My top three favorite pieces of random author drama, in no particular order:

Anne Rice's feud with the owner of Popeye's Chicken because the latter put a big gaudy restaurant on the used car lot where Lestat died

That time Nora Roberts popped off at a commenter on her blog who was complaining that the sequel to one of her books wasn't coming out fast enough and tried to fan-splain the publishing process to her

The most influential children's librarian in American history pushing really hard to get E.B. White to write Stuart Little, then making a complete 180 on it once she read it and trying to keep it from getting published

Round-Up Mystery Reviews

Things I’ve loved watching/reading recently but are so popular they practically sell themselves! First Up: The Glass Onion The second installment in the Knives Out universe is absolutely awesome. Though I must admit, I was worried when I first started watching it. Very, very worried. All the cameos of well-known actors felt a bit gratuitous…but I’d looked forward to the movie for months — so I…

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I enjoy the In Death series a lot. It’s very fun to read but for the love of God I will pay a million kisses to whoever can get J.D Robb (Nora Roberts) to stop writing Eve interact with characters who are victims of rape and sexual assault/abuse. A lot of times those characters end up killing their abusers or are “in the way” of Eve identifying the killer. For example I recently read Brotherhood in Death and Vengeance in Death, also kinda Purity in Death.

All it does is shows the hypocrisy of Eve’s morals. She seems to have a very hard time understanding that some people’s form of Justice is having their abuser dead by their hand. That is good enough for them. It’s not that she has to agree with it or support it, she can’t cause she’s a cop. But she seems to have a hard time understanding it at all.

All we get is everyone around Eve being like “no Eve you killing your abuser is different! Those other guys who killed their abusers are in the wrong, you’re not.” Even though in the grand scheme of things one can argue her killing is exactly the same.

Also she comes across as rude, unsympathetic, and sometimes heartless. Not because she’s “standing for the victims” and often times because of her job it makes her hunt down victims and stand for the people who victimized them in the first place. However, what makes her worse in my opinion, is the fact that she doesn’t really offer any kindness or sympathy. Just “why didn’t you go to the police” or “it’s your fault you didn’t go to the police” which is ironic because 1) them killing their abusers is sometimes the only reason their crimes get brought to light and investigated and 2) with her (spoiler?) background with Homeland Security she should know that not all organizations deemed to protect and serve are trustworthy. What can be said to a victim of their abuser is powerful enough to just call up the chief of police when they get accused?

My other thing is that Roberts writes Eve as a character who comes off as so deep into the patriarchal bargain (in simple terms a ‘not like other girls girl’) that she is very misogynistic when dealing with women who step out of her schematic of what a woman should be. (This also extends to her friends). Which makes sense in terms of her job, her position but makes her unlikable when it comes to cases where women and their pain are the forefront. I suppose that’s what Peabody is for.

Eve is not my favorite character of the series, she is a good character in some regards. When I read cases like what I hope I outlined above it’s like really hard for me to brush past her (what I deem) character flaws.

This Goodreads review of Brotherhood in Death by reader “E” pretty much sums up my thoughts more eloquently.

https://www.goodreads.com/review/show/1545230948

"Are you and Roarke going to the ball drop?" "Oh, absolutely. If we both suffer extensive brain damage in the next twenty-four hours."

J.D. Robb, Obsession in Death

Happy “In Death” day to those who celebrate.

“ ‘Grief passes, doesn’t it...?’

‘It must...Life is to be lived.’ ”

-JD Robb

Ceremony in Death

REVIEW:

RANDOM IN DEATH (In Death #58) by JD Robb at The Reading Cafe:

' a compelling, captivating, horrifying thriller from start to finish'

Nora Roberts does excellent sex scenes, right? God knows she's done enough of them. I tend to skip or skim the myriad ones in her "In Death" series, but sometimes I catch a bit that just, like... doesn't go. Just like a weird bit of grammar can pull you out of your reading flow, I caught this bit in my skim and my visualizations did a record scratch

The problem is in the pluralization of "hands". They've been rolling around just previous to this, and there's a pretty clear indication of missionary position. So my brain's doing this "hang on I want to figure this out" refusal to move on and flipping through the possibilities of how he's not doing some bujangasana hoverboard shit

Like if he shifted to one hand and lifted her hips with the other, makes sense. Otherwise "he shifted" is gonna have to cover him, like, strugglebussing around to get his knees under him -though he'd have to be lifting her hips REALLY high to still get the "long hard strokes." Or scootching them both down until he can stand at the edge of the bed, if it's high enough to accommodate his long legs (which hasn't been much mentioned before)

It's really not important but it's definitely one of those "I think the author lost track for a bit" moments

Review at AudioGals

Review at AudioGals: Forgotten in Death by JD Robb, narrated by Susan Ericksen.

I’m over at AudioGals with a review of Forgotten in Death by JD Robb, narrated by Susan Ericksen.  When I said I was right back into the series, I meant it!

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"He's killing for me, Roarke. It makes me sick inside." "He–or she–is killing for himself." Roarke came back to her, framed her face with his hands. "You're an excuse. And you'll do better work when you fully accept that, and put all the blame–every bloody bit of it, Eve–where it belongs." He kissed her again. "Now, we'll go into your office, and you can tell me all of it."

J.D. Robb, Obsession in Death

Reading 54th book in death series