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Sierra Lavotini #3

Film Strip

nancy bartholomew

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Exotic dancer Sierra Lavotini's latest brainstorm to help the Tiffany Gentleman's Club turn a profit is a disaster. Sierra, headliner for the classiest strip joint in Panama City, Florida, and the club's owner, Vincent Gambuzzo, invited a gallery of porn actresses to guest star on the Tiffany stage. It's a gutsy plan, considering that most of these silicone-enhanced creatures don't have much in the way of true talent. As Sierra likes to say, at the Tiffany dancing consists of more than T&A working a pole.

Still, under Sierra's firm guidance, the venture seems to be raking in the cash. At least until a sniper begins taking exception-starting with Venus, who is shot and killed. Sierra takes a bullet in the, ahem, posterior region during the attack, and would like nothing more than to forget about the whole thing and convalesce with the help of her on-again boyfriend, Homicide Detective John Nailor. But when the investigation hones in on Marla, another Tiffany girl, Sierra is forced to focus her energy on finding the real killer. No small task, considering the interest of the local "organization" in the situation, even once Sierra enlists the help of her landlady Pat; Raydean, her psychotic neighbor; and her oldest brother Francis.

Steamy romance, intrigue, laugh-out-loud humor, mob bosses, and Sierra's overprotective Italian family-it's all here in Nancy Bartholomew's latest hilarious tale.

288 pages, Mass Market Paperback

First published October 1,2000
Series
Sierra Lavotini

This edition

Format
288 pages, Mass Market Paperback
Published
October 14, 2001 by Minotaur Books
ISBN
9780312977443
ASIN
0312977441
Language
English

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nancy bartholomew

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Community Reviews

Rating(4.4 / 5.0, 15 votes)
5 stars
9(60%)
4 stars
3(20%)
3 stars
3(20%)
2 stars
0(0%)
1 stars
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15 reviews All reviews
Profile Image for Kimberly .
IAintAllBad
★ ★ ★ ★ ★
April 17,2025
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Meh. This was a trashy mystery that I read as candy to serve as dessert after a semester of hardcore British and American Literature. It was okay, I guess, but nothing special to write home about. I liked Carl Hiaasen's "Strip Tease" a lot better.
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MinM66
★ ★ ★ ★ ★
April 17,2025
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My flight home was 3 hours late in leaving Halifax so Sierra and her wacky cast of characters kept me company during my wait. It was a quick fun read that I finished before my plane touched down in Toronto.

I enjoyed this book. It was funny yet kept me in suspense.
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ReiBe_
★ ★ ★ ★ ★
April 17,2025
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Vincent, the Tiffany Club owner, has acquired some hefty debts and has decided to invite some Atlanta porn film stars as guests to increase business. The film stars are murdered and Sierra and John are on the case.
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zmsboss
★ ★ ★ ★ ★
April 17,2025
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3.5 stars. I really do like the characters in this series. Their quirks and oddities seem real, not like some "insert wacky neighbor here" characters. Only one more left in the series, which I have in hand!
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MarkXXV
★ ★ ★ ★ ★
April 17,2025
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It doesn't surprise me that I am the first to actually REVIEW this book rather than just rate it. Reading this book is akin to mental masturbation, similar to the fluffy romance novels that are so popular with bored housewives and readers who always want a happy ending.

However, this book (series, I'm sure) has the distinction of being a complete and utter rip-off of Janet Evanovich's Stephanie Plum One for the Moneyseries, but doesn't raise to the moderate level of Sarah Strohmeyer's Bubbles Series Bubbles Unbound: Bubbles Yablonsky Book 1. A Single Italian stereotype, thirty-something solving a crime with the help of her "crazy old lady" neighbor (who drives an antique car) much to the chagrin of her Detective boyfriend, while being attracted to a mysterious, dark and dangerous man. Oh, and her boss is a short, fat, scummy Italian who talks about his mob connections. (Stephanie, Grandma Mazur, Big Blue, Morelli, Ranger, Vinnie if you couldn't already make the connection.)

The reader is dropped of into the world of a stripper...wait...EXOTIC DANCER (never a stripper and 10x better than a porn star) names Sierra. Sierra works at a "class establishment" where she proves how classy she is by beating up her rival "dancers" in the make up room for sitting in the wrong chair or for giving her "lip". It seems that everything Nancy Bartholomew knows about Exotic Dancing Clubs she learned from the movies Strip Tease and Showgirls. To further class the place up, two porn star strippers from Atlanta are killed and a car bomb explodes in the parking lot. Sounds like a high end joint to me!

As a reader, I don't know if the author is stupid or if she's really great at writing stupid characters. Sierra withholds vital evidence from the police (multiple times)because she feels excluded from the investigation or because she is too dumb:a small bomb explodes in her driveway. Is this just an average weekday at the stripper's trailer park?

With the Evanovich books, the crime solving is plausable: Stephanie is a bounty hunter. With Sarah Strohmeyer, Bubbles is a reporter. I can see how a nosy old lady (Agatha Christie) can snoop around, but not a Barbie Doll Stripper.

There is a quote by Sierra's brother Francis about "Feelings", that gave this book an extra star. "Feelings! God damn, Sierra, when are you going to grow up? Feelings don't get you shit. It doesn't change anything. Feelings don't undo what's happened or take it all back. Feelings just get in the way of moving on." I am reminded of Jack Nicholson's character in As Good as it Gets when he says how he writes women characters so well: "I think of a man and I take away reason and accountability." Keeping this quote in mind it makes me think that the author is not a total dummy as she can write male characters pretty well.


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praths71018
★ ★ ★ ★ ★
April 17,2025
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The Tiffany Gentleman's Club is in financial trouble. The plan to save it is to bring in guest porn stars and it seems to be bringing in big bucks until a girl is killed by a sniper. The police believe that another dancer, Marla, is the best suspect but Sierra knows that she couldn't have done it. There has been a strange man hanging out at the club and Sierra makes his think that she is related to the mob. Her detective boyfriend wants her to keep her nose out of the investigation but she is determined to find the real killer before she gets killed too. She needs help and gets it from her landlady, her crazy neighbor, and her older brother. It's a funny but suspenseful tale.
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