Evanovich, Janet - One for the Money

Finished a few minutes ago and I'm still giggling.

Great last line.

I like Stephanie Plum a lot more than Thursday Next, mostly because she's a Jersey girl through and through, has really awful clothes, and has the worst luck ever. Or the best, it's hard to tell.

I haven't read many mysteries at all -- a few Agatha Christie's, a few Mary Higgins Clark's, and the Thursday Next book (which I think fits better in the mystery slot than sci-fi). I like this one a lot more than the others, maybe because it has a sense of humor, although the Eyre Affair did as well. But a lot of it is just Stephanie Plum. I also liked how she's just a beginner in this book, doesn't know what the hell is going on, and has to learn how to shoot, how to track people, and to do things like that. I suspect it'll be a lot of fun watching her get better at all this in the later books. And I just love the fact that she's constantly strapped for money, looks worse and worse every time, gets her eyebrows singed off, and in general gets in a load of messes the few mysteries I've read don't really get into. She feels like a real person to me... ok, maybe with snappier comebacks, like Crusie characters. Evanovich actually reminds me of Crusie a great deal.

Already crushing heavily on Morelli.

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When I sit down to eat lunch and you ask me if you can sit at the same table, it does not mean I instantly want to engage in conversation. This is taken to the nth degree when the first thing I do is not look at you or say hi, but instead pick up a book and read it.

Furthermore, when I am answering in single syllables to avoid talking to you, it means I do not want to talk to you! Go away! Smoke your cigar elsewhere!

I hate people who do that, as this person did today at lunch. I ate my sandwich as fast as humanely possible to get out of the situation. Didn't know this guy at all, and I freak out very easily when people who look twice my age attempt to sit down when I am by myself and make conversation.

And I particularly hate people who say stupid things (while I read). Look, I don't want to tell you why I like this book. I do not want to discuss my reading habits. I do not want to tell you my name or anything.

I hate people who do this on the airplane too. You would think that me having my nose deep in a book would signal that I am quite occupied and DO NOT WANT TO TALK. But nooooo.

Plus, it really creeps me out.

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So. The hamster has not been moving around much for about a week now. Yesterday he was breathing incredibly slow for a hamster. Today, I can't even tell if he is breathing.

The boy says when hamsters hibernate, their hearts beat 4 times a minute. He has also read that some people have actually buried hamsters, thinking them dead, only to have them claw their way out of the grave.

So I have a potentially dead hamster in my house. It's almost like Schrodinger's cat, but not. The boy is madly busy this week with tests and can't take him to a vet to actually make sure. I refuse to touch him, because the last time I did, he bit me. That would be the hamster, not the boy.

This is one of those things that I feel is more fiction than real life. This is something that should be in a Stephanie Plum book, not my apartment.

But right now, I'm kind of freaked out about the fact that I have a potentially dead hamster in my apartment and that it will continue to be here in this strange state of unknowing for four more days.

Evanovich, Janet - Two for the Dough

This is it. I have officially been sucked in. I have borrowed up to book five already, and I'm worried because books 6, 7, 8 and 9 are not in my hand thisverymoment.

This might have been even funnier than book one, and I wasn't sure if that was possible. Kenny's a much less scary villain than Ramirez, but he's pretty insane.

( Small spoilers )

I continue to appreciate how Stephanie is not Sherlock Holmes or any of those other famous detectives -- she's got no idea half the time what she's doing, her hair is awful, and she's scared of her own gun. And the other half the time, she's scared out of her mind.

Smart and hilarious I can always live with.