Things sort of reach a status quo. A stagnation if you will. But that does not mean it is no less wild. What I mean is that there is not many life reflections or revelations from Stephanie this time around about finding a new line of work even though she is thoroughly rattled by the multiple attempts on her life. Nor is she any closer to choosing between Morelli and Ranger. Well besides the usual Joe is stable but Ranger is magic.

As for the adventures Stephanie gets into, its amazing there’s no reality show in the burg. It’s quite a departure from the original semi-realism of the first few books. Here there are vampire chickens, runaway giraffes and rocket launchers. It’s a bit insane but for a Stephanie Plum, that’s just what one wants.

Sizzling Sixteen brings things back to the family fold with Stephanie inheritating her uncle’s lucky bottle. Only it seems to be a bad lucky bottle. Steph, Lulu and co. have to raise enough money to save Vinnie from mobsters. No one truly wants to do it but he is the one providing paychecks so Stephanie does what she can for her sleazy cousin even if it means stealing, kicking and borrowing favors from Ranger and Morelli as Vinnie annoys the hell out of them with his porno addiction.

Smokin Seventeen is the one with the vampire chickens thanks to the demented grandpa vampire that Grandma Mazur accidentally flirts with. There’s also the return of Joe’s crochety Grandma Bella, cursing Stephanie with the voda. A curse of extreme horniness that Bella hopes will make Joe think Stephanie is a slut and leave her. It has the opposite effect as we all know the Morelli men love nocturnal activities. He doesn’t love that Stephanie is also getting into it with Ranger but the jealousy just drives them closer.

I, for one, was pleased by the brief Joyce-Stephanie team up in Explosive Eighteen when she’s on the run from the Pink Panther thievery ring. It seems like everyone gets a chance to stay over at Stephanie’s apartment. It’s just as catty and full of irritants as one expects from living in close quarters. It’s also where Lulu briefly falls in love again thanks to a love potion gone wrong. Not to mention the source of a hole new love triangle angst thanks to what down between Stephanie-Joe-Ranger in Hawaii. While I find the end’s denounment to a bit ridiculous it was a seriously fun.

The other three books provide the usual Plum fare with Grandma Mazur wisecracks, Morelli’s good cop, bad cop routine which is giving me serious L&O: SVU Elliot Stabler vibes especially in contrast to the mafiaosa relations of his family as revealed in Takedown Twenty and Ranger using the lure of extra pay and extra nights to get Stephanie to work with him for Rangeman Security in Notorious Nineteen. As you can tell by how I smush them together, they kind of blend into each other for me without any particular jokes or scenes that made it stand out for me. Even though there were mysterious talking tikis.

So 20 done, now 8 more to go! #21-25 coming up next.