Janet Evanovich

“This cigarette tastes like ass," she said. I wasn't sure what ass tasted like, but she looked like she would know, so I was willing to take her word for it.”

“I was completely out of clean clothes. That meant I could be a slut and sleep naked , or I could be a slob and sleep in what I was wearing. Truth is, I'm not entirely comfortable sleeping naked. I do it from time to time, but I worry that God might be watching or that my mother might find out, and I'm pretty sure they both think nice girls should wear pyjamas to bed.”

“Bucky's garage was a two-bay cinder block structure that sat like an island in a sea of cars. New cars, old cars, smashed cars, rusted cars, cars that had signed on for the vital organ program,”

“I shuddered at the mention of Mrs. Steiger."What's that about?" Ranger asked."Mrs. Steiger is the Antichrist.""Damn," Ranger said. "I left my Antichrist gun at home.""Looks like you brought everything else.""Never know when you'll need some tear gas.""If we have to gas Mrs. Steiger, it"ll ruin my chances of being Miss Burg in the Mayflower parade.”

“Trenton cops wore more hats than I could name. They were arbitrators, social workers, peacekeepers, baby-sitters and law enforcers. The job was boring, terrifying, disgusting, exhausting and often made no sense at all. The pay was abysmal, the hours inhuman, the department budget was a joke, the uniforms were short in the crotch. And year after year, the Trenton cops held the city together.”

“Morelli was wearing a blazer over a black knit shirt, He took a seat, and his jacket swung wide, exposing the gun at his hip."Nice piece!" Grandma said. "What is it? Is that a forty-five?""It's a nine- millimeter.""Don't suppose you'd let me see it," Grandma said. "I'd sure like to get the feel of a gun like that.""No!" said everyone in unison."I shot a chicken once," Grandma explained to Morelli. "It was an accident.""Where did you shoot it?" he finally asked."In the gumpy," Grandma said. "Shot it clear off.”

“God bless YouTube,” Lula said. “You don’t even need to go to college no more because you could learn how to do everything on YouTube.”

“I want to be there when you get Cubbin. And I don’t want to be left out of the television show either. Little people are sexy now. Have you seen Game of Thrones? We’re hot.”

“There are four ways to manage stress. There's drugs, there's alcohol, there's sex, and there's doughnuts. I go with sex and doughnuts. I tried the other two and it wasn't any good. You being in a dry spell, you might have to rely on doughnuts.”

“You know what your problem is? You got too many scruples. One or two is okay, but you get too many of them, and it clogs everything up."What she said made no sense at all, but was probably right."I got some scruples," Lula said, "but I know when to stop. There's a point where you have to say enough is enough and screw scruples.”

“I don't want a new man.""I'll be dead someday," my mother said. "And then what? You'll wish you had someone.""I have a hamster.”

“I'm done with men. I have a hamster. That's all I need.”

“Sounds to me like you're talkin' about the wrong things. Why don't you talk about other things? Like you could make a list of things you won't fight over and then you only talk about those things.”

“Thank God for small favors.”

“I'm underrealized," Lula said. "I gotta lot of untapped potential. Yesterday my horoscope said I gotta expand my horizons." "You expand any more in that dress, and you'll get yourself arrested," Connie said. -- Twelve Sharp”

“I'd hate to list our specialties. Wreck cars, eat doughnuts, create mayhem.”

“My mother had been slicing up the chicken. She took a drumstick and dropped it on the floor. She kicked it around a little, picked it up and put it on the edge of the plate."There," she said, "we'll give him this drumstick.""Deal.”

“Mary Lou et moi, on est amies depuis qu’on est toutes petites. J’étais le boute-en-train de service, et elle, le cancre de la classe. « Cancre » n’est peut-être pas le mot juste. Disons que ses objectifs n’étaient pas très hauts. Elle voulait se marier et fonder une famille. Et si elle pouvait épouser le capitaine d’une équipe de foot, c’était encore mieux. [...]Moi, à la même époque, je rêvais d’épouser Aladin pour qu’il m’emmène sur son tapis volant. Donc, vous voyez : on n’avait pas les mêmes valeurs.”

“Ranger removed my goggles "Would you like to come home with me?" I stepped away from him. "Thank you for the offer, but no. I'm done with men."Ranger smiled. "Forever?""Until I figure some things out.""And if you don't figure them out?""If I can't figure them out on my own, I'll ask you to help me.""Babe, that's like the blind leading the blind.”

“That shooting gave me an appetite," she said. "Somebody passme the potatoes."Grandma Mazur”

“You never want to look in a mirror," Lula said. "Men love mirrors. They look at themselves doing the deed and they see Rex the Wonder Horse. Women look at themselves and think they need to renew their membership at the gym.”

“As Stephanie and Lula were going after the bad guys, Lula was making preparations from the trunk of her Firebird. Stephanie looked inside and stopped breathing for a beat. "That's a rocket launcher!" "Yep," Lula said. "It's a big boy. I got it at a yard sale in the projects.”

“Connie, giving her thoughts on why Vinnie's hot temper is less than normal, says: "Lucille must have fed him a Vallium smoothie this morning.”

“When Grandma Mazur is talking about the reason for the improved play of her 91-year-old bowling teammate, she said: "She's doing better now that we got her the longer tubing to her oxygen tank.”

“Lucille must have fed him a Vallium smoothie this morning.”

“I felt my cell phone buzz, and I looked at the screen. Ranger. “Your GPS just went blank,” Ranger said when I answered. “The car exploded.” There was a beat of silence. “Rafael won the pool,” Ranger said. “Are you okay?” “Yes.” “I’ll send someone.”

“The kid pulled a Buck knife out of his pants pocket. "How about giving me your purse, bitch?" Sally hiked up his skirt, reached into his briefs and pulled out a Glock. "How about using that knife to slice off your balls?" Lula whipped a gun out of her red satin purse and Grandma hauled out her .45 long-barrel. "Day my make, punk," Grandma said. "Hey, I don't want any trouble," the kid said. "We were just having some fun." "I want to shoot him," Sally said. "Nobody'll tell, right?" "No fair," Lula said. "I want to shoot him." "Okay," Grandma said. "On the count of three, we'll all shoot him.”

“Mrs. Zuppa was coming in from bingo just as I was leaving the building. "Looks like you're going to work," she said, leaning heavily on her cane. "What are you packin'?" "A thirty-eight.""I like a nine-millimeter myself." "A nine's good." "Easier to use a semiautomatic after you've had hip replacement and you walk with a cane," she said. One of those useful pieces of information to file away and resurrect when I turn eighty-three.”

“I always know it's Sunday because I wake up feeling apologetic. That's one of the cool things about being a Catholic . . . it's a multifaceted experience. If you lose the faith, chances are you'll keep the guilt, so it isn't as if you've been skunked altogether.”

“Mr. Landowsky was eighty-two and somehow his chest had shrunk over the years, and now he was forced to hike his pants up under his armpits. "Oi," he said. "This heat! I can't breathe. Somebody should do something."I assumed he was talking about God. "That weatherman on the morning news. He should be shot. How can I go out in weather like this? And then when it gets so hot they keep the supermarkets too cold. Hot, cold. Hot, cold. It gives me the runs." I was glad I owned a gun, because when I got as old as Mr. Landowsky I was going to eat a bullet. The first time I got the runs in the supermarket, that was it. BANG! It would all be over.”

“I've never been in this part of Trenton before. I don't feel comfortable driving around buildings that haven't got gang slogans sprayed on them. Look at this place. No boarded-up windows. No garbage in the gutter. No brothers selling goods on the street. Don't know how people can live like this.”

“We gotta be professional about this," Lula said, aiming us toward Route 1. "We need a plan. How about we get the nail polish first, then we get the guy?”

“I rooted through my pocketbook and did a fast paraphernalia inventory. I was carrying defense spray, which was a big no-no in a crowded mall. And I carried a stun gun, which on close examination turned out to need a new battery. My two pairs of cuffs were in working order, and I had an almost full can of hair spray. Okay, probably I wasn't the world's best-equipped bounty hunter. But then what did I really need to bring in an old guy with a nose that looked like a penis and a loser hot dog vendor?”

“I exchanged my flannel shirt for a Rangers jersey and zapped the television on. Probably I should make more phone calls, but the Rangers were playing and priorities were priorities.”

“There are some men who enter a woman's life and screw it up forever.”

“My body is not designed to run. My body was designed to sit in an expensive care and drive.”

“You have no spirit of culinary adventure. You need to be more like that snarky guy on the Travel Channel. He goes all over the world eating kangaroo a**holes and snail throw-up. He'd eat anything. He don't care how sick he gets. He's another one of my role models, except he needs ironing.”

“Bitch.""Slut.""Whore.""Cunt."I kicked Joyce in the shin. I draw the line at cunt.”

“Life is about survival of the fittest, and Jersey is producing the master race.”

“He had a body like batman”

“I rolled my eyes so far into the top of my head I almost fell over backward.”

“Ranger plays by his own set of rules, and I don't have a complete copy.”

“I’ll be real discreet,” Tank said. As discreet as a six-foot-six, no-neck guy weighing three hundred and fifty pounds, all dressed in black SWAT clothes, with a Glock holstered at his side could be.”

“Stephanie Plum, psycho bait.”

“I disconnected and made a mental note not to call Tank unless I was bleeding profusely, and he was the only other person on earth.”

“Now that we know you're not a hundred percent vampire you should stop trying to suck necks," I said to Ziggy."I'll try," Ziggy said, "but it's a hard habit to break.”

“I smell vampire" -Lula"You're a Nut" -Stephine"Well I smell something." -Lula"Mold." -Stephine"Yeah. I smell moldy vampire" -Lula”

“What's with the super soaker?" -Stephine"I had a stork of genius when you called me this morning I said what do I have to do to protect myself from the vampire? And the answer that came to me was holy water! I don't know why I didn't think of this sooner." -Lula"You have the Super Soaker filled with holy water?" -Stephine"Yeah I sucked it out of the church. You know that birdbath thing they got right up front?" -Lula"THe baptismal font?" -Stephine"That's it. They got it filled with holy water, free for the taking." -Lula"Brilliant." -Stephine”

“Opening my door to Dillon Ruddick, my bulding super. I handed him a cup of coffee. "Sorry about the blood." "What was it this time?" No one reported gunfire.""I hit a guy in the face with a hair dryer.""Whoa." Dillon said."It wasn't my fault," I told him."Maybe we should lay down some linoleum here. It would make things easier for clean up.”

“...life is a jelly donut. You don't really know what it's about till you bite into it. And then, just when you decide it's good, you drop a big glob of jelly on your best t-shirt.”