Oh My cette fin !!!

"Looks like you do a lot of reading."
"I'm a book junkie. When I retire from wrestling I'm going to open a mystery bookstore."
"Can you make a living selling mysteries?"
"No. Nobody makes a living selling mysteries. The stores are all fronts for numbers operations."

n  n    Book Reviewn  n
4 out of 5 stars to Seven Up, the 7th book in the "Stephanie Plum" cozy mystery series, written in 2001 by Janet Evanovich. They just keep getting funnier. And in this one, Stephanie gets a marriage proposal from Joe. But Ranger will only help her with the crazy old bail jumper on the loose if she will do anything he tells her to do. She kinda likes that. So do I. But not if she's gonna marry Joe. Come on! The antics and shenanigans are on high alert. Her family is way over the top and need to be stopped. And if I don't get to meet that Grandma some day, there will be hell to pay. It's a great book in the series, can be read in under 4 hours and will leave you red from embarrassment and laughter. But it's worth it. So dig in, my friends... it's a wild ride with this series.

n  n    About Men  n
For those new to me or my reviews... here's the scoop: I read A LOT. I write A LOT. And now I blog A LOT. First the book review goes on Goodreads, and then I send it on over to my WordPress blog at https://thisismytruthnow.com, where you'll also find TV & Film reviews, the revealing and introspective 365 Daily Challenge and lots of blogging about places I've visited all over the world. And you can find all my social media profiles to get the details on the who/what/when/where and my pictures. Leave a comment and let me know what you think. Vote in the poll and ratings. Thanks for stopping by.

Seven Up by Janet Evanovich is the 7th Stephanie Plum Novel. Bounty Hunter, Stephanie Plum is assigned to bring in Eddie DeChooch, an elderly mobster wanted for smuggling cigarettes. Unfortunately, he gives Stephanie the slip and she finds a dead body in his shed, other mobsters are looking for him, and Stephanie's friends go missing. Another action packed, hilarious novel with plenty of loopy characters and funny laugh out loud moments. A perfect lighthearted and very entertaining book for those times when you need to escape from real life.

My favorite part:

"That's the dumbest load of shit I ever heard," Lula said, biting into a chicken thigh. She stopped talking and chewing and opened her eyes wide. "Urg," she said. Then she started waving her arms and clutching her throat.
"Are you okay?" I asked.
More throat clutching.
"Whack her on the back," someone offered from another table.
"That doesn't work," someone else said. "You're supposed to do that Heimlich thing."
I ran around to Lula and tried to wrap my arms around her to do the Heimlich, but my arms wouldn't go all the way around.
A big guy walked over from the counter, got Lula in a bear hug from behind, and squeezed.
"Ptoooh," Lula said. And a piece of chicken flew out of her mouth and hit a kid two tables over in the head.
"You've got to lose some weight," I said to Lula.
"It's just I've got big bones," Lula said.
Everything quieted down, and Lula sucked on her milkshake.
"I had an idea while I was dying," Lula said. "It's clear what you've got to do next."

Totally reliable fun. This one might have run 50 pages too long and lingered on Stephanie's romantic dithering, which is my least favourite part, but it still delivered the laughs, the legwork and the body count. I've bought the next four already. I may get tired of these further down the line, but for now they remain the perfect palate cleanser.

I have had it up to here with Stephanie Plum. It was funny the first couple times but DAMMIT WOMAN ORGANIZE YOUR PURSE AND STOP FUMBLING FOR YOUR PEPPER SPRAY AND LEARN TO HANDLE YOUR GUN or else find another job that's not a bounty hunter if you hate it so much and if you don't then PULL YOUR SHIT TOGETHER SO YOU CAN STOP COMPLAINING ABOUT HOW OFTEN YOU SCREW UP AND GET YOURSELF IN DANGER SO YOUR MANFRIENDS HAVE TO SAVE YOU. And yet they don't seem to get tired of her, because her constant grooming makes her pretty I suppose. Probably why she keeps hairspray in her purse that she keeps grabbing instead of her protective equipment.

And some people call these books empowering.

OK, so this has been building up over several books.

Sometimes you just need to read the insanity that is a Stephanie Plum novel. What a fun ride.

This is a long-running series. The books can be read standing alone or in and out of order. The characters are evolving, changing in front of your eyes. The only thing I have a hard time with is that the books become predictable. Stephanie Plum works for her cousin Vinny's bail bondsman business. This book had far less interaction with the gang at the bail bond agency and more of Plum going it alone trying to catch an old, slippery, killer. When her sister comes home saying she was moving back because her husband disappeared, taking all of their money to the Cayman Islands, things become even more complicated for Plum.

What’s the traditional gift for an 11th anniversary? Apparently, it’s steel. But Shirley knows me all too well, and instead I got books. Smart lady. Besides, with my bad Achilles I could never carry around a book made of solid steel.

I went back to my favorite series, the saga of hapless bounty hunter Stephanie Plum. This time she’s after Eddie DeChooch, wanted for skipping bail on his charge of smuggling cigarettes on the Jersey Turnpike. But of course, it’s not that simple. The octogenarian somehow eludes poor Steph at every turn. And with each turn, the web of crime expands.

Yes, it’s the usual thing, with the usual characters. We get good old Grandma Mazur, Lula, Connie. And they eat lots of donuts, cookies from Stiva’s, and greasy vittles from Cluck In a Bucket. But it’s a little twisty this time: Moonie takes a bigger role, and Ranger takes on a much more interesting romantic role. Morelli is talking marriage, but only out of the side of his mouth. Even Vinnie goes on a raid with Steph.

So, while it’s the same kind of plot, the increase in appearance from prior ancillary characters made this one more exciting. The raids made Steph seem a little more competent, but luck still comes into play. Good ending, and always with a romantic cliffhanger. Not as steamy as the prior entries but still lots of winking fun.



Got me thinking: is someone gonna create a “Steph-a-verse”? I recently watched the new Spiderman movie (3.6/5 for me), and thought, “Gee, what if there’s a universe where Steph gets married, has a ton of kids?” Or joins the police, or works at the button factory, or (gasp), moves outta Trenton? Is there a realm where she gets with EITHER Ranger or Morelli? Or someone else?!? Or becomes a top-notch bounty hunter?

Or…is there a universe where everyone ACTUALLY ages? That would make Steph, oh, about late fifties? And Grandma Mazur…? Wait, never mind. Leave the characters alone. Let them live in a world where Trenton changes, but Steph and her friends never do. A world where we pick up our happy memories, move through the years, and play with them whenever we want. Like the Simpsons. Or that Noah’s Ark at my grandma’s house – I’d love to play with that today. Right?

Onto Hard Eight. See you in Trenton, everyone!

I thought after taking a break with a few other books, I would be OK reading Stephanie Plum again. Wrong! Not a few pages in, Stephanie is once again inept and idiotic. She really annoyed me that after 40% through the book, I started skimming. I don't know if I want to continue reading this series anymore. The secondary characters are what have kept my interest but now even that is not enough to get me through Stephanie's stupidity.

**Edited to add...after reading this review of Book#17 on Amazon which is exactly what I'm feeling:

http://www.amazon.com/review/RA313RWF...

"Characters need growth in a series. Stephanie has not grown, in fact I could argue that she has regressed. After seventeen books, she STILL can't shoot her gun, she can't use handcuffs, she blows up cars, and has no desire to learn self defense. I'm sorry, but she's an idiot. And not a funny one anymore.

To me, and I know that I am not alone, Stephanie used to be a source of comic relief. She made me laugh and took me out of the seriousness of my life or other more suspenseful books I was reading at the time. But she's no longer funny, she's a joke. "

And the flipflop relationship with Morelli and Ranger:

"I was a Joe fan in the beginning of the series, but then he turned rather chauvinistic, spouting how she should be barefoot and pregnant and not working, and that got my feminist hackles all up and pissy. I've always been a Ranger girl, but I can't understand how he can still be around playing for scraps. Is her vagina magic?"

INDEED!

I’m not that huge fan of Janet Evanovich. Some of her books I found better, some of them worse. This one is actually a pretty good one.

I think I like this book more because Stephanie is not as silly as she used to be. At least most of the time. And Lula doesn’t annoy me as much as usual. The crime part is not very brilliant but it is quite interesting and from time to time pretty funny. I followed it with pleasure.

I am most disappointed with the love part. The situation between Stephanie and Joe is getting more and more complicated. I have never liked love triangles and this one here is extremely annoying. This whole quarrel between Stephanie and Joe is so bizarre and totally unnecessary. Basically, it's only needed to warm up the feelings between Stephanie and Ranger. Completely pointless if you ask me.

An additional plus for the "perfect" sister of Stephanie and her two devilish daughters. I will be happy to see them again.