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High Five: Summary and book reviews of High Five by Janet Evanovich, plus links to an excerpt from High Five and a biography of Janet Evanovich.

High Five

High Five
A Stephanie Plum Mystery
by Janet Evanovich
Hardcover: Jun 1999,
292 pages.
Paperback: Jun 2000,
255 pages.

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BOOK SUMMARY

What's Stephanie Plum up to now?

  • Her Uncle Fred has disappeared
  • A body turns up in a garbage bag
  • She's got a nasty bookie following her around town
  • Grandma Mazur has her hands on the stun gun
  • Stephanie can't keep a car for more than 48 hours
  • Two men are trying to get her into bed
  • She has nothing to wear to the Mafia wedding
  • And there's an angry little man (don't call him a dwarf!) who won't leave her apartment

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 back seat, and his wife is at home, waiting for him to return with the bread and the milk and the olive loaf balogna. 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.

Criminally original and stone brilliant, this Intermediate Bounty Hunting Survival Manual is blockbuster entertainment.

Media Reviews

  Kirkus Reviews
Stephanie Plum, the bodacious bounty-hunter from Trenton, New Jersey, returns for her fifth adventure....What's a Jersey girl to do about all this? Something outrageous, of course, that leads to a mad chase on the turnpike - and readers grinning appreciatively at another wonderful romp. Savvy, sassy, sexy Stephanie - good to have her back.

  Publishers Weekly
Ranger is looking awfully good to Stephanie these days, and she is finding it hard to choose between him and old flame Joe Morelli. Evanovich tells her fast-paced and furiously funny story expertly. The action never stops, the dialogue is snappy and the characters are more than memorable. Readers can't miss with this one.

  Library Journal
This time, Stephanie Plum has a lot on her plate: she's dodging a homicidal rapist, hunting for a missing uncle, and tangling with a topnotch bounty hunter named Ranger.

  Booklist
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.

Recent Reader Reviews

Rated 4 of 5 of 5 by pointereader
Farfetched but Funny
Just turn off your instincts that go "no way that would happen" and enjoy. I smiled a lot while reading this, always a good sign. At one point I laughed out loud (her family scenes are hilarious--I still chuckle when I think about the scene...   Read More

Rated 5 of 5 of 5 by Donna
Waiting for book seven in paperback. Books one through six are all fives!!!! If you like quirky characters and off the wall humour with your mysteries you won't go wrong with this read.

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