BONUS: This edition contains an excerpt from Janet Evanovich and Lee Goldberg’s The Heist.Bounty hunter Stephanie Plum’s life is set to blow sky high when international murder hits dangerously close to home, in this dynamite novel by Janet Evanovich. Before Stephanie can even step foot off Flight 127 Hawaii to Newark, she’s knee deep in trouble. Her dream vacation turned into a nightmare, and … dream vacation turned into a nightmare, and she’s flying back to New Jersey solo. Worse still, her seatmate never returned to the plane after the L.A. layover. Now he’s dead, in a garbage can, waiting for curbside pickup. His killer could be anyone. And a ragtag collection of thugs and psychos, not to mention the FBI, are all looking for a photograph the dead man was supposed to be carrying.
Only one other person has seen the missing photo—Stephanie Plum. Now she’s the target, and she doesn’t intend to end up in a garbage can. With the help of an FBI sketch artist Stephanie re-creates the person in the photo. Unfortunately the first sketch turns out to look like Tom Cruise, and the second sketch like Ashton Kutcher. Until Stephanie can improve her descriptive skills, she’ll need to watch her back.
Over at the bail bonds agency things are going from bad to worse. The bonds bus serving as Vinnie’s temporary HQ goes up in smoke. Stephanie’s wheelman, Lula, falls in love with their largest skip yet. Lifetime arch nemesis Joyce Barnhardt moves into Stephanie’s apartment. And everyone wants to know what happened in Hawaii?
Morelli, Trenton’s hottest cop, isn’t talking about Hawaii. Ranger, the man of mystery, isn’t talking about Hawaii. And all Stephanie is willing to say about her Hawaiian vacation is . . . It’s complicated.
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It is almost impossible to summarize all the action in this wild, crazy parade of over-the-top characters and twisty action. Rest assured that it’s never boring, as Stephanie Plum survives multiple threats to her life, deals with two boyfriends, and still somehow brings the really bad guys to justice.
Just delightful, entertaining, light reading.
I love reading her books their very interesting.
I read Explosive Eighteen a few years ago but did not remember but Amazon let me know 🙂 Any of Evanovich’s books are excellent reading.
The mysteries themselves are good and often pretty scary for Stephanie at al. I think my favorite part might be how funny they are. Meanwhile, could I get some chicken from Cluck on a Bucket? And a dozen of those donuts those gals are always snarfing?
I’ve read them all and can’t wait until I hear about the next one.
I’ll start this off by saying that there are possible spoilers coming…
I’ve been reading this series for years and I used to devour the books as fast as I could, but these days I wonder why I even bother. In the beginning, I loved the freshness of the characters, the situations that Stephanie found herself in and even the love triangle between Morelli, Ranger and Stephanie.
But around book 9 or so, the freshness wore off and I felt I kept getting a rehashing of the same old story. We know there’s going to be a car mishap in each story (it’s usually an explosion). Stephanie is still inept, won’t use her gun, can’t seem to manage a tazer, and runs to Ranger for help in capturing her easy skips. Lula continues to get more and more outrageous and is as inept as Stephanie. And then there’s Stephanie’s inability to choose between Morelli and Ranger and they just seem to accept the fact that she’s sleeping with them both and not pushing for a decision.
Here’s my problem. I keep coming back to this series expecting more. Expecting growth. And every time, I come away mad that I wasted time on this series because it’s not there. At this point, I don’t even bother BUYING the books. I rely on the library to support my unsatisfying Stephanie Plum fix. And imagine my disappointment when I got the audio book from the library and it was only 5 discs long. I was able to listen to it in one day at work… and often found myself tuning out because I felt like I’d heard it before.
The only thing preventing this book from getting only 1 star is that I did have a few laugh out loud moments and thought the basic plot was promising. Too bad the execution of it was lackluster and more often than not, I was shaking my head and questions why I was even bothering. Like many other one-time fans, I think it’s time that Evanovich either breathes new life into the series by seriously shaking things up or she needs to wrap it up. She’ll no longer be making money from me as I refuse to buy these books anymore.
My review originally posted at Romancing the Book.
Oh my goodness! ANYTIME I can get a Stephany Plum audio book by Janet Evanovich, I get it!! The person who reads them has great! She makes the characters come alive!! Super funny, I love to take them on long road trips, I am laughing all the way. So fun!
The Stephanie Plum novels are always fun to read! I read them in a hurry because I get so caught up in the stories. Janet Evanovich has a great sense of humor and she plays it out in her characters. Who will Stephanie end up with? There is always the element of her moving between one or the other of the sexy men in her life. And when you least expect it, a third man comes along! It is a fun read.
This book is witty, unpredictable and action-packed. Stephanie Plum, a bounty hunter, is a street smart Jersey girl and she is being chased by multiple unscrupulous people. Good thing she can hold her own in a fight. Janet Evanovich creates the most entertaining plots. The narrator, Lorelei King, is fabulous! She is the absolute best at creating entertaining voices. You have no trouble differentiating between characters.
Good book those who love some out of the ordinary thrillers will like this like me always the ordinary may not interest all.
I read this on a return ight from Londonvto Chicago. I laughed so much I’m sure my fellow passengers thought I was bizarre!
Love this author!
I love the entire Stephanie Plum Series. It’s a great easy read!
I love all her Stephanie Plum books. This was no exception.
Love this authors books.
A good summer romp. Stephanie Plum is fun. Can’t take anything, except Ranger, seriously
I loved this book!
Love all of the Stephanie Plum series!
These books make me laugh out loud. My kids always know when another one is out.
Love all of the Stephanie Plum books!