So this morning after sleeping off the New Year's hangover (kidding, I don't drink) I set a goal to finish one of the books I borrowed from the library; not a New Year's Resolution but merely a daily goal I set for myself. I read from the second chapter to the end in one sitting so I was pretty proud of myself considering it only took a few hours.
The book I read was Hot Six by Janet Evanovich, which is the sixth book in the notorious Stephanie Plum series that is still being written today (the most recent is Sizzling Sixteen, which you guessed it: is the sixteenth book in the series).
Because I like to ramble and because I read so many books, I don't actually have time to do a full review of each and every book I read, so I'm going to start doing "drive-by reviews"; however, on occasion I might do a full-blown review on a book if it was just that amazing. Now this book was good but this series is a pretty easy read (considering it took a few hours to read), but "easy read" does not hold a negative connotation by any means.
In these "drive-bys" I will give an excerpt from the first chapter, a couple of sentences on my opinion of the book, and my favorite part(s) of the book. So here goes:
Excerpt: "Truth is, I didn't for a minute think she'd jump. For one thing, she was wearing a four-hundred-dollar jacket from Wilson Leather. You just don't jump off a bridge in a four-hundred-dollar jacket. It isn't done. The jacket would get ruined. Carol was from the Chambersburg section of Trenton, just like me, and in the Burg you gave the jacket to your sister, then you jumped off the bridge."
Favorite parts:
#1 "Munson knocked the two of us aside and streaked down the stairs. He ran the length of the house and out the back door. I was close behind, and Lula was about ten feet behind me. His foot had to be killing him, but he ran flat out through two yards and then cut off to the alley. I took a flying leap and caught him square in the small of his back. The two of us went down to the ground and rolled around, locked together, swearing and clawing. Munson was trying to scramble away, and I was trying to hang on and cuff him. It would have been easier if he'd had clothes to grab hold of. As it was, I didn't really want to grab what was available.
"Hit him where it hurts!" Lula was yelling. "Hit him where it hurts!"
So I did. A person reaches a point where she just doesn't want to roll around anymore. I hauled back and gave Munson a knee in the gonads.
"Ulk," Munson said, and assumed the fetal position.
Lula and I pried his hands away from Mr. Sad Sack and cuffed him behind his back.
"Wish I had a movie of you wrestlin' with this guy," Lula said. "It reminded me of that joke about the midget at the nudist colony who kept sticking his nose in everyone's business."
Mitchell and Habib had gotten out of their car and were standing a few feet away looking pained.
"I could feel that all the way over here. If we get the word that we have to rough you up, I'm wearing a cup." Mitchell said.
#2 "It's his legs," Lula said. "They froze up in a seated position." She pulled a lawn chair off a stack at the back of the garage and set the chair next to the dead guy. "If we put him in a chair he'll look more natural, like he was waiting for a ride or something."
So we picked him up, set him into the chair, and backed away to take a look. Only, when we backed away, he fell out of the chair. Smash, right on his face.
"Good thing he's dead," Lula said, "or that would have hurt like the devil."
We heaved him back into the chair and this time we wrapped a bungee cord around him. His nose was a little smashed and one eye had been jarred closed from the impact when he fell, so one was open and one was closed, but aside from that he looked okay. We backed away again, and he stayed in place.
#3 "Amen," Lula said, and she made the sign of the cross.
"I thought you were Baptist?"
"Yeah, but we don't got any hand signals for occasions like this."
This book, like all in the series, is hilarious and even though they all have the same basis with Stephanie running around getting into shenanigans, they are quick reads and will provide entertainment so don't hesitate to read any of them. The first one was published in 1994 and she's written one a year since then. I will be moving onto the seventh book eventually and I look forward to the next "chapter" in Stephanie's life.
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