|
[ Home ]
[ About | Reviews | Search | Submit ]
OK, I am officially confused. When we left Stephanie Plum in ELEVEN ON TOP, she'd very wisely legged it from cousin Vinnie's bond business and was comfortably ensconced in Ranger's batcave, working for him. But when TWELVE SHARP opens, she's back at Vinnie's with absolutely no explanation as to why she's returned to her old job -- one about which she is deeply ambivalent. The plot of the new book, though, takes her even closer to Ranger when a woman claiming to be his wife starts stalking Stephanie. Then, when the woman is found dead in a car and a child goes missing, Stephanie and Ranger have to work together to track down yet another madman. Evanovich is one of my guilty (OK, I don't care, not at all guilty) pleasures. I pretty much start sniggering as soon as Grandma Mazur sets foot on stage. But there's a feeling of melancholy beneath the usual laugh-aloud humour in TWELVE SHARP One of the ways Evanovich has always managed to keep this series fresh is by introducing new faces. This time we meet Melvin the pervert, who ends up being a filing wizard and becomes the answer to office manager Connie's problems. And the undertakers has been taken over by two nice gay boys, one of whom is a wizard when it comes to baking cookies. Among the old faces are the hideous Joyce, who is still set on being a kick-ass bounty hunter, and Sal, the cross-dressing guitarist and sometime bus driver and wedding planner, who is leading Grandma Mazur into bad ways (not difficult to do, mind). Some of the funniest scenes in the book are when Grandma, Sal and Lulu form a band and terrorise the old folks' homes of Trenton. If you want to be grumpy, TWELVE SHARP doesn't advance Stephanie's life much. She's still unhappy in her job, and still pulled two ways between Joe Morelli and Ranger. But never mind that -- Evanovich does it all with such panache and style! This is an essential summer read.
Reviewed by Sharon Wheeler, June 2006
[ Top ]
QUICK SEARCH:
Contact: Yvonne Klein (ymk@reviewingtheevidence.com)
[ About | Reviews | Search | Submit ]
[ Home ]
| 
