Thankless in death

In best-selling Robb's thirty-sixth title featuring the tough-as-nails police detective, Eve Dallas, and her enigmatic billionaire husband, Roark, Carl and Barbara Reinhold have spent their life trying to help their son, Jerry. They ignored his failures at school, excused his inability to hold down a job, and overlooked the times he borrowed money from them without asking. When Jerry is fired once again, however, and kicked to the curb by his girlfriend, they decide enough is enough. But what they see as tough love Jerry views as endless, annoying nagging. One morning, while his mother reminds him yet again to look for work, Jerry snaps, picks up a knife, and stabs her to death. Later the same day, he beats his father to death with a baseball bat. Now only one person can stop Jerry from paying back all the people he feels have wronged him, and that person is Eve. Robb shakes up a potent crime cocktail composed of fast-paced action and high-stakes suspense spiked with just the right dash of dry wit.--Charles, John Copyright 2010 Booklist

Apart from references to such things as advanced robots and "vids" (the new name for theatrical movies), 2060 New York City is indistinguishable from present-day Gotham in bestseller Robb's 38th full-length Eve Dallas thriller (after 2013's Calculated in Death). In addition, nothing in the cookie-cutter plot couldn't have happened in the present or near past. On impulse, 26-year-old Jerald Reinhold, an unemployed loser, stabs his mother, Barbara, to death in his parents' Manhattan apartment, where he waits until his father, Carl, comes home so he can bludgeon Carl with a baseball bat. Lt. Eve Dallas, of the New York Police and Security Department, gets on Reinhold's trail, but the savvy veteran makes a rookie mistake by not warning a clear target of Reinhold's rage that she could be the next victim. Eve also has trouble assessing her quarry. At one point she calls Reinhold "a fucking moron," then adds "he's cannier than I gave him credit for initially." Readers will have to judge for themselves. Agent: Amy Berkower, Writers House. (Sept.) (c) Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved.

Lt. Eve Dallas goes up against a spoiled kid who's suddenly developed a taste for killing. Lots of families get a little edgy as Thanksgiving approaches. But that's no excuse for Jerald Reinhold to stab his mother 54 times when she nags him once too often, then to lie in wait so that he can take a baseball bat to his father. Some sons would feel pangs of remorse after murdering their parents, but Jerry just feels powerful and liberated--finally he's become a man, the way his whiny mother always wanted him to be--and, financed by the money he's stolen from his parents' accounts, he considers whom to kill next. Since Jerry's nursed a grudge against the whole world since childhood, there are many candidates, but he settles on Lori Nuccio, the girlfriend who got him two jobs he couldn't keep but threw him out when he hit her. Killing's too good for Lori, Jerry decides, and he devotes several hours to torturing her first. Although the kid thinks he's invulnerable, Eve, who's been offered a Medal of Honor and a captain's bars for her tireless work (Delusion in Death, 2012, etc.), is close behind him. The surveillance cameras outside his parents' house instantly make him the leading suspect, and the trace evidence he cavalierly leaves at Lori's apartment confirms his guilt. But his skill is growing with every murder, along with his bankroll. Which of the dozens of people who've crossed him over the years will become his next target, and how can Eve and her squad head him off? Considering how few complications the chase offers, Robb does a fine job of keeping up the tension. Both the cops and the killer make use of more futuristic gadgets than usual.]] Copyright Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.