JD Robb Land

JD Robb Land

J.D. Robb is a pseudonym for Nora Roberts. In an interview with Wait, Wait, Don’t Tell Me, Nora Roberts described how her publisher had too much inventory and said, “she needed to get a hobby.” Nora didn’t want a new hobby, but her agent encouraged her. She explained branding by referencing how Pepsi also had Diet Pepsi and Caffeine-Free-Pepsi. And so JD Robb was born… or as host Peter Sagel commented: Pepsi_with_Murder.

JD Robb now has a huge fan base. I chose her as a topic because there is enough information to make an interesting report (but not too much!), and I am familiar with the content of the novels and the author’s background. Despite this, I have not explored the online community or associated digital networks. I’ve been reading the books since 2003 (Portrait in Death) and recommend it as a great starting point for the series.

(Image from Goodreads)

So that you know some history, Nora Roberts has sold over 5 million copies of her more than 220 novels (according to the Guardian). Her first novel, Irish Thoroughbred, was written in 1979 and published in 1981. Mills & Boon or Silhouette Romance mostly published her early novels. These early books featured young, virginal good girls (often of Irish descent) overcoming contemporary issues or magical challenges to meet and marry their “one tru luv.”

Later Roberts novels became known for thrillers with a strong element of mystery and family (relationships of all kinds). Her books featured detailed and complicated plots. Men started to become the main characters rather than focusing on a heroine, such as the MacKade or the Chesapeake Bay series. These two novel collections tell stories from the point of view of guys and the plucky, modern, and strong women who they ended up settling down with, often to their own bemusement. In the last 40 years, there has been a significant change in the culture of the US, along with our relationship with technology and digital culture. This bubbled up a bit for Nora Roberts in 2005 when she left the Romance Writers of America guild. As mentioned in the Guardian article:

“Roberts criticised the organisation over its homophobia in 2005, after it published a statement “defining romance as one man/one woman” — “Jesus, it’s fine to have a character fall in love with a freaking vampire, but not someone of the same sex? Bullshit. Just bullshit,” she wrote on her blog.”

In 1995, the first “In Death” novel came out. The In Death novels are significantly different from most Roberts books. In Nora Roberts Land, the typical tropes are explored by author Ava Mills: small town romance featuring predominantly white, middle-class, heteronormative characters with challenges that are ‘not too dark for light reading’ and always feature a HEA (happy ever after). However, the first novel, Naked In Death, starts with the brutal sexual murder of a prostitute, a tortured homicide detective (Eve Dallas), and a reformed (or not-so reformed) criminal billionaire, Roarke, from the slums of Dublin. The day the book starts, the main character is forced to kill a suspect in a domestic disturbance call when he threatens and kills his young daughter, which gives her terrible nightmares — or are they memories from her own past? Characters are diverse, and society in futuristic New York is radically different from most of Roberts' books' peaceful small towns and rural settings.

Profile picture of Eve Dallas, Homicide Division Lieutenant, NYPSD (from Twitter)

Lt. Eve Dallas @EveDallasNYPSD_ (Twitter)

Since 1995, Robb has written over 50 novels featuring Dallas and Roarke, almost all with the words “In Death” in the title. As you may guess from this publishing powerhouse, she has gained strong followership and has a thriving fan club. There are encyclopedia entries for over a thousand characters on the wiki, lovingly detailed with their personal quirks and favorite trends.

Today, the In Death series can be found on Facebook, Twitter, Goodreads, YouTube (that one is pretty odd!), Etsy- the fan club runs through a podcast website, now in their 71st episode. There are also fan fiction sites, of course, and fan art.

To get you started, the facts are easily seen in the basic Wikipedia entry, which lists all the books and stories in the series and (interestingly!) everyone named that dies in the books. Some books deal with terrorism and mass casualties; other murders are as simple as someone pushing Santa out a high-rise window (Oops, there were too many party favors at that Holiday party).

Eve and Roarke, fanart, from www.fayeyong.com

Going into questions of digital culture related to this topic, I have a couple of different ideas to explore. I don’t know which rabbit hole will be the most likely thread that my research will follow:

• Divergence in the digital communities of Nora Roberts versus JD Robb
• The ways the digital/online presence of JD Robb has grown and changed since 1995
• The books are set in the years 2059–2063. There were a lot of predictions about daily life that were accurately predicted (telephone gadgets for kids on wristbands, the PPC [personal palm computer], the dash computer in the car, theft via computer chip, advanced munitions), and things that were totally missed- a glaring example being social media.
• Content-wise, from the start, the books incorporate the character of Captain Feeney and later Detective McNab, who are part of the Electronic Detective Division (EDD). While they pursue cybercrime, they also do cyber research, network with organizations like IRCCA (which is basically a futuristic INTERPOL), deal with physical and electronic locks, security systems (CCTV), and more. There is a strong E-geek culture for that division in ways they communicate, dress, eat, and talk from the other detectives from divisions like Homicide or Violent Crimes. How is JR Robb’s digital culture different from today?
• What are the police doing today (2022) that was predicted in these books in 1995? What can we expect from law enforcement in the future that will affect digital culture? What can we learn from this sort of speculative fiction?
• Murders committed via digital means. Because Roarke is a technogeek, there are a bunch of these. Look at the murders through the lens of digital culture and speculative fiction. Can we expect murders like this in 2063? Examples:
• - Rapture in Death (VR as murder)
• - Holiday in Death (dating service murders)
• - Purity in Death (killer computer virus)
• - Divided in Death (spying/privacy issues)
• - Fantasy in Death (digital game designer killed by own game)
• - Secrets in Death (blogger/social media star killed)

I hope everyone enjoys this series and its fictional universe, which has brought me many hours of laughs, relaxation, or at least time with someone else’s problems. It is nice when the mystery can always be solved by the proper amount of brains, teamwork, brute force, and Roarke’s techno-toys.

Is anyone here familiar with either Nora Roberts or JD Robb? If not, share a link to your favorite author’s online community!