A fifty-five-gallon drum washes up in the Malibu Lagoon stuffed with the corpse of Gene Dent, the key player in a bribery scandal that ensnared several local politicians. LASD detectives Eve Ronin and Duncan Pavone know the case—and all the likely suspects—well. Just as they begin their investigation, the sheriff publicly reveals evidence linking the crime to LA’s mayor.
But Eve and Duncan realize the bombshell allegation, true or not, arises from corruption within the sheriff’s own office…because they helped cover it up years ago. If the sheriff goes down, so will they.
Eve is agonizing over her moral dilemma when a helicopter crashes in the hillside below her Calabasas home. It’s not a coincidence. Eve soon discovers among the twisted wreckage and dead passengers shocking connections to her own past…and they lead straight to a fight for her life.

The Eve Ronin books are such fun. The story rolls out effortlessly. The humour works. The action is intense. The technical details are shared with a light, often humorous touch. The plot is serpentine and closely linked to earlier books.

You can read ‘Fallen Star’ as a standalone novel but it has spoilers for some of the earlier novels so, if you’re new to Eve Ronin, I suggest you start with the first Eve Ronin book, ‘Lost Hills’ and maybe  try the first Sharpe & Walker book, ‘Malibu Burning’.

In ‘Fallen Star‘, Eve is worried that, subconsciously, she’s becoming too like the image of her promoted in a TV show loosely based on her life but with action scenes that make her look like superhero.  She’s concerned that her actions in real life are so on-brand for her TV show persona, that they’re inappropriate as the actions of a serving police detective.

The thing is, Eve’s actions in real life, no matter how reckless, are just Eve being Eve. Being Eve means a video of her, off duty, using her gun to single-handedly frustrate a flash mob raid on a high-priced cosmetics store goes viral. It means that she’s fist on the scene when a helicopter crashes on the hill below her house, and takes charge of what soon becomes a murder case.

This tiime Eve got to be even more herself when she enlisted the help of Walker, US Marshal turned Arson investigator, to set a trap for a sniper, with Eve as bait.

I love Eve being Eve.