Naked in Death (In Death, #1) in Around the World in 80 Books

Jul 29, 2015 Nadine in NY Jones rated it did not like it

Shelves: romance, fantasy-and-sci-fi, suspense-thriller, nyc, authors-i-don-t-ever-want-to-read-a, mystery, genre-blender, romantic-suspense

on NPR's list of 100 best romance books http://www.npr.org/2015/07/29/4267318...

The best thing I can say about this book is that I finished it. Also, I have now satisfied my curiosity about J.D. Robb and/or Nora Roberts, and I can safely check that one off my imaginary literary bucket list, as it were.

I would give this book two stars, for the plodding tell-don't-show writing, the two-dimensional characters, the dull future (clearly she just watched Blade Runner, Star Trek, and The Fifth Element on NPR's list of 100 best romance books http://www.npr.org/2015/07/29/4267318...

The best thing I can say about this book is that I finished it. Also, I have now satisfied my curiosity about J.D. Robb and/or Nora Roberts, and I can safely check that one off my imaginary literary bucket list, as it were.

I would give this book two stars, for the plodding tell-don't-show writing, the two-dimensional characters, the dull future (clearly she just watched Blade Runner, Star Trek, and The Fifth Element and grabbed a few ideas), and the predictable murder mystery ... but I'm gonna hafta go with ONE STAR instead. Because of the rapey romance.

Let's look at our romantic hero, Roarke: first of all, Eve's a cop; she's an experienced cop, the best in her squad, and he acts like it's just a cute costume she's put on that he finds sexy, ultimately she needs him to tell her what to do and when to eat and how she should just relax and lean on him sometimes (er, ALL the time). He has no respect for her or her actual skills as a cop. Second, hello, creepy stalker guy! He breaks into her apartment (and then he's actually hurt when she asks if he broke into the victim's apartment!!), and waits there for her, in the dark, so she's freaked out when she walks in. He tells her what she should be eating, how she should be handling her emotions. Third of all, he needs to learn about CONSENT, because not once (NOT ONCE!) does he respect her "no." Fourthly ("fourthly" is a word, right? because "fourth of all" sounded weird), we're supposed to think it's OKAY that he ignored her no, because she really meant yes! No means yes!! :));!,'sh*&tti$!):)?; mj'rn€#'neyy%#%%}*++¥¥£€><€~!~!~>}>{** ..... That's the sound of my brain exploding.

And then, lets look at the the excessively lurid descriptions of crime (is this a porno-snuff film or a mystery novel??) I don't mind reading detailed sex scenes, but I do NOT like reading detailed abuse scenes. And there's a LOT of that in this book! The victims are abused, and the murderer abused others (that we have to hear about, in detail, how he groomed her, how he forced her, how he raped her on her twelfth birthday ... this isn't even really part of the murder mystery!!) And Eve was abused as a child too, so we have to hear about that, how he groomed her, how he forced her, how he tied her up, how he beat her, how he raped her. A little girl was gruesomely murdered in Eve's previous case before this story begins, that has no bearing on this case but she has frequent lurid flashbacks anyway, descriptions of the pool of blood, the dripping knife, the little girl's dead, staring eyes ... And on top of all that, the murder victims are shot in the vagina (interestingly, I'm pretty sure the word "vagina" is not used ONCE in this book, which is quite a feat when you consider all the abused vaginas that are described); he kills them by shooting them in the forehead first, so at least there's that small mercy, then he shoots them in the chest (why? you never find out), and then he shoots them in the vagina. (I'm not giving anything away here, this is all first described on page 6.) And it's all described in a disturbingly titillating fashion. [shudder]

None for me, thanks!

I read this book to fulfill the "romance set in the future" prompt in the 2016 Popsugar Ultimate Teading Challenge. I won't be reading any more in this series!!

Because I was reading this in 2016, this one passage jumped out at me:

"In the year 2016," she said softly, "at the end of the Urban Wars, before the gun ban, there were over ten thousand deaths and injuries from guns in the borough of Manhattan alone."

(I looked it up: in 2015, there were just over fifty-three thousand gun incidents in the entire USA. So Ms Robb's predicted statistics are a little off, but her heart is in the right place!)
...more

2 likes · Like · see review

Feb 16, 2010 Lauren⁷ 💜 rated it really liked it

Shelves: library-has-a-copy, romance, hot-hunky-hero, romantic-suspense

I really liked this! It is totally deserving of all the hype. Eve is fabulous, she's no shrinking violet and I can definitely see what attracted Roarke to her. Roarke. Oh Roarke. He is definitely deserving of the hype! Roarke is yummy! Mysterious. Intelligent. Rich. Gorgeous. And I can't wait to read more of him! He is a great hero! I like he futuristic elements a lot. They're well thought out and Robb doesn't beat you over the head with them. They flow naturally. The suspense plot was good. It ...more

1 like · Like · see review

Feb 20, 2016 Dana Arbelaez rated it really liked it

Shelves: insaneshelf

Read for 2016 Insane Challenge: Pulp (Noir)

Eve is as imaginable a woman as any I've adventured with, both in-person and in-book. I plan to read the rest of the series, as I can, and maybe even read a couple more for this Reading Challenge. ...more

1 like · Like · see review

Jan 29, 2023 Andy Plonka rated it it was ok · review of another edition

Shelves: src

Nothing outstanding but the good guys won.

Like · see review

Sep 13, 2007 Doina rated it liked it · review of another edition

Shelves: thrillers-suspense

1st in the series. i think i picked this one up in some airport somewhere, and i found it interesting. a fluffy kind of mystery, but i liked the writing, and the characters. i think there is over 20 books in this series, and i read most of them because they all manage to hold my interest. easy, enjoyable read for when you don't want to think too hard about what you are reading. ...more

Like · see review

Aug 26, 2007 Agatha Donkar Lund rated it liked it · review of another edition

Shelves: mystery, 2007, fiction, 2021

Recommended to me by Keri. Enjoyable and fluffy, with a lot of smut and a pretty solid mystery. The second and third in the series are sitting by my bed; I liked this one enough that I'll eventually get around to reading the rest of them. ...more

Like · see review