Passions in death

While Erin Albright's bride-to-be Shauna Hunnicut and their girlfriends are shaking their booties at the Down and Dirty, a Manhattan club, Erin slips away to one of the private rooms to prepare the surprise she had planned for Shauna: hard-earned tickets to Hawaii. But a killer has a very different kind of surprise in mind for Erin, her fiancé, and the bridal party. Now lieutenant Eve Dallas and her crew must figure out who among Erin and Shauna's friends would want to stop their wedding in the most brutal way possible. To add to the suspense, Eve has to contend with memories of being attacked in that very same space. Robb (Random in Death, 2024) expertly engineers another winning combination of twisty plotting, turbocharged pacing, and memorable characters in the fifty-ninth stellar entry in her wildly popular In Death series.

Spunky New York City homicide detective Eve Dallas investigates a bachelorette party gone south in the anemic latest near-future thriller from Robb (after Random in Death). In 2061, New York's Down and Dirty sex club is packed with partiers celebrating the upcoming wedding of marketing executive Shauna Hunicutt and street artist Erin Albright. The festivities come to a halt when the one of the brides-to-be is found strangled to death in the club's private room. The brutality of the crime suggests a personal vendetta, so when Dallas and her colleagues, detectives Delia Peabody and Ian McNab, arrive at the scene, they waste no time interviewing the party guests, many of whom have known each other since high school. The case stirs up uneasy memories for Dallas, who was once assaulted in the same private room, and she fights to suppress her emotions as she parses Shauna and Erin's circle of friends. While Dallas's home life with her wealthy husband continues to offer a welcome dose of romantic fantasy, the circuitous investigation is likely to test the patience of even Robb's most devoted fans. This series has seen better days. Agent: Amy Berkower, Writers House. (Sept.)