Guilty Indulgence

Hello all, well I have survived the baseball season! WOO HOO! Yes the season is finally over, not that I don't enjoy watching my son play, but dang sitting in those stands with the heat and the gnats I was ready to snap my leash. Both my kids are at Camp Granny this week.....for those of you that don't know Camp Granny is at Jenn's Moms house, and I can not thank her enough for taking both my kids along with Emma and keeping them occupied and busy for the week. I know they are having fun because I get to see the pictures posted on facebook.

One of my favorite summertime guilty indulgences has been the Stephanie Plum series by Janet Evanovich. A good friend introduced me to this series about 8 years ago...you know back when we were just on book 9 and I have been laughing my ass off ever since. I love how Stephanie bumbled through life and the myriad of hilarious and scary character's that would come into her life. I have flipped between Joe and Ranger so many times that I have just decided that she should keep both and the men are just going to have to learn to deal with being in a menage relationship! (or better yet dump Stephanie and Joe and Ranger can take the series in a WHOLE new direction.) These books for me are funny, silly fluff and sometimes you need that in life. But even I have come to the conclusion that it might be time to end this series. It's become a little to predictable and things that were funny and fresh in the first 10 books have become blah and repetitive.


Smokin' Seventeen, Janet Evanovich
Where there's smoke there's fire, and no one knows this better than New Jersey bounty hunter, Stephanie Plum. The bail bonds office has burned to the ground, and bodies are turning up in the empty construction lot. To make matters worse, Stephanie is working out of a motor home she shares with a dancing bear, and Joe Morelli's old world grandmother has declared a vendetta against her. And just when Stephanie decides it might be time to choose between the two men in her life, Morelli and Ranger, a third man from Stephanie's past moves back to Trenton...

I totally got sucked into buying this book on the promise from Ms. Evanovich that this was the "decision" book, and while I don't want to give anything away I feel the need to call BULLSHIT. I liked this book and yes it did make me laugh out loud and yes I even snorted once but AAAAGGGGHHHHH!! Stephanie actually caught some skips quickly, for once, all the best funny stuff was there, Lula, cars exploding, Grandma Mazur at the funeral home, Lula, Grandma Bella and the evil eye, Lula, getting food thrown on her, Lula, capturing someone naked and Lula. There was also more sex in this book than the last 5 combined but I didn't feel any connection between Stephanie and either man so it just felt like filler. If you are a fan and have stuck with the series this long then yes you must read it but get it from the library or wait till it comes out in paperback. I give Smokin' Seventeen 3 chocolate dipped strawberries.