J.D. Robb – Taken in Death

From the anthology: Mirror, mirror

An omnibus of novels by Mary Blayney, Elaine Fox, Mary Kay McComas, J D Robb and R C Ryan, published september 24, 2013.
Genre: romance
Cover: meh



Once upon a time...
...in a world far removed from the days when fairy tales were new, five bestselling authors spin versions that take the classic stories into a new dimension. You'll recognize Hansel and Gretel, Cinderella, Sleeping Beauty, and other enduring characters, but they'll exist in realms beyond your imagination, where the familiar is transformed into the extraordinary and otherworldly.


An open and shut case, if you believe the security video. A woman comes home just before midnight, and leaves a few minutes later with her children. Leaving a dead nanny behind. Eve doesn’t hesitate for a moment, and sends out an Amber alert for both children. And when the parents come home early, it should all have wrapped up nice and quickly.
But looks are deceiving, as Ross and Tosha MacDermit where still in Australia at the time of the murder/kidnapping. Eve does believe the shocked mother’s horrible story about her evil twinsister. Maj has always accused Tosha of killing their mother at birth, of stealing her rightful powers, just by living. She has tried to kill and injure Tosha as early as she can remember, and when they were twelve, Maj killed their father and was found laughing, while sitting on his dead body and drinking his blood. Maj has been imprisoned ever since, and Tosha was raised by family. She has officially deleted Maj from her personal records, and has moved from Sweden to America to escape her memories and her twinsister. At last, the bond between them has died, after Tosha consciously suppressing it.
And now Maj has appeared in her life again, kidnapping her children, Tosha’s most beloved “possessions”, in order to hurt Tosha the most.

And Eve and her loyal team are involved in a race against the clock, to find the children before they are hurt or killed. Maj is clearly psychotic, and she loves killing, and has even cannibalistic tendencies. She seduced her shrink into helping her escape, and as a thank you, she killed him after cleaning out his bank accounts.

A little toy will help Eve find little Henry and Gala, like leaving bread crumbs in the forest to the candy house …


“The evil witch killed Darcia”. The first sentence and I was captivated till the last sentence of the book. As it is a novella, it was very fast paced, a race against the clock to find the kidnapped children. They were brave in the face of evil, and they kept faith that the Good Witch would find them in time.

It is short, but all of J.D. Robb’s signature skills are put in this story, and I gobbled it up in a few hours. It was thrilling to follow all the crumbs, to learn about Maj and to witness everything. This is a nice retelling of Hansel and Gretel.

10 stars.

© 2013 Reviews by Aurian