Janet Evanovich

“Stephanie, I'm begging you. Eat some doughnuts. I can't keep going like this." - Morelli”

“Last time you called me late at night you were naked and chained to your shower curtain rod. I hope this isn't going to be disappointing.”

“A uniform cordoned off the area with crime scene tape. The M.E. pulled in and parked. There were two EMT trucks idling at the edge of the lot. I’d stayed close to the back door, and one of the Rangeman guys had taken a position two feet from me, standing at parade rest. No doubt in my mind he’d take a bullet for me rather than face Ranger over a dead Stephanie.”

“I was on my back, looking up at Morelli through cobwebs, and my first thought was that the 7-Eleven victim had exacted revenge on me, and I’d been stun gunned. The cobwebs cleared, and I discounted stun gunning.“What happened?” I asked Morelli.“You fainted.”“That’s ridiculous.”“I agree, but if someone sent me a dead woman I might faint, too.” He was down on one knee, bending over me. “Are you ready to get up?”“I need a moment.”“Don’t take too long. People will think I’m proposing.”

“Are you telling me your brain and your lady parts decided on a love fest bake-off winner?”

“I'd do the lifting, but I just got a manicure. And I notice you don't have a manicure at all. Only thing noticeable about your hands is the missing tan on your ring finger that I don't care about. -Lula”

“I don't know if it's a good idea to give a woman a box of bullets when she's got a pimple.”

“It's the twenty-first century." I told Tank. "Women drive.""Only in my bed," Tank said. "Never in my car.”

“Cracker Jacks don't count as junk food because they're corn and peanuts, which we know to be high in nutrition. And they have a prize inside.”

“DeAngelo blew up my bus, so I filled his car with shit. Genius, right?""DeAngelo didn't blow up the bus," Connie said. "I just got the report from the fire marshal. The coffeemaker shorted out and started the fire."Some of the color left Vinnie's face. "Say what?""Oh man," Lula said. "DeAngelo is gonna be pissed. Least he won't know who did it.""I left a note," Vinnie said.Lula gave a hoot of laughter and fell off her chair.”

“Yeah, but I want to take a look at your little peashooter. It's kinda cute.""It's a gun," Brenda said.Lula pulled her Glock out of her bag and aimed it at Brenda. "Bitch, this is a gun. It could put a hole in you big enough to drive a truck through.”

“[Stephanie Plum]Jeez. No True Love"[Grandma Mazur] There's always been true love, but in my day, you either talked yourself into thinking you had it, or you talked yourself into thinking you didn't need it.”

“I don't need shoes. I need a night scope. You think they sell night scopes someplace here?”

“In spite of all the sparring that went on between us, I sort of liked Morelli. Good judgment told me to stand clear of him, but then I've never been a slave to good judgment.”

“...I blink back the threat of tears, swiped at my nose and narrowed my eyes. "Listen to me, you two bags of monkey shit, "I yelled. "I am not in a good mood. My car keeps stalling. The day before yesterday I threw up on Joe Morelli. I was called a fat cow by my ex-husband. And if that isn't enough...my hair is ORANGE! ORANGE, FOR CHRISSAKE! And now you have the gall to force yourself into my home and threaten my hamster. Well, you have gone too far. You have crossed the line!”

“Bitch, this is a gun...”

“Wouldn't want to tarnish my image by looking like a good guy.”

“Next time I fall in love it's going to be with someone who isn't an expert in fibbing.""You're in love with me?""You didn't know that?""I did, but it's nice to hear.""Scares the hell out of me.”

“We're not going to die. You're with me kiddo and it just happens I know a few survival skills." "Oh yeah right. Like carrying your Visa Gold in case the restaurant doesn't accept American Express.”

“I buy wine according to the bottle design. After I get down the first glass it all tastes okay to me so I figure you go for something classy to look at on the table”

“I don't think his elevator went all the way to the top anymore, if you know what I mean”

“I don't believe this," Morelli yelled. "I don't fucking believe this. What do you do, sit in bed at night and think about ways to fuck up my life?”

“You have the Super Soaker filled with holy water?”“Yeah. I sucked it out of the church. You know that bird-bath thing they got right up front?”“The baptismal font?”“That’s it. They got it filled with holy water, free for the taking.”“Brilliant,” I said to Lula.She tapped her head with her finger. “No grass growin’ here.”

“That’s nice of you, but it’s not necessary to loan me a car.”“I loan you cars all the time.”“And I almost always destroy them or lose them. I have terrible luck with cars.” “Working at Rangeman is a high-stress job, and you’re one of our few sources of comic relief. I give you a car and my men start a pool on how long it will take you to trash it. You’re a line item in my budget under entertainment.”

“I can’t cut back. I’ve turned into a sex addict. I get within a foot of Ranger or Morelli and I’m ready to go … and go, and go, and go, and go.”“That’s a lot of going. I’m a retired professional, and it’d be a lot of going even for me. What you need are granny panties. You put on a big ol’ pair of ugly granny panties and you won’t be dropping your drawers no more. And even if you forget in the heat of the moment, and you pull your skirt up over your head, you’re not gonna see no action on account granny panties have a deflating effect on a man. Your man’s gonna be going unh ah, no way am I getting busy with a woman wearing granny panties.”

“Lula hauled herself up off the floor and put her hand to her neck. “Do I got holes? Am I bleeding? Do I look like I’m turning into a vampire?”“No, no, and no,” I told her. “He doesn’t have his teeth in. He was just gumming you.”“That’s disgustin’,” Lula said. “I been gummed by a old vampire. I feel gross. My neck’s all wet. What’s on my neck?”I squinted over at Lula. “Looks like a hickey.”“Are you shitting me? This worthless bag of bones gave me a hickey?” Lula pulled a mirror out of her purse and checked her neck out. “I’m not happy,” Lula said. “First off I don’t know if I got vampire cooties from this. And second, how am I gonna explain a hickey to my date tonight”

“It wasn't exactly that Lula was fat. It was more that she was too short for her weight." - Stephanie Plum”

“If you buy chocolate with loose change the calories don’t count.”

“Any intelligent woman would have made a dignified retreat, but this was New Jersey, where dignity always runs a poor second to the pleasure of getting in someone's face.”

“No Ranger in sight. That's because he's in the wind. You can't see the wind. Or maybe the wind went home to watch Tuesday night fights.”

“That’s how you tell what a man’s really made of. It’s one thing for a man to be big and brave and kill a spider. Any man could do that. Trailin’ after a woman when she’s shopping for thongs and push-up bras is a whole other category of man. And then if you want to see how far you can go with it, you ask him to carry one of those little pink bags they give you.”

“Think of this as an adventure, Diesel said.I’m from Jersey. I get my adventure on the Turnpike.”

“Cripes, I can’t keep up on this political correct shit. I don’t even know what to call myself. One minute I’m black. Then I’m African American. Then I’m a person of color. Who the hell makes these rules up, anyhow?”

“I wasn’t sure anymore what made a good marriage. There had to be love, of course, but there were so many different kinds of love. And clearly, some love was more enduring than others.”

“In my father’s scheme of things, there were Italians and then there was the rest of the world.”

“My Spanish is limited to burrito and taco,”

“I failed math twice, never fully grasping probability theory. I mean, first off, who cares if you pick a black ball or a white ball out of the bag? And second, if you’re bent over about the color, don’t leave it to chance. Look in the damn bag and pick the color you want.”

“Tastykakes are just another of the many advantages of living in Jersey. They’re made in Philly and shipped to Trenton in all their fresh squishiness. I read once that 439,000 Butterscotch Krimpets are baked every day. And not a heck of a lot of them find their way to New Hampshire. All that snow and scenery and what good does it do you without Tastykakes?”

“Almost everybody I know has died,” Grandma said. “Bunch of wimps.”

“I wasn’t a fabulous cook. I didn’t have a boyfriend, much less a husband. And I wasn’t a big financial success. I could live with all those failings as long as I knew that once in a while I looked really hot.”

“Stop the planet. I want to get off.”

“No one expected a first year engineering student to build the perfect bridge.”

“I was going to go to church, but I decided to get doughnuts instead.”

“Thats what her cars do," Lula said. "They explode. But I gotta tell you this was the best. This here's the first time she exploded a garbage truck. One time her truck got hit with an antitank missile. That wasn't bad either, but it couldn't compare to this.”

“Cooking wasn’t so bad, I thought. In fact, it was a lot like sex. Sometimes it didn’t seem like such a good idea in the beginning, but then after you got into it …”

“Stephanie: “I have a list of Kenny's friends. I'm going to run through it.”Morelli: “Where'd you get this list?” Stephanie: “Privileged information.”Morelli: “You broke into his apartment and stole his little black book.”Stephanie: “I didn't steal it. I copied it.”Morelli: “I don't want to here any of this. You're not carrying concealed, are you?”Stephanie: “Who, me?”Morelli: “Shit, I must be crazy to work with you”

“I figured I'd embellish the truth a little, since the police might not be up on the finer points of bounty hunterism and might not understand about commandeering.”

“Throwing up is not a group activity”

“I got out of the elevator and confronted Mr. Wexler. “Killing is wrong.” “We kill chickens,” Mr. Wexler said. “We kill cows. We kill trees. So big deal, we kill some drug dealers.”It was hard to argue with that kind of logic because I like cows and chickens and trees much better than drug dealers.”

“When something needs to be ironed I put it in the ironing basket. If a year goes by and the item is still in the basket I throw the item away. This is a good system since eventually I end up only with clothes that don’t need ironing.”