Dare: June 8, 2025
Author: Janet Evanovich
Title: One For The Money
I must start this review with first an apology to Mz. Janet Evanovich. I once upon a time read a book of hers that I didn’t like and have since been speaking in a not so flattering tone of her. I’m not even sure why I was moved to give her one more chance. But alas, I did and am glad for it. This was a very entertaining story and well written. Makes me want to read the next in the Stephanie Plum series. So, this is my way of making amends, by giving Mz. Evanovich a sterling review.
So, what had happened was Mz. Plum, Stephanie, by first name, found herself down and out and unable to pay her bills or to find a job to replace the last one she so callously lost. Having heard word on the street that her cousin Vinnie, (yes, she went there) was in need of a bounty hunter. With no marketable skills as a bounty hunter, she relied on some good, old-fashioned familial blackmail and landed the job!
In pure Jersey fashion she set about first to get the absconding bad guy. She was unphased about this duty and set about to do just that. She even knew from her own personal experience with said bad guy just how bad he really was, but her experience was of a totally different variety than the dodging of court appearances that landed him in this hot water. It seemed at least half the women population of Jersey would concur. He was a lover and a leaver and still was as far as Stephanie could tell.
Despite this, Mz. Plum was starting to see the good in him as well, so together they set out on a mission to clear his name. This was a win-win situation as the bad boy would regain his freedom and she’d be rewarded in the end with enough bounty money to get her furniture back and maybe fix the oil leak on her super new, super old car, which was only about one ladder rung up from being considered junk yard worthy.
Mz. Evanovich had this pair running through the streets taking on drug smugglers and dirty boxing champions. You know. The low of the low. Not only did Mz. Stephanie Plum bag her bounty but she also managed to solve the case making sure the truly guilty paid.
In all this was a very exciting book and had me in its thrall for much less than 24 hours. I dub this an if-I-could-read-it-in-one-sitting-and-get-away-with-it-I-would-style-story. And did.