Reviews for Leverage In Death

by JD Robb

Kirkus
Copyright © Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.

The 44th case for future-dwelling Lt. Eve Dallas is less whodunit than whydunit and howtocatchem.On the day appointed for the merger between Quantum Air and EconoLift, Quantum marketing VP Paul Rogan arises from his seat at the table, apologizes to Derrick Pearson, the CEO who's come to treat him like a son, then detonates a suicide vest containing enough explosives to kill himself, Pearson, and nine othersalthough not, as it happens, EconoLift president Willimena Karson, who's merely sent to the hospital in critical condition. Eve and her partner, Detective Delia Peabody, soon realize that the reason a treasured employee would do such a thing is that he felt he had no choice: A pair of masked killers had taken his wife and daughter hostage and threatened to kill them and worse if he didn't follow their murderous orders. But why would anyone take so much trouble to blow up the meeting room instead of either killing their chosen target individually or detonating enough explosives to blow up the whole floor of the building? That's the question Eve focuses on, and when she comes up with a plausible explanation, she realizes that whoever pulled off this high-fatality caper has every reason to try it again. She's too late to prevent another blast, which claims five more victims at an art gallery, but the second time around provides her with enough clues to narrow her list of suspects dramaticallythough fans should be warned that from this point on, Eve's detective work is a bit of a slog, and the main event yet to come, as so often in this series (Dark in Death, 2018, etc.), is Eve's interrogations of the suspects she's hauled in.A nifty, if exceptionally coldblooded, criminal plan buried in close to 400 pages of mostly forgettable suspects and dialogue. There's not even much detail about the good life in 2061 this time around. Copyright Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.

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