Holiday in Death (Mass Market Paperback)

Confirmation comes when a second victim is found; she has two turtle doves in her hair and has also requested the services of Personally Yours. And as the investigation progresses, we find Charles Monroe, a character who we met in the first book in the series, "Naked in Death", and who has also been using the services of the dating agency even though he is a licensed companion. I think Robb made an excellent decision in reintroducing Charles in the series, since he brings no small amount of smart comments and interesting personal interactions with Eve and Peabody.

Peabody, Eve's aide, is having the time of her life, because the search for the killer is taking the duo around town where they have a chance to visit shops and mingle in the crowd of holiday shoppers. Eve, on the other hand, hates the experience and besides being worried about finding a dangerous killer, has to deal with her personal issues regarding Christmas. She even has to figure out what to buy for her friends and husband, the billionaire Roarke. Finding a present for a man that has everything is no small task!

This series is moving ahead full steam, with interesting cases and characters that are becoming more complex and fascinating. I think the latter aspect is what I enjoy most about this series, since Robb spends a fair amount of time on the relationship between Eve and Roarke, Eve and Peabody, etc. For those of you that have not read other books in this series, I am fully confident that this book stands on its own, but you will be missing a considerable part of the appeal found in these books due to the relationships among the main characters. My recommendation is that you start with the first book in the series, and I guarantee that you will be hooked after that.

Now, if you are still reading this review I must suppose that you already have read that book, and so you know what the "In death" series is about: a very good cop (Eve), her unlikely husband (Roarke), and the crimes they somehow end up solving together. Of course, by summing up the series in such succinct manner I leave aside a lot of the details that make the series so good but then, if I want to be concise I have to sacrifice something: nothing is perfect :)

"Holiday in death" definitely isn't perfect either. The plot is pretty simple: it is almost Christmas time, and Lieutenant Eve Dallas not only has to buy presents for her loved ones (she hates shopping!!!), but also to deal with a killer who dresses up as Santa Claus, rings the doorbell of his victims and kills them. The only link between the victims is a dating service, and so Eve decides some undercover work is in order to catch the killer, before he continues with his "special" way of celebrating Christmas. Officers Peabody and Mc Nabb will be the undercover agents, and also the protagonists of a secondary storyline that the fans of the series have been waiting for some time :)

I certainly cannot say that this is my favourite book in the series. Despite that, and strangely enough, I DO RECOMMEND IT. Why?. Well, because it has more than average "entertainment value", if you like to mix suspense, a bit of romance and an interesting futuristic spin. I want to point out, though, that the crime scenes that all the books in the series have are specially horrific in "Holiday in death", so please don't read it if you can't stand gory scenes. I don't like them, and that is the reason why I gave this book 3 stars instead of at least 4, but that's your decision to make, after weighing the pros and cons of giving "Holiday in death" a try...

Belen Alcat