|
[ Home ]
[ About | Reviews | Search | Submit ]
MOTOR MOUTH is the second comic thriller in the Alex 'Barney' Barnaby series by Janet Evanovich who is of course best known for her Stephanie Plum series. Alex is now working as a specialist mechanic and spotter for former boyfriend Sam Hooker, a NASCAR driver, which means that she observes and feeds him information during a race to let him know how the competing drivers are faring. Shortly after the final race of the season in Florida she gets a call from nerdy fellow spotter, Gobbles, who has got trapped in the large hauler of another team while trying to spy on a car suspected of contravening race rules. Alex and Sam agree they will get him out, but it's not easy, and when they do so, they find the hauler conceals another secret passenger, and this one is dead, and shrink-wrapped to boot. Helped by a couple of eccentric Cuban women they met in the first book of the series, Sam and Alex conceal the hauler and examine the suspect race cars, and also reposition the body so it can be found by the police. Confident they can dump the hauler without anyone realising it was them who had taken it, they drive it off to a car park in the night, but tiredness overcomes them and they leave an enormous clue behind. Within hours events start to spiral out of control, a string of deaths follow and both the police and the bad guys are after them. Barney is a much more resourceful character than Stephanie, and can look after herself in a fight, but she still revels in a little romantic action as she teasingly keeps the persistent Hooker waiting for a reunion. Hooker's faithful hound Beans, a St Bernard dog with an appetite for just about anything, is an enjoyable member of the cast too. MOTOR MOUTH has a couple of minor weaknesses. I found some of the electronic information a little hard to understand fully; there was very little of this, but it was central to the plot and I wasn't convinced some of it made logical sense. It didn't really affect how the story evolved, but it was bit frustrating for me, perhaps a little more, or even a little less, information would have been better. I also felt that whilst the plot was very strong throughout the book, it petered out at the very end, and whilst there was a lot of action right up to the final chapter, the epilogue left me a little unsatisfied. Nevertheless MOTOR MOUTH is happily exactly what we have come to expect from a Janet Evanovich novel; a funny page-turner, an easy to read, madcap thriller with eccentric likeable protagonists, and nasty burly bad guys.
Reviewed by Bridget Bolton, March 2007
[ Top ]
QUICK SEARCH:
Contact: Yvonne Klein (ymk@reviewingtheevidence.com)
[ About | Reviews | Search | Submit ]
[ Home ]
| 
