Publisher's Weekly Review
Set in New York City in 2061, bestseller Robb's capable 50th In Death police procedural (after 2019's Vendetta in Death) pits Lt. Eve Dallas against a particularly callous and ingenious assassin. One day, pediatrician Kent Abner receives a mysterious golden egg in the mail. When he opens the lid, the egg emits a deadly toxin that kills him. A loving husband, father, and grandfather, the victim was well liked in his West Village neighborhood. After questioning Abner's work colleagues and relatives, Eve and her stalwart partner, Det. Delia Peabody, are unable to establish a motive or a viable suspect. However, when book club host Elise Duran is killed in an identical manner, Eve notices a link--both the victims' spouses worked at the same private school. Dogged investigative work and a little assistance from her billionaire husband, Roarke, help strong, shrewd, reliable Eve bring the heinous killer to justice. The gripping plot builds to a dramatic finale. Robb shows no sign of losing steam. 750,000 announced first printing. Agent: Amy Berkower, Writers House. (Feb.)
Kirkus Review
Lt. Eve Dallas celebrates her 50th futuristic procedural by taking down an unusually malevolent and resourceful poisoner.Who would have wanted to kill saintly physician Kent Abner, who donated his services to a pediatric clinicexcept of course for all those abusive parents he reported to the authorities over the years? Eve and her partner, Detective Delia Peabody (Vendetta in Death, 2019, etc.), are still wending their way through the list of possibles when they learn that Elise Duran has been prevented from hosting the weekly meeting of her book club in exactly the same way Abner was killed: She breathed the toxic fumes released from a golden egg delivered to her door. The murder method is so offbeat and so precisely calibratedthe malefactor clearly targeted both victims when they were home alone and chose a chemical agent that would be sure to dispatch them without killing any innocent victimsthat both crimes were obviously hatched by a single brain. And this time, the second murder, instead of muddling the mystery, clarifies it so dramatically that Eve, backed up by her usual legion of omnicompetent colleagues and a little help from Roarke, her dishy billionaire husband, quickly identifies the likely motive for both homicides and then zeroes in on her prime suspect when her tale is only halfway told. So there's precious little mystery after the initial false leads. The rewards on tap instead are the familiar pleasures of watching Eve and Peabody and the New York Police painstakingly gather evidence, make their case, relentlessly question any number of variously complicit citizens who don't happen to be the killer and walk away from their pushback, and then break the perp in a climactic interrogation that the mountain of physical evidence they've amassed makes as superfluous as it is satisfying.It's great to think that the dawning surveillance state will help catch some actual criminals in the mid-21st-century. Copyright Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.
Booklist Review
For the victims in Golden in Death, murder comes in small boxes delivered right to their doorsteps. The first victim is a loving husband and father, a beloved member of New York City's medical community, and a kind neighbor and thoughtful friend. So who on earth would want to kill such a paragon of goodness? That is the question NYPSD (New York Police and Security Department) lieutenant Eve Dallas, along with her always frosty professional crew and her helpmate-in-every-way-possible Roarke, must discover if there is any hope of catching the enigmatic killer before another innocent person opens his or her door to death. In the title, Robb, a romantic suspense pseudonym for best-selling romance queen Nora Roberts, cleverly celebrates the golden anniversary, so to speak, of her legendary Eve Dallas series. In the book itself she proves definitively that she has the golden touch when it comes seamlessly fusing danger-spiked plots, propulsive pacing, and a sexy partnership between a tough-as-nails heroine and the man of mystery who complements her in the best possible fashion.HIGH-DEMAND BACKSTORY: A national one-day laydown of 750,000 copies and an all-out traditional and social media PR campaign will ensure that Eve Dallas' many fans note the fiftieth title in this iconic series.--John Charles Copyright 2019 Booklist
