke, and the detectives of the NYPSD dig into the case, they find that everything among these groups of friends was not as it seemed. There were undercurrents of various feelings other than friendship, some of them not healthy. Whether the unhealthy ones were strong enough to spur a murder, though, Eve and her partner, Det. Delia Peabody, can’t easily determine. The quest to do so carries the reader through the book. 

In addition to Roarke and Peabody, the supporting cast includes, among others, Eve’s friend Mavis and her family, Leonardo and Bella, and Electronics division Det. Ian McNab. The last several books have had a plot thread running through them about Peabody and McNab remodeling an old house with Mavis and Leonardo. Peabody and McNab will live in one side, also providing security, while Mavis and her family, including an expected baby, will have the other side. The remodeling project now is nearly done. This thread provides a lighter, happier note that contrasts with both the grim investigation and the troubling undercurrents among Erin and Shauna’s friends. 

Eve and Peabody narrow their suspect list before the end of the book. My only quibble with the story is that I (who never figure out whodunnit) was pretty sure which one was the killer for reasons I think will also point them out for regular readers of the series. 

Despite my quibble, the story is engrossing, and the characters deliver their usual strong, steady performances. One of the things I like about this series is that Eve, Peabody, Roarke, and company not only pursue justice with iron resolution but also have empathy toward the victim and toward those wounded by the victim’s loss. 

Highly recommended. 

4.5 stars 

~Nancy

 

 

Review - - Cross the Line

Cross the Line

by Simone Soltani

Publisher: Berkley

Release Date: July 28, 2024

Reviewed by Nancy

 

Her brother’s best friend sends her heart racing in this sparkling Formula 1 romance.

 
Formula 1 driver Dev Anderson’s career is on the line. After a social media disaster leaves him with an angry team and sponsors threatening to jump ship, he needs someone to help save his image. At a party in Monaco, he bumps into the woman who can fix it all. There’s just one problem: she’s his best friend’s little sister. And, okay, maybe there’s another problem—he kissed her last year and hasn’t been able to stop thinking about it since.
 
Recent college grad Willow Williams needs a job. She may have a talent for seeing the bright side of any bad situation, but it’s hard to stay positive when she’s struggling to get hired. So when Dev offers her a temporary solution, she can’t help but say yes. Even if it means ignoring the crush she’s had on him since childhood.
 
Willow and Dev are determined to keep things strictly professional, regardless of old feelings and the blazing chemistry between them. But in the glittering and high-stakes world of Formula 1, some lines are meant to be crossed…

 

Nancy’s Thoughts: 

This delightful friends-to-lovers romance skillfully blends the hero’s and heroine’s families, their mutual friends, and the world of Formula 1 racing. Even though I knew nothing about this sport when I started reading, the story includes just enough of what I needed to know to let me keep reading without stumbling over things I didn’t understand. I enjoyed this new-to-me setting and the way events in Dev’s career push him and Willow closer. 

From the moment she starts her job as his social media manager, their mutual attraction flares. Resisting it becomes increasingly difficult. But the presence on his team of two of his longtime friends provides a constant reminder of the risks of crossing the line. 

These friends, along with Dev, are very close to Willow’s brother, Oakley, who has made it plain that he doesn’t want them to become involved. He’s mainly concerned about protecting her, but Willow and Dev worry about what their involvement could do to him. Her last boyfriend, who was part Oakley’s friend group, treated her horribly, and the resulting breakup fractured Oakley’s group’s friendship. Neither she nor Dev wants to risk a similar problem or to make Oakley feel pulled between them if a relationship doesn’t work out. 

Others in their lives, like Dev’s family and Willow’s friends, are urging them to go for it, but neither wants to cause pain or strife among those they love. Soltani handles the conflict skillfully and believably. Everyone involved is credibly acting out of concern for others. 

The same cannot be said of Dev’s racing team, whose members try to support him but are often stymied by the owner. His son, Nathaniel, is the team’s second driver, and the owner doesn’t want Dev to show up Nathaniel. Dev’s frustration over being held back and his determination to do his best anyway earn Willow’s sympathy and support and lead to increasing emotional intimacy between them. In turn, this deepens their attraction, which plays out for most of the book in beautifully done sexual and emotional tension. 

Once Dev and Willow decide to cross that invisible line and become physically intimate, their concerns about Oakley and the reactions of their friends remain. They try to keep the relationship secret, but that proves harder than they expect. When Oakley does learn the truth, his reaction has a great twist on it. 

The one problem I had with the book occurs near the end. Everyone is preparing for Dev’s sister’s wedding. Because his family are Indian, they’re having an Indian wedding, which Soltani refers to as a Desi wedding. I don’t know what that is, and it stopped me. The stoppers became more numerous as the wedding approached. Apparently, such a wedding involves several nights of celebrations, each of which has a particular name and observes particular customs and requires particular clothing. The book explains none of them, except to say one outfit has a skirt and a top, and the meanings are not apparent from context—unlike the term jaanu, which Dev uses to address Willow and which context shows is an endearment. 

Readers shouldn’t have to look up one term, let alone several terms, to understand what’s happening in the story. A brief explanation would have sufficed. Without it, I kept stumbling over these unfamiliar terms. 

The characters are likeable, and the hero and heroine are also charming. The romance is sexy and hot without undermining the characters’ friendship, and the story moves at a good pace. The only reason I’m not giving this book a five is the problem I just mentioned. Despite that, I highly recommend it. 

4.5 stars. 

~Nancy

Review - - Primal Mirror

Primal Mirror

by Nalini Singh

Psy-Changeling Trinity - Book 8

Publisher: Berkley

Release Date: July 23, 2024

Reviewed by Nancy

 

New York Times bestselling author Nalini Singh takes us into a family dark with shadowy secrets, as the world of the Psy teeters on the edge of a final catastrophic collapse. . . 

Daughter of two ruthless high-Gradient telepaths, Auden Scott is not the child her Psy parents wanted or expected, even before her brain injury. Her thoughts are scattered, her memories fuzzy—or just terrifyingly blank. The only thing she knows for certain is that she must protect her unborn baby . . . a baby she has no recollection of conceiving and who draws an unnerving depth of interest from her dead mother’s closest associates.

Leopard alpha Remi Denier is a man driven by the primal instinct to protect. Protect his pack, protect his allies . . . and protect the mysterious woman who has become a most unlikely neighbor. With eerie eyes that see too much and a scent that alters in ways disturbing and impossible, Auden Scott is the enemy . . . but nothing about this strange Psy is what it seems, and Remi’s feline heart is as fascinated by her as his human half.

Then Auden asks Remi to help her shatter the wall of secrets that is the Scott bloodline. What they unearth will reveal a nightmare beyond imagination. This time, the battle is to the death. . .

Nancy’s Thoughts:

Once a series hits about the tenth book, I sometimes find my interest falling off. The stories don’t seem fresh to me anymore or don’t engage me or otherwise aren’t satisfying. Nalini Singh’s Psy-Changeling books, however, have yet to disappoint although she’s up to her twenty-third book (not counting shorter works) set in this world.

The hero, Remi Denier, is alpha of the RainFire leopard changeling pack in the Smoky Mountains. Remi first appeared in Shards of Honor (Psy-Changeling #14) when he and his pack gave Arrows Aden and Zaira refuge after they’d been kidnapped and tortured by a shadowy group of enemies. The interaction resulted in bone-deep friendship between Remi and Aden and, by extension, the Arrows and RainFire. The Arrows play a significant role in this book, and I always enjoy seeing them.

Remi has forged a group of loners and misfits into a tight-knit pack. I loved the scenes of him interacting with the pack, especially the children. He doesn’t have a lot of internal conflict to move past, aside from initial distrust of what Auden is doing on the border of RainFire’s territory. He worries about the unpredictable change in her scent and the accompanying changes in her personality and memory, but his concern for this pregnant woman who seems so alone in her cabin arouses his alpha instinct to protect and nurture. He soon resolves to help her. This means helping her understand what causes her memory issues and personality shifts.

It's just as well that Remi doesn’t have a lot of romantic baggage to overcome because Auden has issues enough for them both. She doesn’t understand her blackouts and memory gaps, nor can she explain how things her late mother knew but she never did suddenly pop into her mind, allowing her access to her mother’s secret records. Her late mother’s assistant, now Auden’s assistant since she has become the figurehead CEO of the family corporation, behaves much more like a zealous guardian than an assistant. To come into her own, Auden must take control of this relationship and resolve her memory issues and the related mysteries.

One of the mysteries Auden faces is just exactly how she became pregnant. She has no memory of agreeing to be impregnated. Still, she’s resolved to protect this child. The assistant, who behaves as though she were in charge of Auden, and the doctor show an intense interest in the baby that worries Auden. Something isn’t right about the whole situation.

Auden’s reaction to her pregnancy is part of the reason I gave the book less than a five-star rating. I’m all in on her determination to protect her baby from the schemes of her assistant and the doctor. My issue is the speed with which she reached that decision in the backstory. Since she was impregnated without her knowledge or consent, I wanted a little bit of wrestling with that before she resolved to see this baby girl as hers and to shield her from whatever schemes are floating around them.

The other part of my reason for rating the book at less than five stars is that I initially found Auden hard to relate to. We first meet her when Remi sees her in a clearing near his pack’s territory, on the property where his Arrow friends Aden and Zaira were tortured. Although other readers may react differently, I found Auden’s changes in focus and scent a barrier to relating to her.

Auden is a Ps-Psy, meaning she reads emotional imprints on objects. Her cabin is therefore sparsely furnished with things that are safe for her to touch. Keeping her surroundings relatively pristine is critical to her wellbeing. Yet she reads an emotional memory from something on Remi’s person when they first shake hands. Given her concerns about her ability, her failure to draw back when she realized what was happening felt a little off to me. 

The reading draws Remi to her, and it briefly brings her into focus. Yet she persisted in the reading, which was obviously very personal, and never acknowledged that this was an intrusion until they met again months later. Then she apologizes but seems to shrug off the incident. For someone who finds other people’s imprints intrusive and often painful, this struck me as less than sympathetic.

After Remi and Auden’s first encounter, her memories become more stable, and I found myself relating to her as I’d hoped to. The reader soon sees her plan to keep her baby safe from her domineering assistant and the intrusive doctor. She can’t do that unless she also wrests control of her life away from them. Her determination to do so, along with the difficulties she knows she faces, are admirable. The stakes rise as she goes along, and her willingness to make a very tough call was heart-wrenching.

Auden’s efforts to break free draw Remi’s sympathy and his heart. She’s falling in love with him at the same time, drawn by his determination to protect her before he even knew her and his dedication to his pack. One of the things I like about the book a great deal is his resolve not to take their feelings to a romantic level until Auden is emotionally stable enough to give meaningful consent to doing so. I think that consideration is too often swept to the side in romance novels, especially where the heroine’s physical security is at issue.

With Remi, of course, comes RainFire. The mutual loyalty and love of changeling packs always draws me into their stories. We meet different members of RainFire in this book, and I can’t wait to read their stories.

Auden and Remi’s story takes place along with further breakdown of the PsyNet, the psionic network all Changelings need to survive. I won’t say more because I’m afraid of spoiling it, but the way these two plotlines turn out to be woven together is masterful.

In summary, Primal Mirror offers an emotionally wrenching but ultimately satisfying romance while expanding the Psy-Changeling world in intriguing ways. It also offers time with established, beloved characters from other books. The story moves at a good pace. I was delighted to see Remi have his own story and to spend time with RainFire. Despite a little initial difficulty relating to Auden, I soon became a fan of her as well and came to love them as a couple.

Readers new to the Psy-Changeling world can read Primal Mirror as a standalone. Singh is adept at dropping in enough detail from prior stories to move the current one along without a big delay. Those who read the series in order, however, will be better able to appreciate the richness of the world and the found families in it.

Highly recommended. 4.5 stars

~Nancy

Review - - Random in Death

Random in Death

by J.D. Robb

Publisher: St. Martin's Press

Release Date: January 23, 2024

Reviewed by Nancy

Jenna’s parents had finally given in, and there she was, at a New York club with her best friends, watching the legendary band Avenue A, carrying her demo in hopes of slipping it to the guitarist, Jake Kincade. Then, from the stage, Jake catches her eye, and smiles. It’s the best night of her life.
It’s the last night of her life.

Minutes later, Jake’s in the alley getting some fresh air, and the girl from the dance floor comes stumbling out, sick and confused and deathly pale. He tries to help, but it’s no use. He doesn’t know that someone in the crowd has jabbed her with a needle—and when his girlfriend Nadine arrives, she knows the only thing left to do for the girl is call her friend, Lieutenant Eve Dallas.

After everyone on the scene is interviewed, lab results show a toxic mix of substances in the victim’s body—and for an extra touch of viciousness, the needle was teeming with infectious agents. Dallas searches for a pattern: Had any boys been harassing Jenna? Was she engaging in risky behavior or caught up in something shady? But there are no obvious clues why this levelheaded sixteen-year-old, passionate about her music, would be targeted.

And that worries Dallas. Because if Jenna wasn’t targeted, if she was just the random, unlucky victim of a madman consumed by hatred, there are likely more deaths to come.

Nancy’s Thoughts:

Few series reach fifty-eight books. Most run out of steam well before then, and the last few often seem pale retreads of the earlier ones. I’m happy to report that this is not the case with Random in Death. The plot is tight and twisty, and we learn new things about familiar characters.

As you can see from the blurb, Eve Dallas’s friend Nadine Furst and her lover, Jake Kincaid, play prominent roles in this story. Regular readers have often seen Nadine step to the fore, but this is the first extended look at Jake and at the two of them as a couple. Jake may be astoundingly famous, but he’s a decent guy, the kind fans would hope Nadine would fall for. He and Avenue A offer their help at every step of the investigation. At the end, they offer something priceless, which I won’t spoil, to Jenna’s family. 

The murder appears to be random, with Jenna crossing the killer’s path at the wrong time. But is it? Aware that a random killing is among the hardest to solve, Eve and her team search doggedly for an explanation of why Jenna and why now. Before they find the answers, the killer makes a mistake that gives them a lead.

Many of the elements of the story are standard police procedural components. Where did the murder weapon come from? Who had access to the components? Did the killer know the victims? If not, did they fit a type? What keeps the story in Random in Death fresh is the array of characters. Robb gives each victim a family different from the others, uniting them grief or anger for their daughters.

Along the way, other familiar characters play their roles. We learn what Jamie Lingstrom is doing. He’s a tech genius who wants, much to Roarke’s frustration, to become a cop rather than work in the much more lucrative private sector for Roarke or someone like him. Jamie teams up with Quilla, a clever, independent teenager who first appears in Concealed in Death. They play an important role in the investigation.

There are also updates on the joint building project of Peabody and McNabb and on Mavis and her family. Dr. Louise DiMatto and former licensed companion Charles Monroe contribute to the hunt, as do Dr. Charlotte Mira, Eve’s homicide cops, and the forensics team at Cop Central. We see these characters frequently, the scenes with Nadine and Jake offer a new, interesting element. Nadine has had relationships before, but this one seems different. And, of course, there’s Roarke, who has evolved in the series into Eve’s very effective partner in crimefighting as well as in life. Overall, though, I think the continuing appeal of this series is Robb’s ability to keep the plot fresh without letting it get scattered and to add a bit here and there to the characters readers already know and like.

Random in Death can stand alone, but readers who start with this book will miss Eve’s evolution from a loner to someone with an extensive found family and the gradual growth of her relationship with Roarke that eventually forged them into a unit. Given the tight plot, great pace, and beautiful character bits, I rate this book as five stars, highly recommended.

~Nancy