Product Description

Stephanie Plum, the bombshell bounty hunter from New Jersey, already has problems. Her relationship with Joe Morelli is so complicated it’s now over. Plus, her attractive, if terrifying, mentor and tormentor Ranger has decided he’s ready to collect his reward. But when Steph's mother and Grandma gang up to insist she finds their neighbour’s missing granddaughter Evelyn and her child Annie, Steph can’t refuse. Mabel Markowitz signed a custody bond guaranteeing Annie would stay in Trenton after her parents’ divorce. Now Evelyn and Annie have vanished, Mabel will lose her house to True Blue Bail Bonds Agency. But following their trail is not simple. Where have they gone? And why is a giant rabbit stalking Steph?

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #41402 in Books
• Published on: 2005-06-06
• Original language: English
• Binding: Paperback
• 352 pages

Amazon.co.uk Review
In Hard Eight, Stephanie Plum picks up a case a little nastier than anything the wisecracking bounty hunter's seen before. Evelyn Soder and her young daughter have gone on the run, leaving an angry ex-husband who's planning to collect on a child custody bond that will leave Evelyn's grandmother homeless. Stephanie's first clue that there's more to it than that comes in the form of Eddie Abruzzi: a shady local businessman who warns her to butt out of the case. Stephanie doesn't scare easily, but when Abruzzi's henchmen leave a bag of snakes on her doorknob and tarantulas in her car, she has no choice but to call Ranger, the hunky man of mystery to whom she already owes too many favours. Steph knows that Ranger will soon be calling in his debts, but with her ex-fiancé Joe Morelli out of the picture, that should be OK--shouldn't it?

In the meantime, she's got other fugitives to catch, aided by the usual band of misfits, plus a bumbling correspondence-school lawyer who's developed the hots for Stephanie's sister, Valerie. And Steph's in for a surprise from her mother, who proves she's not above wielding a dangerous weapon to save her daughter's life. Author Janet Evanovich has made a bold move in using a soupçon of child jeopardy to pull this series out of the comfortable but formulaic pattern it was threatening to fall into. It's still funny, and yes, some cars are destroyed, but now there's a real edge of darkness under the humour. Fans needn't fear, though: Jersey girl Stephanie is still full of sass and Tastykakes. --Barrie Trinkle, Amazon.com

From the Author
I ate a lot of Cheez Doodles while I was writing HARD EIGHT. I finished the book and went through on an edit and discovered my heroine Stephanie Plum couldn’t fit into her Levis. Stephanie and I aren’t the same person, of course —it’s more that we tend to have similar problems. We’ve both had a bad hair day that’s lasted about fifteen years. Not that bad hair stops us from pushing on with life’s adventures. For instance, Plum is stalked by a killer rabbit in HARD EIGHT. Her car is blown to smithereens. And there are two sexy guys who want to romance her. Not to mention she’s doing her bounty hunter thing, tracking a guy who once went at her with a chain saw. Just an average day in the world of Plum.

About the Author
Janet Evanovich now lives in New Hampshire but, like Stephanie Plum, grew up in New Jersey. She has won major crime fiction awards for her Stephanie Plum novels: ONE FOR THE MONEY was presented with the Crime Writers’ Association John Creasey Award and the Dilys Award, TWO FOR THE DOUGH won the CWA Last Laugh Award and THREE TO GET DEADLY was awarded the CWA Silver Dagger for 1997.

Customer Reviews

More page-turning fun!
The surreal adventures of Stephanie Plum are as gripping as ever. Although this book does not have the romantic cliff-hanger ending of many of the others in the series, the relationships between the zany bounty hunter and the men in her life are as complicated as ever but, to me, it is the interplay between Stephanie and the other characters (Lula, Connie, the Plum family and even the appalling Vinnie) who make the book sparkle. I look forward to the next one! Next year?? Get writing, Janet!

You won't be able to put it down!!!
Hard Eight is a great follow up to the rest of the Stephanie Plum series and will have you in hysterics! Stephanie again finds herself in the middle of a ridiculous situation as she tries to help out her next door neighbour. This time she is stalked by a large rabbit...
Before reading this book I was worried it would be a disappointment. I loved the others so much and couldn't see how Janet Evanovich could produce another original storyline but I was proved wrong. If you haven't read any of the Stephanie Plum novels yet you should definitely do so now!

Stephanie is beset by geese, spiders, snakes and a bunny
Anyone starting the Stephanie Plum series with HARD EIGHT is sure to get hooked. It's Stephanie at her wackiest.

Plum is a disaster-prone bounty hunter working for her cousin Vinnie, a bail bondsman in Trenton, NJ. In this novel, Stephanie volunteers to help out her parents' next door neighbor, Mabel, who's put up her home to guarantee a child custody bond taken out on her granddaughter, Evelyn, who had one imposed on her by the judge in a recent divorce ruling. Now, Evelyn has skipped town with her daughter, Annie, and Mabel will be tossed into the street if the missing child isn't found. But, as becomes evident in all of Stephanie's adventures, there's more to the story than is obvious. Especially after the corpse of Evelyn's aggrieved husband, Steven, is left on the couch of Plum's apartment. Steven had been sawed in half.

The imagination of author Janet Evanovich worked overtime in making HARD EIGHT perhaps one of the craziest to date. It's a nice touch that Stephanie faces off against a virtual menagerie. And she's finally beginning to take her .38, usually kept unloaded in a cookie jar, seriously. And her unfortunate association with fire-bombed vehicles reaches a record high. Notwithstanding these plot devices, however, books one to eight in the series are basically interchangeable. (I'm struggling, perhaps unsuccessfully, to keep from writing the same review over and over.)

Evanovich needs to mature her heroine, who seems to have a slow learning curve. I suggest that Plum finally marry, or at least permanently set up house, with Detective Joe Morelli. It might not be a relationship made in heaven, but it would supply grist for any number of new episodes. And Lula, Stephanie's sometime partner in her Keystone Cop takedowns, is growing tiresome, as is the fact that the author refuses to bring Stephanie's Dad more into the limelight.

Mind you, I'm still finding the Plum novels immensely enjoyable in a mindless sort of way. But even the best of a good thing, like a premium chocolate chip cookie, begins to get stale after awhile. Perhaps I've read too many in too short a time, and should alternate with the likes of WAR AND PEACE and the works of Plato.