"Uncle Fred was someone I saw at weddings and funerals and once in a while at Giovichinni's Meat Market, ordering a quarter pound of olive loaf. Eddie Such, the butcher, would have the olive loaf on the scale and Uncle Fred would say, 'You've got the olive loaf on a piece of waxed paper. How much does that piece of waxed paper weigh? You're not gonna charge me for that waxed paper, are you? I want some money off for the waxed paper.'"

The speaker is Stephanie Plum, the glamorous if slightly ditzy bounty hunter from Trenton, New Jersey, and one of the most original creations in recent mystery fiction.

In this fifth entry in Janet Evanovich's increasingly popular series, Stephanie's problems are many and varied. She's not making enough money picking up FTAs (Failures to Appear) for her cousin Vinnie, of Vincent Plum Bail Bonds; her red-hot love affair with Detective Joe Morelli has cooled off; and her giant extended family is no help at all. For instance, Uncle Fred the cheapskate has disappeared, leaving behind some suspicious photographs of body parts in garbage bags and links to some really dangerous people.

When Stephanie turns to her friend and mentor, Ranger, for financial advice, he gets her involved in a gang of toughs doing instant evictions for landlords. (She complains to Ranger about the job and its dangers, prompting one of the hired thug to say, "Man, you don't like to get shot. You don't like to get arrested. You don't know how to have fun at all.")

Most of Stephanie's charm, of course, comes from her attitude--a combination of the brazen bravado that turns a failed lingerie model into a bounty hunter in the first place and the normal fears of a person in over her head.

Other Plums in paperback, by the numbers: One for the Money, Two for the Dough, Three to Get Deadly, and Four to Score. --Dick Adler

From Publishers Weekly
Actress Mazar (Goodfellas) has just the right sassy streetwise accent to fit the first-person voice of Evanovich's hero, Stephanie Plum. Mazar sounds poised yet real in her role as the New Jersey-based bounty hunter (the fifth adventure in the series and the second reading for Mazar). She gamely throws herself into the dramatic "bits" along the way, playing out the dialogue scenes with relish. Plum is a tough character, coolly navigating her way through the male-dominated terrain of North Jersey's criminal element. But she's also fragile on the inside, sensitive and haunted by the violence and chaos in her life. Her boss, her cousin Vinnie, runs a business that naturally attracts lowlifes prone to nasty crimes: a man blows himself up with a bomb, a homicidal boxer is on the rampage. Meantime, the love of Plum's life, Morelli, a rakish Trenton vice cop, treats her badly. But her luck isn't all bad, as when she is given a Porsche (she rationalizes, "When you had a car like this, you didn't mind so much that your boyfriend was boinking a skank"). On tape, Plum's attitude holds more sway than the plot, as she sails from case to case with a blistering irreverence that's sure to keep listeners charmed. Based on the 1999 St. Martin's hardcover. (July) Copyright 1999 Reed Business Information, Inc.

From Library Journal
This latest novel in the Stephanie Plum series concludes with an author interview: a Q&A between Evanovich and the many characters of the books, as voiced by this book's narrator, C.J. Critt. An abridged edition was issued last July by Audio Renaissance. Copyright 1999 Reed Business Information, Inc.

From AudioFile
Debi Mazar's streetwise and brash style bring to mind Stephanie Plum's big hair, short skirts, and smart mouth without even hearing her described. All of these attributes come in handy in Stephanie's job as a bounty hunter in Trenton, NJ, working for her (totally) unprincipled cousin Vinnie. Mazar narrates a little fast sometimes and doesn't always enunciate every word, but that's undoubtedly the way Stephanie talks too, and emphasizes the importance of setting to the story. In HIGH FIVE, Steph searches for a missing relative and tracks garbage, assisted by two oddball characters. Mazar has a lot of fun, and so will the listener. M.A.M. (c) AudioFile, Portland, Maine

From Booklist
Raucous, rambunctious Jersey girl Stephanie Plum, the Bounty Hunter from Hell (as she's known in her neighborhood), is back in her fifth madcap adventure. That she's lived long enough to have five adventures is amazing enough, considering that Stephanie has near-death experiences (bombings, shootings, kidnappings) like normal people have breakfast. This time she has about 47 problems on her hands. Her uncle Fred has disappeared after a close encounter with the garbage company; Grandma Mazur is disturbed when she finds her granddaughter Stephanie's stun gun; Stephanie herself has found a dismembered body in a garbage bag; and the superdeadly killer she supposedly put away for life has been released on parole. And, of course, there's that pesky car problem: this week alone, Stephanie has been through three (bombed, stolen, towed). It will be no surprise to series fans that Stephanie overcomes all these obstacles, finds her uncle Fred, disposes of the bad guys, and brings peace back to Jersey. Is she Wonderwoman or what? This series may be the hottest thing going in the mystery genre right now. The combination of hilarious dialogue, oddball characters, and eye-popping action is hard to beat on its own, but the heroine, a righteous babe if ever there was one, is what sets the over-the-top series apart from all the competition in the comic mystery field. A must for all collections. Emily Melton

From Kirkus Reviews
Stephanie Plum, the bodacious bounty-hunter from Trenton, New Jersey, returns for her fifth adventure (Four to Score, 1998, etc.). Or rather misadventure, since nothing ever goes right for Stephanie, thank heaven. This time out the trouble (and fun) starts when Steph's mom informs her that Uncle Fred is missing. Actually, nobody could really miss the disagreeable old coot, but he is family. And either the Plums stick together, Stephanie's told, or they get picked off separately. Besides, not much is happening in the way of miscreants jumping bail, which means she's got time on her hands. The hunt commences. Soon enough, Steph discovers that dead-head Fred is connected to some high-powered scams nobody would have believed he had the gumption for. In turn, this has the effect of connecting Steph to various hard guys who mean her serious harm. So she scrambles an egg and downs a multivitamin with her orange juice: ``A healthy breakfast to start the day off rightjust in case I lived through the morning.'' The ensuing complications include: Champ Ramirez, that no-account sociopath, freed from the slammer and on the prowl for her; hunkish Detective Joe Morelli and his special kind of prowlingeverlastingly lustful; and now senior bounty-hunter Ranger the dangerous, her erstwhile mentor, casting looks at her that are distinctly non-mentorish. What's a Jersey girl to do about all this? Something outrageous, of course, that leads to a mad chase on the turnpikeand readers grinning appreciatively at another wonderful romp. Savvy, sassy, sexy Stephaniegood to have her back. ($350,000 ad/promo; author tour) -- Copyright ©1999, Kirkus Associates, LP. All rights reserved.

Review
"Terrific."-- The Washington Post Book World

"Wonderful."-- The Philadelphia Inquirer

"This one deserves our high five!"-- Liz Smith, Syndicated Columnist


Book Description
Half Hungarian, half Italian, and all Jersey, smart, sassy Stephanie Plum is at it again in a raucous, all-new adventure! Out of vail skippers and rent money, Stephanie throws caution to the wind and follows in the entrepreneurial bootsteps of Super Bounty Hunter Ranger, engaging in morally correct and marginally legal enterprises. Okay, so a scumball blows himself to smithereens on her first day of policing a crack house, and the sheik she was chauffeuring steals the limo. Hey, nobody's perfect.

Besides, Stephanie has other things on her mind. Her mother wants her to find Uncle Fred, who's missing after arguing with his garbage company. Homicidal rapist Benito Ramirez is back, quoting scripture and stalking Stephanie. Joe Morelli, the sexiest vice cop in Trenton, New Jersey, has a box of condoms with Stephanie's name on it. And Stephanie's afraid Ranger has his finger on her trigger. In other words: the star of the best-selling novels One for the Money, Two for the Dough, Three to Get Deadly, and Four to Score is back (along with some of her outrageous sidekicks and hangers-on) for another round of mirth, mayhem, and murder-- Stephanie Plum style!


From the Publisher
"Evanovich is the master." -San Francisco Examiner "A Fun Romp." USA Today "Terrific"-The Washington Post Book World

About the Author
Janet Evanovich is the #1 bestselling author of Seven Up and Hard Eight. She lives in New Hampshire.

FROM OUR EDITORS

The Barnes & Noble Review
From the day Stephanie Plum first started tracking down bail jumpers for her cousin Vinnie, neither bounty hunting nor the city of Trenton have ever been the same. Now, in High Five, Janet Evanovich's fifth installment in the Plum series, New Jersey's most entertaining bounty hunter is back on the trail again with the monstrous powder-blue Buick and the usual cast of zany characters at her side. There's stun-gun-packing Grandma Mazur, who has redefined the term "riding shotgun," and Lula, the black, bodacious, and bountiful hooker-turned-file-clerk who is just itching to bag herself a bail jumper. Of course, there's also vice officer Joe Morelli, with his fine-fitting jeans and a way of making Stephanie forget all but his presence. But after getting a little too close for comfort in the last book, Stephanie and Morelli have agreed to step back and take things slower, which allows Ranger — Stephanie's sexy and mysterious mentor — to step in and give Morelli a run for his money.

Stephanie's big case this time is a personal one, the result of high pressure from the family and an extremely low caseload at the office. She is trying to find her missing Uncle Fred, who went to the bank and grocery store three days ago and never returned. The only clue is a picture of an unidentifiable body in a garbage bag. While Stephanie is only too happy to help out the family, there is the little matter of the rent to pay and food to buy, and Uncle Fred's case is a freebie. Hoping to make enough to tide her over for a short while, Stephanie makes two fatal decisions. The first is toaskRanger, who never seems to be at a loss for money or sleek and sexy black cars, if he has any jobs she can do to tide her over. The second is to bring in what appears to be a low-paying but easy-to-find bail jumper, Randy Briggs. This second option looks like even easier money when Stephanie discovers Briggs is all of three feet tall, but Briggs, who gets a tad testy when he's called a midget, isn't as easy as he looks and refuses to be brought in by a "loser" like Stephanie. His success in avoiding capture and his constant taunting push Stephanie over the edge until finally, in a fit of pique, she bashes in his door and practically throws him down a flight of stairs.

Meanwhile, Ranger offers Stephanie a series of jobs that quickly become a series of disasters. But there is pay involved and the side perk of a company car, which frees Stephanie from having to drive the hated but seemingly indestructible Buick. Problem is, Stephanie has always had a penchant for having things blow up or burn down around her, and both her new jobs and her new wheels are short-lived as a result. To make matters worse, her investigation into Uncle Fred's disappearance is going nowhere and there's a nasty bookie following her around, making her life miserable. About the only good thing in Stephanie's life is the way both Morelli and Ranger seem determined to get her into bed. But neither of them is likely to get very far, since Stephanie has virtually no privacy. Not only is the mysterious bookie showing up inside her apartment unannounced; Randy Briggs has moved himself in lock, stock, and attitude, feeling it's only fair that Stephanie put him up while the door she ruined back at his own place is being repaired.

As disturbing details about Uncle Fred's disappearance surface, the body count for both people and cars mounts. Will Stephanie be able to solve the mystery before a vicious killer comes after her? Will she get her man in the end? (And in the case of Morelli and Ranger, which man will it be?) The answer is yes on all counts, but not before plenty of wisecracking comments, madcap adventures, and sidesplitting fun.

—Beth Amos

FROM THE PUBLISHER

Bail jumping in Trenton is down to small potatoes. Stephanie's only open case is a small bond for a small violation, committed by a small person who raises Stephanie's frustration level in big ways. So, short of money and long on bills, Stephanie comes up with a plan - diversify! Signing on as an intern with entrepreneurial Super Bounty Hunter Ranger, Stephanie ventures into Ranger's mostly morally correct and marginally legal operations.. "None of this makes vice cop Joe Morelli a happy man. The cop in him can't help but wonder as to the source of Stephanie's expensive new car. And the rest of him, the man who's been friend and lover to Stephanie, can't help but wonder if there's more to the partnership than meets the eye.. "The internship is downgraded to second priority when Uncle Fred goes missing. Even though Grandma Mazur is sure he was abducted by aliens, Stephanie sets out to look for Fred. He's a perfectly average senior citizen, and he's disappeared without a trace while running errands. He's left his ten-year-old Pontiac station wagon locked up nice and neat in the Grand Union parking lot, the cleaning is carefully arranged in the backseat, and his wife is at home, waiting for him to return with the bread and the milk and the olive-loaf bologna. Locked in the top drawer of his desk are photos of a body, dismembered and stuffed into a garbage bag. And locked away in the computer files of another average citizen are the clues that will lead Stephanie to Fred.

SYNOPSIS

Stephanie Plum, America's favorite Jersey-girl bounty hunter, is back in her fifth entertaining hit, High Five . Uncle Fred is missing, and even though Grandma Mazur is convinced aliens abducted him, Stephanie drops everything in order to sniff out her luckless relative. But finding dear ole Fred isn't all our hero needs to worry about. No, not in the least. Give Janet Evanovich a high five.

FROM THE CRITICS

Jill M. Smith - Romantic Times

Welcome back to the weird and wonderful world of Stephanie Plum. Janet Evanovich's genius for delivering hilarious scenarios laced with intrigue and danger is unmatched!

Dallas Morning News

Steamy.

Marilyn Stasio - The New York Times Book Review

Like Stephanie's awesome wardrobe, the plot is a grab bag of colorful bits and pieces that don't really go together but are great fun to play with.

Jill M. Smith - Romantic Times

Welcome back to the weird, wonderful and wacky world of Stephanie Plum. Janet Evanovich￯﾿ﾽs genius for delivering hilarious scenarios laced with intrigue and danger continues to be unmatched!

USA Today

A Fun Romp.Read all 14 "From The Critics" >

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