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Fiction. Mystery. Romance. Humor (Fiction.) HTML: The #1 bestselling phenomenon continues in the eighth Stephanie Plum novel. The stakes get higher, the crimes get nastier, the chases get faster, and the men get hotter. This time Stephanie, Morelli, Ranger. Lula, Valerie, and Grandma Mazur are strapped in for the ride of their lives. Stephanie is hired to find a missing child. But things aren't always as they seem and Stephanie must determine if she's working for the right side of the law. Plus, there's the Morelli question: can a Jersey girl keep her head on straight when more than just bullets are aimed for her heart? And with the Plum and Morelli relationship looking rocky, is it time for Ranger to move in for the kill? Janet Evanovich's latest thriller proves that Hard Eight will never be enough..… (more)
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There were a few things I liked about the book.
1: I love Stephanie’s niece Mary Alice. How can you not love a kid who thinks she’s a horse?
2: I also like the creativity of the murder. I know it’s
3: After so many books, you have to get creative with the bad guys. This time they wore costumes. I like the creativity, but it’s hard to take a guy in a bunny suit seriously, even if he is throwing fire bombs at you.
4. Albert Klaughn (Clown) .. enough said. I love the Clown. He reminds me of an 8 year old girl wanting to know everything she can about the world in as little time as possible. I imagine the numerous questions he asks come out a mile a minute.
On paper, it seems like “What else can you ask for?” But, I thought the book was kind of blah. Those things stood out, but in 300 pages, that’s really not a lot. They can’t all be 5s.
I give Hard Eight 2 bookmarks.
Of course, she never will, because she has her two men who are amazingly always able to save her at just exactly the right moment, which comes in handy. But I don't know, all of a sudden I just want her to stop, settle down, get a different job and buying that wedding dress!
Hard Eight is one of the few books in the series where I really felt that Stephanie was in big trouble. Stephanie started off trying to find a mother who had disappeared with her young daughter. In the process she angered a very bad "business" man who made it his job to terrorize her. And he terrorized her in some severely creepy ways. There was also the very needed humor -especially with the introduction of Albert Kloughn. Such a needy little guy!
Throughout the story, I was completely drawn in to see what was going to happen to Stephanie next. It was actually pretty dark and scary. This is definitely one of the better books in the series as far as suspense goes. I really enjoyed it and look forward to continuing the series.
I must confess to having very mixed feelings about this book. I'm familiar with the other Stephanie Plum books and the format hasn't changed: there are still many moments that are laugh out loud funny. Better than that, there are moments that are go-back-read-it-again-immediately and laugh-out-loud-again funny. There's not much point in quoting pieces out of context, but suffice it to say that the dialogue is often very funny. The book is very easy to read and the storyline is hardly taxing - it's certainly NOT a whodunnit, or even a whytheydunnit, more a how-many-times-can-she-let-them-escape-her? For those of you looking for strong, interesting plotlines and complex humour, this is not the place to look. If, however, you are looking for something undemanding and amusing, you've struck gold.
Except...there are two things that bothered me about this latest installment.
Firstly, and least importantly, Evanovich breaks the cardinal rule of will-they/won't they tension by letting Stephanie and the mysterious Ranger fall into bed together. It is noticeable that in Friends and similar comedies, it is always funnier when there's an element of doubt, when the protagonists aren't together. Ross and Rachel had to be split up as the writers of the show realised that they lost their comic edge when they were lovers. Anyway, getting back to the point, no matter what happens between Stephanie and Ranger now, that element of sexual tension has been well and truly lost, and with it, the humour such tension generated. There is more comedy to be found in frustration that in action and these novels are intended to be comic.
Secondly, and far more importantly for me, important events and meanings are skimmed over. There are references to Lula's former occupation as a 'ho' which are utterly devoid of any kind of feeling about her past. Even the fact that Lula was extremely brutally treated by Benito Ramirez in a previous book is treated in a very off-th-cuff manner. As the death toll rises, Stephanie reassures people who come accross her that she hardly ever kills anyone and worries that her couch has death cooties as a result of being the last refuge of sawed-in-half Steven Sodor. As in previous books, the cavalier attitude to arson attacks, kidnapping, sexual threats and extreme violence leads to humour and prevents the reader being overly concerned by the harsh treatment meted out to crooks and minor characters. However, the more I read the more I felt that too much grotesque violence was being happily skimmed over by the narrator and Stephanie herself. Although this is meant to be a light read, I felt it would have benefitted from either less violence or a slightly more considered response to it. It reminds me of a bit in Huckleberry Finn in which Huck is asked if anyone was hurt when the boat blew a cylinder head. He replies that only a black man was harmed and his aunt responds, in all seriousness, that it was very lucky, because sometimes people did get hurt. Yes, Steven Sodor got sawed in half but there isn't a moment of pity or thought spared on him as he is, in Evanovich's world, completely villainous and expendable.
Anyway. I'm probably taking it all too seriously! An easy, light-hearted and very humorous read, if you don't stop and think too much.