Wednesday, October 12, 2005

Origin In Death by J. D. Robb

Origin in Death is another in this amazing series (over 20 so far) with kickass New York police Lt. Eve Dallas and her fabulously wealthy husband, Roarke. I have read them all and this one is better than some in this series but not the best. I will probably always love Naked in Death more than any others and I have re-read it several times. OID features an excellent murder mystery and I really enjoyed it. I found the scientific elements of cloning and its morality kind of creepy but with the way today's advances in science are headed, highly believable. The usual cast of characters are present including Peabody, McNabb, Feeney, Commander Whitney, Sumerset, (very pregnant) Mavis, Nadine, and Dr. Mira. One particularly memorable scene involved an altercation between Eve and Dr. Mira. They are both extremely strong women, Eve especially so, and Dr. Mira does not back down when she feels she is right. This scene cemented the pseudo-mother/daughter relationship for them.

The mystery is better than usual but though satisfying, the Eve/Roarke relationship is a bit light. The secondary plot centered around Roarke planning a Thanksgiving dinner to which he has invited all his newly discovered relatives from Ireland. It was touching to see Roarke so panicky and unsure of himself and I laughed at Eve's attempts to relate to the youngest members of his family. Eve is so incredibly strong that when she displays pure cowardice (such as when someone tries to hand off a baby to her or Trina wants to give her some kind of cosmetic treatment) you just have to laugh. One of my favorite aspects of this series of books has been the developing relationship between Eve and Roarke and learning more about their pasts, but this was not really in evidence in this book. The ending was exciting and intense and kept me on the edge of my seat, but I felt a little bit gyped. I would have liked to see what happened at that dinner :)

My Grade: B

5 comments:

Anonymous said...

Ooh, I'm interesting in hearing how the Dark Queen is. I had looked at it a while back, then forgot about it.

Rosario said...

...present including Peabody, McNabb, Feeney, Commander Whitney, Sumerset, (very pregnant) Mavis, Nadine, and Dr. Mira.

Heh-heh, I first read that Summerset was very pregnant! ;-)

ReneeW said...

Jay - I'm really, really trying to get into this book but for some reason I keep getting distracted to other things. I will keep at it and let everyone know my thoughts.

Rosario - Very funny! That snuck right by me :)

Anonymous said...

I thought mystery-wise, this is the best JD Robb I've read so far. I'm usually more drawn to the characters than the mystery. It's amazing to me that all these books later and I'm not the least bit tired of them. Maybe it's because the actual time is so short - only a few years have passed since Naked in Death. And I love to see how the characters (Eve and Roarke especially) are growing an developing.

ReneeW said...

Kristie - I agree that the mystery was excellent. But one of the reason I have stuck with this long series is that I love the developing relationship between Eve/Roarke. This one had very little of that, but I can't see myself ever giving up on this series. The characters really make these books wonderful.

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