Friday, March 27, 2020

SERIES REVIEW - Eve Duncan by Iris Johansen



Last summer a friend and I decided to read the Eve Duncan series by Iris Johansen in full. We decided to this because we both received the print ARC of Smokescreen. Considering the huge mountain of review and TBR books on our plate, one or two books a month were planned until this was completed.

I don't know how far my friend got in this endeavor, but I never stopped. This blog post will summarize the series as a whole, while I discuss certain highlights of the books and the series.

Reading these books gave me great pleasure and one thing I loved about the books is that I found another strong woman character in the form of Eve Duncan. She is a forensic sculptor who chose her career to help her deal with a tragic situation she experienced. Her daughter Bonnie was kidnapped when she was seven years of age and her body was never found. This kept Eve from finding closure to a devastating set of circumstances.

With her job and the notoriety Eve experienced, Eve has perfected the skill of recreating skulls which helps parents broken from the loss of their children. For each skull Eve completes, a set of parents find the closure Eve had never been able to claim.

Eve is not alone in her quest. Her lover Joe Quinn, former FBI and former SEAL, now a police detective, is by her side every step of the way. As each book is written, readers are clued in to the amazingly intense relationship between Eve and Joe, thus adding an emotional edge and romance to each of the books.

Early in her career, Eve saved a homeless little girl in one of her cases. The child was ten-year-old Jane and Eve and Joe adopted her, giving her the love and care that turned her into a beautiful, talented artist.

This series is fast-paced, thrilling and addictive. When I got to the tenth book in the series, Eight Days to Live, I found I could not stop.



The image above shows the books that I binge read from March 14-March 21. Sixteen books in a week's time because I simply could not stop. How did I manage this? I was able to download all of the books from my online libraries via Overdrive. But then I decided to see if Scribd had any of these books. Scribd is similar to Audible. The fee is $9.99 monthly for unlimited books. At least that is what they say. All of the time I have been subscribed, I am only able to get two books monthly for the series books I want to read. Here is a quick peek as to what I mean when I say series:



Back to the series and Scribd. I guess Scribd ranks popular books differently, and for my benefit, these did not rank that way and they were ALL available to me. Listening to them via audiobook was thrilling, with Jennifer van Dyck narrating some of them, and with Elisabeth Rodgers rounding out the series, I enjoyed both narrators. Even with switching narrators midway through the series I found myself thoroughly invested in each and every book.

My overall rating of the series is Five Stars, with a couple of Three stars. The reason for the lower ratings when I did so was because most of the books have taken on an aspect that I do not enjoy, and that involves Eve being able to speak with her daughter Bonnie's ghost when she is highly stressed or in difficult situations. Sometimes it was due to her enactments with Bonnie's ghost that she was able to sort things she might not have been able to otherwise. It has always been hard for me to enjoy anything paranormal in books, and when these stories were very impacted in that, my ratings would drop.

Here are my ratings.

The Face of Deception (Eve Duncan, #1) by Iris Johansen ðŸŒŸðŸŒŸðŸŒŸðŸŒŸðŸŒŸ
The Killing Game (Eve Duncan, #2) by Iris Johansen ðŸŒŸðŸŒŸðŸŒŸðŸŒŸðŸŒŸ
Body of Lies (Eve Duncan, #4) by Iris Johansen ðŸŒŸðŸŒŸðŸŒŸðŸŒŸðŸŒŸ
Dead Aim (Eve Duncan, #4.5) by Iris Johansen ðŸŒŸðŸŒŸðŸŒŸðŸŒŸðŸŒŸ
Blind Alley (Eve Duncan, #5) by Iris Johansen ðŸŒŸðŸŒŸðŸŒŸðŸŒŸðŸŒŸ
Countdown (Eve Duncan, #6) by Iris Johansen ðŸŒŸðŸŒŸðŸŒŸðŸŒŸðŸŒŸ
Stalemate (Eve Duncan, #7) by Iris Johansen ðŸŒŸðŸŒŸðŸŒŸðŸŒŸðŸŒŸ
Quicksand (Eve Duncan, #8) by Iris Johansen ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️
Blood Game (Eve Duncan, #9) by Iris Johansen ⭐️⭐️⭐️
Eight Days To Live (Eve Duncan, #10) by Iris Johansen🌟🌟🌟🌟🌟
Chasing The Night (Eve Duncan, #11; Catherine Ling, #1) by Iris Johansen🌟🌟🌟🌟🌟
Eve (Eve Duncan, #12; Eve, Quinn & Bonnie, #1) by Iris Johansen ðŸŒŸðŸŒŸðŸŒŸðŸŒŸðŸŒŸ
Quinn by Iris Johansen ðŸŒŸðŸŒŸðŸŒŸðŸŒŸðŸŒŸ
Bonnie (Eve Duncan, #14; Eve, Quinn and Bonnie #3) by Iris Johansen ðŸŒŸðŸŒŸðŸŒŸðŸŒŸðŸŒŸ
Sleep No More (Eve Duncan, #15) by Iris Johansen ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️
Taking Eve (Eve Duncan, #16) by Iris Johansen ⭐️⭐️⭐️
Hunting Eve (Eve Duncan, #17) by Iris Johansen ⭐️⭐️⭐️
Silencing Eve (Eve Duncan, #18) by Iris Johansen ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️
Hide Away (Eve Duncan, #20) by Iris Johansen ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️
Shadow Play (Eve Duncan, #19) by Iris Johansen ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️
Night and Day (Eve Duncan, #21) by Iris Johansen ⭐️⭐️⭐️
Mind Game (Eve Duncan, #22) by Iris Johansen ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️
Shattered Mirror (Eve Duncan, #23) by Iris Johansen ðŸŒŸðŸŒŸðŸŒŸðŸŒŸðŸŒŸ
Dark Tribute (Eve Duncan, #24) by Iris Johansen ðŸŒŸðŸŒŸðŸŒŸðŸŒŸðŸŒŸ
Smokescreen (Eve Duncan, #25) by Iris Johansen ðŸŒŸðŸŒŸðŸŒŸðŸŒŸðŸŒŸ


The only books that wrote reviews for are The Face of Deception and The Killing Game. The reason for this is that I read a ton of books each month and write a lot of reviews. To be honest, with at least one review posted on this blog daily, sometimes two, including Blog Tours and Spotlight posts, there just wasn't enough time to write individual reviews.


Should this blog ever slow down (yeah, right!), I will write reviews for the rest of the series. Since I received Smokescreen as a print ARC, I may write a review for this book at a future date.

One reason that I binge read the series from book #10 on was that there were a few trilogies thrown at readers, and some books ended on cliffhangers. Since these books were available at my library and Scribd, I didn't suffer from frustration and curiosity as to where things were going. The trilogies written within the series were Eve, Quinn and Bonnie and Taking Eve, Hunting Eve and Silencing Eve.

The series really evolved as the books rolled forward and I definitely recommend reading them in order. There are so many things that would be missed if anyone were to jump in randomly. With this post I am being quite general so as to not give a single spoiler should someone endeavor to take on this amazing series. I am excited to the next book in the series to be released, The Persuasion, in June.

The Eve Duncan series has two connected series. 

Kendra Michaels, co-written with her son, Roy Johansen,



and Catherine Ling.  My review for this series is here.



At this writing, I am still reading the Kendra Michaels series. I will write a series review for it when I am finished with it.  

That's all I can think of for now. I hope that you will check out the wonderful series by this New York Times beststelling author.


6 comments:

  1. Nice. You have accomplished a lot with this series. Glad you are enjoying it.

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  2. Your ability to binge read always blows me away. Glad you found this series!

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  3. You are a marvel! I aspire your level of completion and retention.

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  4. Wow that is a lot of books. I love how you colour chart your reading too.

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  5. I wish I could read as much as you do.

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  6. love this post, and your reading powers always astound me:)

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