Time of Death by J.D. Robb

I received a review copy of Time of Death from the Penguin Group. This is an anthology of 3 novellas published by JD Robb, Eternity in Death, Ritual in Death and Missing in Death. Although these are reprints and not new books this is a good packaging/marketing tool. I like it when publishers use anthologies especially in long running series. It’s a good way to get a taste of the series and decide if you like it enough to invest in other books without first spending a lot on new books.

In each of these books we discover a bit more about the main character Eve Dallas. In Missing in Death, her husband says of her “it takes more than skill and duty to make a good cop…it takes an unfailing sense of right and wrong.” In each of these books Dallas doesn’t just solve the crime, she wrestles with the motives and the feelings that each criminal brings to the crime.

These are books where the murders happen relatively early in the story. The balance of the story is the deduction of who did it and why it was done. Along the way we find out more about what makes Eve Dallas tick and why she is a good cop.

This book is a good introduction to the series. You will want to go back and catch up on the story, find out about her childhood, how she met her husband, why she doesn’t like his butler. But you don’t need to know all that to enjoy this anthology.