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Avg. Rating: 2.26
By: CheriePie
This was a really quick read, and a fairly interesting book. I was afraid it\'d be all romance with little to no mystery or intrigue, but I was pleasantly surprised. Granted, it can probably only be loosely categorized as a mystery, but probably a cozy mystery.
The main character, Billie, falls for Nick, who\'s known around town as a sexy womanizer, love \'em and leave \'em type. But in Billie, Nick finds something that he\'s been missing in his life. This story deals with his struggle as much as hers, in overcoming their hesitancy surrounding their feelings for each other. Nick, because Billie, divorced with 2 children, represents stability and a stark departure from his wild ways. While from Billie\'s perspective, Nick represents danger, and thinking back to her unfaithful husband, the kind of man who cannot be trusted. The story progresses with both characters working out their feelings toward each other, while in the background, a rash of break-ins and other goings-on are plaguing Billie\'s neighborhood (which is where the mystery part comes in). The mystery part comes to a head towards the end when the Billie is put in danger by someone she thought she could trust, and of course, Nick arrives to save the day.
In conclusion, I was happy with the way it all turned out, and though not as good as the Stephanie Plum series, I\'m interested enough to read the rest of the books in Janet Evanovich\'s Full series.
Early Evanovich with Great Characters
If you're expecting something along the lines of the Stephanie Plum mysteries, this book is not for you. Full House must be viewed on its own. It's not as action-packed as Evanovich's more recent best sellers, although there's some action and a car does in fact get blown to bits. Full House, originally published in 1989 under the pen name Steffie Hall, is obviously the same author we love so much, but in her earlier days.Nick Kaharchek has a playboy reputation, owns a newspaper and a stable, teaching polo as a hobby. He typically enjoys the company of elegant, sophisticated, well-breed women. That is, until he meets Billie Pearce, divorced mother of two, 6th grade teacher, who comes for polo lessons as part of her recent get-into-shape program. Although the attraction is unlikely for them both, it is most definitely mutual. Following this romance is dangerously fun. Full House is witty, with plenty of steamy romance. Although it's a simply story without much depth, it's Janet Evanovich's characters that keep you interested. The characters are extremely vivid, likeable and very memorable. For example, Nick's cousin Deedee, a rich, spoiled, ex-beauty queen, sweet but dim-witted. Nick cons Billie into letting Deedee stay with her for a couple weeks until her wedding to professional wrestler Frankie The Assassin. Also beware of Deedee's 16-year-old brother, Max, a young genius, animal rights activist, who likes to blow things up to get attention. There's also Nick's ex-fiance Sheridan to contend with. And Raoul, the bug-guy who tries to please everyone in the neighborhood, but isn't too good at his job. There's bugs everywhere. Keep yourself from comparing this to Evanovich's latest mysteries and you should enjoy it like I did.
Wildly disappointing
I am a BIG fan of the Stephanie Plum novels. They are such fun to read, so I decided to try other books by Ms. Evanovich, starting with Full House.The first half of the book was rather vanilla, but not intolerably so. There was little plot, the characters were uninteresting, and the viewpoint was a hodge-podge of omniscient and third person subjective which was so confusing at times, I had a hard time separating truth/fact from character opinion. For someone as well-published as Evanovich, this book was very poorly written. It reads like someone's first novel. When I learned it was one of her earlier works, I thought I could cut her some slack, but to find out this is a re-written version of it -- BLECH. She should have known enough about how to tell a story by now. This book should have been allowed to go quietly out of print. I lost interest half-way through the book, and while I am struggling to force myself through it, I don't think I'm going to make it. The dialog is boring, the characters cardboardy, and the plot has simply died. There's nowhere for them to go. The conflict has just petered out, so it's more like looking in the window of an ordinary person, watching their ordinary daily lives. Yawn. Don't waste your money. Get a Stephanie Plum novel if you want a fun read.
Sugar but no Plum
Apparently Janet Evanovich wrote romances in an earlier incarnation and this is one of them. Macho men aren't supposed to read romances but there's only one new Stephanie Plum a year and my addiction is such that I had to scrape the barrel.
As regrards plot it has the one size fits all plot derived from "Pride and Prejudice". Elizabeth Bennett is played by Billy Pearce, a divorced 38 year old mother of two. Darcy is played by Nicholas Kaharchek,a millionaire newspaper owner and polo horse trainer There are some misunderstandings between them but then in the end you'll never guess what happens.
Are there any traces of the brilliance of the One, Two, Three ...Nine series? Occasionally - there's a good scene of buying a wedding dress with a salesperson whose previous job was IRS auditor. The writing is full of cliches. On one page we have"expert hands" "Thoughts into a tailspin""utterly confused""fresh-scrubbed look""simple nature""put on airs" and a man wonders "What was the power she had over him that made him desire her." I've read that romance writers deliberately stick to stereotyped plots and use cliches so maybe it's not all JE's fault. A lot of people like romances and many art forms use conventional formulas. (And Pride and Prejudice is a great novel.}
It's interesting from the point of view of Evanovichian scholarship and I'd love to know what the input of Charlotte Hughes was and to lay my hands on an unaltered early work.
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