Explosive Eighteen by Janet Evanovich

Title: Explosive Eighteen

Author: Janet Evanovich
Read by: Lorelei King
Publisher: Random House Audio
Length: 6 Hours, 5 CDs
Source: The Kewaunee Public Library

I know, I know, I just ranted about Stephanie Plum’s inability to grow as a character last week, but what did I do, but listen to another Stephanie Plum novel this week. I’ll admit that the end of Smokin’ Seventeen snagged me. Stephanie had two plane tickets and was taking a tall, handsome man with her on a trip to Hawaii. I wanted to know who she took with and how it worked out.

Explosive Eighteen begins with Stephanie returning from a disastrous vacation in Hawaii. She has a tan line on her ring finger and isn’t telling her Grandma or Lula what went down. Stephanie soon finds out her trip has done more than ruined her love life, her seat mate never returned to the plane, and he left her with a mysterious photograph that everyone wants from the FBI down to a psychotic killer named Razzle Dazzle. Life at Plum Bail Bonds is also not going well, their new office is not complete, and the bus they have been using goes up in smoke. Stephanie ponders (finally!) taking a self-defense course, but also shows that she has fine fighting skills without one. She seems unable to pick up any of her skips and Lula is sure that whatever bad mojo that Stephanie picked up in Hawaii, has come back with her to the states. When Stephanie’s nemesis, Joyce Barnhart, moves in with her, she realizes she needs to get her act together and get the many mysteries solved.

I feel that Evanovich finally has turned it around in this book. I enjoyed how the story of Hawaii was included and it was different then the format of previous novels. It was interesting to get little teases and then finally the entire story of Hawaii. There was a lot of action in this book and I enjoyed it all. The humor was still there and the great characters, which are my favorite parts of any Evanovich novel. Did Stephanie finally end the triangle? Sadly no, but I felt like progress was made in that direction. This book did make me want to read number nineteen when it comes out and I have hope that Stephanie will finally make the choice and move on. Lula was even talking about wanting to settle down and have kids. That would be great if both Lula and Stephanie moved on with life into the next phase. There would be a lot of fresh comedy.

Lorelei King was one again a superlative narrator of this novel. There is not better narrator of audiobooks out there. I LOVE all of her unique voices for each characters. I checked out her web page and noted that she has read a version of Little Women. I need to track that down. I really enjoy listening to Evanovich novels on my drive to and from work.