Stephanie Plum

I'm in the throes of the Stephanie Plum series by Janet Evanovich.  Now I try to keep on top of things in Goodreads - what I've finished, when I finished, what's up next... Last night, when I was marking 17 as done and swapping 18 from "Want to Read" to "Currently Reading," I noticed that people had some unsavory comments.

The ones, though, that are driving me to write today were the ones that carried on about how redundant the series is.

I thought about that - and I actually see it and understand it... but I STILL find it to be off.  I have a book and a half before I catch up - and we've been making a real go on these (listening to the audios, not reading the books) so you can take it as you want to.  Maybe it's different when you read them - maybe it's different if you've waited a year or whatever to read a new one (though I'd assume that wouldn't be the case).

I know what they mean.  When Stephanie and Lula go to pick up a skip, you KNOW that some kind of hi jinks will happen.  Even knowing that, I still want to know.  I mean, any time that Lula yells "FEET DON'T FAIL ME!" I crack up. You also know that Grandma Mazur is good for a laugh.  She's a "pip."  Stephanie also seems to wind up with a bizarre posse in these books: the stoner, the little person, the psychic stalker - and they are always entertaining. When Stephanie answers Morelli's often asked "What did you do today." It never stops giving me the giggles. The no-nonsense delivery of her antics just strikes me as funny.

So I guess my point is:  Why not take them for what they are?  You don't read them for a new experience, you read them because you liked them. It's hard to write ONE book, let alone twenty.  Appreciate the differences between the books and don't go in thinking you're going to get 20 different experiences.  (Yes, I know that 20 doesn't come out until November - but I'm assuming that it's written already.)

Maybe they're redundant to you, but I've found myself sliding from my firm standing on Team Morelli to be in support of Team Ranger.  I can't help but think that a stagnating story would have kept me at Team Morelli.

I read a lot of reviews on Goodreads, though.  I read a lot of books - and I don't like my time to be wasted on a stinker... a book has to be really bad for me to abandon it.  I've only abandoned two in recent memory.  Sometimes I use the reviews to decide whether or not I can be bothered.  In my perusal, I've decided that I must stink at reviews - because I don't like to say mean things about books.  I have a book I've been writing for ages - and I can appreciate the work that goes into writing a book.  I also appreciate how much of themselves authors put into their creations.  Imagine someone walking up to your child and saying: "Well, she has a cute nose, but her eyes are too far apart, she is not funny and wearing green is just the worst idea ever.  You should really consider not having any more children because your genetic makeup seems to be off." Their works are being picked apart.

I'm not saying I don't give unfavorable reviews. I do... but before I do, I make sure that I'm being as fair as I can.  If I paid 99 cents for a book on Amazon, and it comes with typos, I just roll with it (and by roll with it, I mean I don't mention it... it DOES bother me, but I figure if I needed perfectly punctuated books, I'd have to pay a lot more for them.) but people cite that in their reasons for disliking a book.  I mean, aren't you there for the story?