Ticket 2 Ride

Stephanie Plum is back in book #30. Janet Evanovich follows her template to deliver another absorbing and funny Stephanie Plum adventure.

Dirty Thirty (2023, Atria Books) has the familiarity of watching your favorite Friends or Golden Girls episode on a cold, November night. Thirty books in is an incredibly successful series, and challenging to be both familiar, yet new, to a legion of fans.

All the regulars are back (where else would they go?) and it’s remarkable how little they’ve aged in this series, but that’s the point. Stephanie is still juggling Moretti and Ranger, and tracking bail jumpers, bumming meals from her long-suffering mother, and while keeping both her grandmother and bail enforcement partner Lulu out of trouble. And dodging Moretti’s evil-eyed grandmother who calls Stephanie a slut. Just another day in the Burg, Stephanie’s neighborhood in Trenton, New Jersey.

We find Stephanie on her own; Moretti has gone to Miami to testify in a trial, but the more than willing Ranger is there as usual, when the required apartment fire and totaled vehicle leaver her homeless and ride-less. No spoiler alert because these two things happen in every Stephanie Plum mystery.

One interesting twist: Stephanie’s mother, in between preparing meals and her not-so-secret drinking, gets to drive on a stakeout. The white-knuckle Mrs. Plum, now that’s an adventure.

“My mom wishes I had a more boring history. She’s been given the role of Family Adult in Charge of Worrying. It’s not a job I’d want, but my mom is pretty good at it. When the job is overwhelming, she goes to Jim Beam for help.”

In each Stephanie Plum mystery, one or more bail jumpers are missing, usually with strange circumstances. There are clues, but we’re too busy enjoying the banter between Stephanie and her assistant Lulu, which drives the series even more than Stephanie’s romance with Moretti or her fantasies about Ranger. Somehow, Stephanie and Lulu make an effective team, albeit an unconventional one.

The dialogue is witty as usual as you gain a sense of life in the Burg.

“Not stealing,” Gloria said. “It’s shoplifting, and if you’re a senior or destitute, it falls into the RAM program. Redistribution of Available Merchandise. It supplements Social Security and Medicare. It’s an entitlement program.”

“I never heard of that program,” Lula said, “but I know a lot of people who participate. Most of them are in jail.”

If you’ve read any Stephanie Plum mysteries or Janet Evanovich books, you know what to expect and won’t be disappointed. And there is a surprise at the end. Stay tuned.

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