Three to Get Deadly (Paperback)

Stephanie Plum is, as usual, way over her head in her unchosen profession. Untrained, uncoordinated, dysfunctional and disorganized, she's the world's most unlikely bounty hunter - a definite Sandra Bullock role if they decide to make the movie.

This time her main task is simply to track down the town saint, a well-loved candy man with a devoted following of little old ladies, and a stable of nasty goons on the side.

Suddenly people are shooting at her, drug dealers are turning up dead, her vehicles don't work, and her new sidekick is a former hooker with an attitude and a craving for action - once it's not too dangerous.

Acknowledging her limitations, she calls on professional bounty hunter Ranger (part to be offered to Sam Elliot if I have a say in casting) and police officer Morelli (think Colin Farrell), her primary weakness in the romantic department.

After all the expected twists and turns, and the unexpected twists and turns, this turns out to be a wildly funny and entertaining read.

Amanda Richards

By now, klutzy Stephanie is settled into her career as a bounty hunter employed by her sleaze-ball cousin Vinnie, a bail bondsman in beautiful Trenton, NJ, a job she took in desperation after being fired from her previous gig as a lingerie buyer. Her latest quarry is the affectionately-named Uncle Mo, the elderly, unmarried owner of the neighborhood ice cream and candy emporium, who skipped bail after being charged for carrying a concealed weapon - everyone in Trenton carries, it seems - by an overzealous cop on a traffic stop. In trying to track Mo down, Plum discovers that little is known about him by neighbors and relatives. But, Stephanie is considered Pond Scum by all for hounding a man akin to the Pope and Santa Claus all rolled into one. Then, local drug dealers start disappearing. And what's that putrid smell coming from the basement of Mo's store? As Stephanie delicately puts it, "Is it dookey?"

For me, the series hasn't become stale because Evanovich either brings to the forefront a tagential character from a previous novel, or inserts a brand new one into the plot. In THREE TO GET DEADLY, Lula, a reformed ho beaten and left for dead on Stephanie's fire escape month's before, now does filing for Vinnie and insists on "assisting" Plum on her takedowns. And we're initially introduced to Stephanie's former first husband, the shyster lawyer Dickie Orr. In the meantime, the sexual tension remains high between Stephanie and Joe Morelli, the exasperating Trenton plain-clothes cop whom the teenaged former once ran down with the family Buick after the teenaged latter despoiled Stephanie's maidenhood on the floor behind the eclair case of the local donut shop where Plum was working at the time.

The images conjured by Janet's prose are hilarious, as when Stephanie and her pet hamster Rex are beset by two thugs in her apartment and shots are fired. Her elderly neighbors pour forth to lend help with enough armament to have rescued Custer. Or when Stephanie struggles to apprehend a fugitive costumed as a chicken in a fast food joint.

I normally like to vary my reading, but I'm immediately jumping to Plum's next escapade, FOUR TO SCORE. Albeit frivolous, this is good stuff.