Review: One For the Money

I'm posting this one in honor of the movie One for the Money, coming out January 27.  Being a big fan of Stephanie Plum, I am excited to see it.  The trailer looks so good! One for the Money is the first book in the Stephanie Plum Series by Janet Evanovich

My Description:
After losing her job as a lingerie buyer for a department store, Jersey girl Stephanie Plum is desperate for money and turns to her cousin for a job with his bail bonding company. She becomes a recovery agent, which is a fancy term for bounty hunter.

Her first bail jumper is worth ten thousand dollars. And it's a guy that she has some history with: Joe Morelli. The interaction between Stephanie and Morelli is great.  You know they are going to get together eventually. 

Stephanie stumbles her way through, trying to bring in bad guys, but she is not particularly good at it. I love the humor in this book. It is told from Stephanie's POV and she is witty and sarcastic. An example that I particularly like:

"I want to see your tailpipe fading off into the sunset."
Good luck, I thought. My tailpipe was somewhere on Route 1, along with my muffler.

And another:

I wasn't sure exactly how prostitutes determined price, but if men bought hookers by the pound, these two would be doing okay.

My Thoughts: 
I definitely recommend this book, but I do have to admit that I have abandoned the series, which I rarely do. I made it to #16, but reading reviews for #17 I could see that it was more of the same, so I haven't bothered, although I may at some point.  After a while, the books start to get repetitive.  The jokes get old and you just want Stephanie to pick a man already.  One would hope that a woman of Stephanie's age would eventually grow up, but that just isn't happening.  She seems to be the same person in book 16 that she is in book one.  And while it is funny in book 1, by book 16 it is just sad.

My Rating:  *****
Steam Factor: !