Saturday, June 23, 2012

Book #3: One for the Money...and Bonus Movie Review.

First off, let me say that I'm a bit disappointed in myself for taking so long to reach by goal of six books this year.  I really thought I would just plow through and surpass that goal long before the end of the year.  Now I'm glad that my aim is such a modest number.

I just finished One for the Money by Janet Evanovich.  This is the first in a series of books numbered sequentially (Two for the Show, Three to Get Deadly, etc.).  Some people love this author and wait expectantly for each new book in this series whose lead character is named Stephanie Plum.  I was hoping to join their ranks and add Evanovich to my list of favorite authors, but I don't think that will come to pass.  The book is set in Trenton, NJ which provided some added entertainment for me since I grew up in the Garden State.  But the plot itself was predicable and the writing style was average.  It was very readable and was a great beach book since you could follow the plot with little work and you could lay it down for several days, pick it back up with no trouble at all.

After I was a few chapters into this book I realized that a movie had been made of the story and it had risen to the top of our Netflix cue.  One of my motivations to finish the book was that I didn't want to see the movie until I had read the entire story in print.  The movie was essentially the same.  The few changes made to the plot didn't drastically alter the story.  And like the book, it was pretty predictable.  The scenery was believably New Jersey.  Katherine Heigl played Stephanie Plum.  While I've enjoyed her in other movies, she didn't fit my characterization of Stephanie.  Sandra Bullock would have been more believable in the part, but she might be too old to play this character.  I wouldn't go out of my way to see this one.

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