FURY IN DEATH, the SIXTY-THIRD In Death series novel featuring Eve Dallas

FURY IN DEATH
J.D. ROBB
St. Martin's Press (non-affiliate Bookshop.org link)
$14.99 ebook, available now

Rating: 4.5* of five

The Publisher Says: In the new crime thriller from the #1 New York Times-bestselling author, Lt. Eve Dallas journeys into the darkness where murder is born…

NYSPD homicide detective Eve Dallas never knows what to expect when she gets word of a body. It could be an elderly man who made the mistake of climbing a ladder in slippery footwear. And the next call could be a wealthy biotech executive beaten to death in his home office—but what was Larry Chu’s mistake?

The victim’s corpse is so mangled and damaged it’s hard to believe a lone, unarmed assailant could have managed it. The killer was clearly unnaturally strong—and smart enough to find a way into Chu’s highly secure building. Most of all, whoever did this was very, very angry.

The excessive violence leads Dallas to conclude that this was a deeply personal act, born of a rage that she can’t excuse but can understand thanks to her own traumatic past. And though the motive seems rooted in heated emotion rather than cold hard cash, she can’t ignore the suspicious bank account in the Cayman Islands, or the shadowy, profit-hungry company Chu worked for. The mystery only grows when it turns out Chu isn’t the only victim—and Dallas will need to tear through one layer of secrecy after another to reveal what lies behind this explosion of fury...

I RECEIVED A DRC FROM THE PUBLISHER VIA NETGALLEY. THANK YOU.

My Review: The story starts with a huge spoiler and it's not the perp's identity. It's a weird place to put one of those, Author Robb, and I think rafts of people have been hollerin' at you online.

A very interesting slantwise take on the Luigi Mangione case, with a deeply aggrieved victim deciding on exacting revenge against the corporate scum he once worked for after they cause him irreparable harm. It's terrible to contemplate the events that drove him to take the actions he took.

It's Eve and Delia solving the how part of the crimes, uncovering deeply buried secrets and unearthing the bodies literally everyone in the story would prefer to remain buried if only for decorum's sake...there were *awful* crimes committed in connection to this case.

I'm routinely gruntled by the explicitly anti-capitalist messaging in these stories. It gives me a happy dose of fellow-feeling for the undoubtedly well-off Author Robb to expressly go out of her way to chastise greed that blinds the greedy to morality and common sense, while loving and enjoying a billionaire with that lifestyle because no one's ever said Roarke is an evil rotten-souled bastard.

I'm sure it's just me, but it feels like this is the first time I've heard MacNab's name? Delia and Summerset and that repugnant felid all recrudesce as expected, but MacNab? No bells in my brain so much as clinked still less rang. I got an unnerved frisson, though, about the seemingly eternal housewarming party FINALLY coming home (!) to roost...is Author Robb planning to retire now, after I finally found my way into the series by starting at #40? No fair, if so, and I'll kick off big style if there's no #64 in 2027.

I myownself think you'd do best to start where I did rather than here. It's okay to get this plot early but most of the best fun is dynamics that develop best over time. Start with Obsession in Death, #40, for maximal character and series-story enjoyment.

A VIOLENT MASTERPIECE, an apt (if too mild) title

A VIOLENT MASTERPIECE
JORDAN HARPER
Mulholland Books (non-affiliate Bookshop.org link)
$29.00 hardcover, available now

One of Maris Kreizman’s Best of Books of 2026 So Far

Rating: 4.4* of five

The Publisher Says: This epic crime novel tells a story of Los Angeles power brokers and those at the edge—and a single shattering incident that threatens to bring it all crashing down.

Los Angeles, right now. America with its back up against the wall. This Frankenstein's monster of crimes and lurid dreams sewn together into something like a city.

A city ready to explode: A Hollywood pedophile is arrested, and is ready to tear down the city to get his freedom. A young woman goes missing—and men in black rubber gloves who look like cops clean out her apartment in the middle of the night. And the serial killer known as the LA Ripper is on the loose, leaving tragic/graphic/brutal crime scenes in his wake. Three people trying to keep their heads above the dirty water will find themselves coming together to unite these strands into one enormous, unspeakable crime...

JAKE DEAL is a gonzo live-streaming nightcrawler, beaming the city's chaos straight to his audience of blood-hungry subscribers, giving them the view from the top of the mushroom cloud—until a job he can't refuse drags him back into his old life of Hollywood glamour, drugs, sex and sleaze. Armed with cameras and hidden mics, he'll infiltrate private clubs, gather high-class dirt—and stumble onto a conspiracy woven into the center of LA's most powerful men, who call themselves "The Kids in the Candy Store."

DOUG GIBSON is a street lawyer, who fights for his clients against the army of cops, prosecutors and judges - he is the knife they bring to the gunfight. But when he's hired by a Hollywood pedophile ready to sell out his friends for a chance for freedom, he'll take on a fight bigger than he could have imagined. And when his client "commits suicide" in prison, Gibson will have to stop being a weapon—and become a warrior.

KARA DELGADO works for an underground private concierge company—a make-a-wish foundation for the terminally rich. She scores drugs, makes connections, and plans multi-million dollar sex parties. She has learned the secret truth of this world: there are no rules, only prices. Her best friend Phoebe has gone missing, and Kara's the only person who knows that Phoebe's place was wiped clean of evidence by men in black rubber gloves. But when she begins to unravel the mystery of what happened to Phoebe, and its connection to the killer known as the LA Ripper, it will drag her into the dark heart of the city.

As Jake, Doug and Kara all investigate these crimes, they'll encounter ketamine-addled sitcom stars, bloody riots, homeless gangsters, a killer cop on death row, secret vaults in Beverly Hills, tech-bro orgies, medical cannibals, true crime junkies, private security wet-work teams, reality shows, street takeovers, car chases, coyotes, a sadistic Tarzan, and a three day, fifty million dollar wedding, before everything is revealed and they must each make their choice about how to fight back in this violent world before the bloody, blazing conclusion.

I RECEIVED A DRC FROM THE PUBLISHER VIA NETGALLEY. THANK YOU.

My Review: A violent fever dream of a novel ripped from the fact-fueled fantasies of the next cult leader who will go about preying on bewildered, enraged, left-behind stooges. Nothing in this awful tale of those who serve the dreadful scum that has risen to the top of LA's heap as threats to their lives, their power, their money mount is ever clear. And each is more obviously from within their "charmed circle" than the last.

Author Harper's triumvirate of Jake, Doug and Kara each work on a corner of the to-them invisible puzzle of who threatens the elite, why, and work out what to do about it, they all draw more and more into one another's direct orbits. By the time Jordan Harper brings them together, the reader thinks "I am ready for the end to come."

No you are not.

If you have a trigger, you are warned. If you want to be ignorant of how very much misery the powerful feel entitled to inflict on others purely for their own amusement, you are warned. If you aren't willing to sit, slack-jawed and glassy eyed with horror, while brutality is described to you, you are warned.

Let the tumbrils roll.

WILD INSTINCT, good story that (I hope!) starts a series

WILD INSTINCT
T. JEFFERSON PARKER
Minotaur Books (non-affiliate Bookshop.org link)
$14.99 ebook, available now

Rating: 4* of five

The Publisher Says: Lew Gale, a former Marine sniper, now an Orange County California Sheriff’s detective, is assigned to track and shoot a mountain lion that has killed a man in Caspers Park, located in the rugged country east of Laguna Beach, California. The victim is Bennet Tarlow, a rich developer and man-about-town in upscale coastal Orange County.

The investigation takes an unexpected—and chilling—turn when Lew and his deputy sheriff arrive at the kill site in the Santa Ana mountains, only to discover that Bennet was dead before the lion got to him. And while Bennet might have been the first to die, he certainly will not be the last.

I RECEIVED A DRC FROM THE PUBLISHER VIA NETGALLEY. THANK YOU.

My Review: Blame an animal for a human crime. A solid, well-established trope for the unimaginative villain in mysteries. It's popular because it works for authors and readers both.

Lew Gale gets to be his psychologically and physically stressed self as he draws on the learning about his Native American ancestors he's done, as well as his truly intense and often dreadful life in the Marines; Daniela's book-learning gets real-world polishing as the grit of human evil takes down the higher, rougher edges.

That bodes well for more stories to be told featuring these two. I don't know if the author/publisher discussions have included this as a possibility. Since he has three series on the go already {that I know about: Charlie Hood (6 books), Merci Rayborn (3 books), and Roland Ford (4 books)}, permaybehaps that is not on the horizon still less the table. I'd read 'em if they came out.

Which leads me to why I enjoyed the read. I was not interested in anyone being caught for the death of a rich scumbag who was also a property developer *shudder*. I was interested by Lew's ability to make connections when I wasn't sure I saw them, and then prove they were relevant. I resonate well with the reminder not to get locked in on one and only one solution to a problem. Daniela's got the apprentice role, so she's helping us readers by asking questions. She's a solid character in her own right, with major baggage and some disturbing issues to work out, but we need the question-asker in every mystery. It lets the sleuth, in this case a sheriff, infodump on us gracefully...in the right hands, like Author Parker's.

I will note that the mountain lion bit of the story is lightly salted over the real story. It was not central to any development; it could've been eliminated entirely and nothing would change. *unhappy sigh*