Book: Naked in Death (In Death 1) by J.D. Robb
Release Date: July 1st 1995
Genre: Crime/Mystery/Romance
Rating: 4 out of 5 stars
Synopsis
In a world of danger and deception, she walks the line–between seductive passion and scandalous murder…Eve Dallas is a New York police lieutenant hunting for a ruthless killer. In over ten years on the force, she’s seen it all–and knows her survival depends on her instincts. And she’s going against every warning telling her not to get involved with Roarke, an Irish billionaire–and a suspect in Eve’s murder investigation. But passion and seduction have rules of their own, and it’s up to Eve to take a chance in the arms of a man she knows nothing about–except the addictive hunger of needing his touch.
Review
The In Death series is one that has been mentioned to me a lot over the last few years. But most specifically by a friend, Zadien (whose writing I personally enjoy and I hope one day she will be able to publish her own book) who has mentioned her love for this series more than once, and more so recently by Liesbet from Zwartraafje. So I finally decided to pick it up. And I don’t regret it. While I have had this series mentioned to me a lot I made sure that I did not know a lot of it before reading it. Of course I knew it was a detective/crime/thriller type of book, but the setting surprised me in a pleasant way. This book is set quite a few years into our future where guns are a collectable. They have lasers, touch screens, and even a project on the moon. I love how the synopsis also doesn’t give this away.
I found the plot interesting. Of course the curse that is me, I already guessed who was going to be the main murderer before the halfway point of that book. He was just the most likely one based on what we got at that point. The other bit also wasn’t too hard to guess in the second half. It did take away some of my enjoyment of this book, but not a whole lot.
This was because I had taken a liking to Eve Dallas, our main character. I can’t even quite pinpoint what it is about her that drew me in. But I like her. She has a troubled past. I don’t think her past added too much drama to this book. It was something she still struggled with, and while we have a good idea of what happened to her there are still some questions about her past that I find interesting. It was certainly done a lot better than in a book I read previously with something similar.
The romance in this book was mostly good. I certainly rooted for Eve and Roark. However I do feel that Roark sounds a bit too much like the perfect guy at first glance. Next to that sometimes his pushing bordered on him forcing himself into her life which isn’t okay (like him being in her apartment). It just made me a bit uncomfortable seeing as I otherwise like their chemistry. I also liked how in love was used instead of right away the love was blurted at each other (in the Dutch translation in any case). Eve is nowhere near ready for anything like that.
So while the detective part of this book didn’t surprise me in any way, it does give me what I want in a book that I often miss within this genre. Attachments to the characters.
Fijne review! Ik ben heel benieuwd geworden naar het boek, dus zodra ik hem ergens tegenkom ga ik hem meenemen.
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Leuk! Hij is echt heel leuk om te lezen.
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I used to love this series! I have a ton of them sitting on my shelf. I’m happy to hear you enjoyed it. If you like this series, I bet you’d also like Marie Force’s Fatal series.
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There are so many books of this series out. It’s kind of amazing how much Nora Roberts can write.
I’ll have to look into that series. 🙂
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I know. It’s crazy! She’s a machine.
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I love crime fiction but often guess the killer too. Still, like you say, it doesn’t have to spoil the enjoy,net of your book.
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It doesn’t as long as the characters are great, for me anyway.
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Wow, I was so excited to see a fresh review of the first in this series! I have considered picking them up but hesitated because it’s been so long running, I thought it would be like Evanovich’s Plum novels of long standing (the early ones are sooooooo early 90s it’s awful).
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Glad it helped. The setting reall helps this to make it easily read in any moment after it was published without noticing how long ago it was written.
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Wauw, onze meningen komen goed overeen. Net als jij wist ik al snel wie de dader zou zijn. Dat heb ik vrijwel bij ieder boek, maar bij deze serie stoort het me nooit omdat Eve zo’n sterk hoofdpersonage is. Ik hou echt van de personages in deze reeks en ben heel blij dat dit eerste boek bij jou ook goed is meegevallen.
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Oh en dankjewel voor de vermelding. Dat was ik even vergeten te melden
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Graag gedaan. 🙂
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Ja dat had ik ook dus. Eve is gewoon heel leuk om te volgen. En de schrijfstijl is ook heel fijn. Ik heb ondertussen boek 4 en 6 al gescored, haha. Nu nog even de rest.
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