One for the Money (Stephanie Plum, #1)

by Janet Evanovich

Dear Reader,

They say write what you know. My first published works were romance novels. Obviously, I don’t know a whole lot about that subject since I almost immediately ran out of whoopee positions. So, I left the romance genre for crime. Problem was I didn’t know anything about crime, either. I’ve never been in law enforcement, criminal law or robbed a bank. I was a mom and a really crappy employee at any number of really crappy jobs. Then I saw the movie Midnight Run and realized the main qualification needed for being a bounty hunter was lying. That seemed like a skill I could embrace, and Stephanie Plum was born. I gave her all the things I knew. Things like being fired from your job. Not having money. Driving around in an embarrassing car. And together, Stephanie and I learned how to do the job of bringing in failure to appears. I’ve never actually brought in an FTA, but I did interview bounty hunters (they were more than happy to talk for a free lunch) and toured the Trenton Police Department (they gave me a hat and a fake badge and the cops were awesome). I cruised the streets of The Burg, a neighborhood I was already familiar with. I ate fresh filled cannoli, homemade tomato pies and vodka rigatoni. While it’s been many years since ONE FOR THE MONEY was published, and some things are definitely dated and time-warpish, I’d like to think the essence of Stephanie Plum remains timeless. She’s a survivor, a devoted daughter and an everyday hero in small ways. If Stephanie Plum can make it through her day, so can you. Of course, it would be a lot easier to get through the day if we all had a Joe Morelli and Ranger in our lives to look forward to, but that’s what books are for. Happy reading!

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

When I first wrote ONE FOR THE MONEY, Joe Morelli was what people in the romance novel industry called a bad-boy hero. A guy who plays by his own rules. He isn’t a bad person, but he’s a hundred percent trouble. He’s also smoking hot and a guaranteed good time. It’s a sure bet that self-control and good reasoning will go right out the window the second you see him. I’m not sure why the world loves bad-boy heroes so much, but we do. Han Solo, Wolverine and Bender from The Breakfast Club (remember him?). Even Ranger is a bad-boy hero. Whatever the appeal of the bad-boy, it seems timeless.

The clock on the dash told me I was seven minutes late, and the urge to scream told me I was home.

This is probably a pretty universal reaction to visiting your parents once you’ve moved out. It has nothing to do with how much you love them, miss them or enjoy their company. It has everything to do with knowing that you aren’t leaving the house without the leftover ham and who knows what else. It’s knowing that whatever personal hell you have going on, it will be the first question out of your mother’s mouth. My parents were pros at these things, and somewhere along the line the torch was passed. It’s like a superpower awoke in me. I now have the pleasure of seeing my own adult kids sitting in the car, fearing leftovers and questions about when I’m getting more grandkids.

The way I see it, living in New Jersey is a challenge, what with the toxic waste and the eighteen-wheelers and the armed schizophrenics. I mean, what’s one more lunatic shooting at you?”

The Plum series is all about attitude and point of view. The world is a crazy place and life can be ugly. It’s important to take a couple steps to the side, reevaluate, find a positive attitude and say, “meh. I got this. It could be worse.” I like to think people from Jersey have the laugh-through-life attitude in spades. Because if you can’t laugh off armed crazies and emphysema from the smog you’re going to have to move to a new state. And that means you’ll have to pump your own gas and give up soft serve frozen custard.

I shot that sucker right in the gumpy.”

I get asked a lot about Grandma Mazur, and if she is based on anyone I know. Grandma Mazur is a combination of my Aunt Lena and Grandma Fanny. When I was a little girl, growing up in South River, NJ, there wasn’t a lot to do for entertainment. It wasn’t exactly a country club town. So, my Aunt Lena and her lady friends would get together every week at our house and go through the obits. If there wasn’t anyone they knew being laid out, they would hope for someone high up in the Elks club or one of the other fraternal orders. That would always guarantee a large turnout, ceremonial attire and an excellent selection of cookies. My Grandma Fanny was a force to be reckoned with. She wore high heeled shoes to her dying day, her purse in the crook of her arm and walked everywhere. Every other week she would visit the salon and get a rinse in her white hair. Sometimes it would be pink. Sometimes apricot or blue. Fanny had a real zest for life. The scene of Grandma Mazur shooting the roast chicken in the gumpy was inspired by what is probably the only tradition in my family… the giving of the gumpy. Every year some lucky person shows up at the Thanksgiving dinner table to have a turkey gumpy on their plate. Over the years the tradition has progressed. One year my sister received the gumpy on Thanksgiving, took it home and froze it. A month later she put it in a box filled with popcorn, wrapped it up and gave it to my son for Christmas. The giving of the gumpy started with my grandparents and I suspect will continue for generations to come. There’s nothing like a good gumpy.

In my opinion, the only good spider is a dead spider, and woman’s rights aren’t worth dick if they mean I can’t ask a man to do my bug squashing.

Am I right or am I right? I’m all for equal rights, but there is something nice about chivalry. It goes both ways. Men holding doors for women, and women giving men the first dibs on the extra porkchop at dinner. It’s these small, established acts of kindness that help keep society civilized and people feeling good about themselves and each other.

I wasn’t much good with a gun, but I was bitchin’ with an aerosol can.

When I first started writing ONE FOR THE MONEY I went to a gun range, took a class and tried firing a gun. I figured it was important that I knew what the experience was like, so I could write about it. I hated it. Scared the crap out of me. I realized that even if I had a gun on me, it would never occur to me to use it if I had to. I’d beat the bejeezus out of my assailant with my purse, first. It would probably be pretty effective since the gun in it would be hard and heavy. Whenever I write about Stephanie in a situation, I always ask myself what would I do? Hopefully that’s one of the reasons the Plum series has been so popular. I’m not the only woman out there who would sooner beat someone up with her handbag, and it helps make Stephanie identifiable and human.

Burg Catholicism was a convenient religion. When the mind boggled, there was always God, waiting in the wings to take the rap.

As a kid, I was one of a handful of Presbyterians of Danish descent in my town. Most of the rest of the town consisted of eastern European Catholics. So, I became a Catholic by association. I like that when things go unexplainable, God is there, ready to take the blame. It’s like he’s the ultimate parent. Happy to bear the burden of “why is this happening” and then stand by your side while you struggle through.

“I’m telling you, it’s fucking hard to be classy,” she said.

This came out of Connie’s mouth in ONE FOR THE MONEY, but it was me talking. I remember being at a mass book signing about a hundred years ago. Sandra Brown was there, and she was the perfect beautiful, cultured Texas lady. Perfect hair, perfect makeup, perfect slim figure in a perfect Chanel suit. She smiled at every reader and said something lovely while she signed their book. I was two tables away. I was wearing Doc Martins and jeans that were too small. My red thong was sticking out of the back of my jeans, barely covering my butt crack. I was trying hard to channel Sandra Brown but all I could think about was that I’d kill for a margarita.

I had an alarm, I had nerve gas, I had a yogurt. What more could anyone want?

I look back on this and I can’t believe I wrote it. Stephanie Plum eating yogurt. What the heck was I thinking? I wrote this in 1993. It must have been during the six months of my life that I was trying to be healthy.

I wasn’t sure exactly how prostitutes determined price, but if men bought hookers by the pound, these two would be doing okay.

I think the world would be a better place if we all got paid by the pound. My skinny grandson would be in trouble, but I’d eat my way to FORTUNE AND GLORY. (Notice that this is a sneaky way to get my new book title into the discussion. A girl’s gotta do what a girl’s gotta do.) https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/49779612-fortune-and-glory

My body was not designed to run. My body was designed to sit in an expensive car and drive.

Like Janet, like Stephanie. The only reason the car has to be expensive is because I have plenty of experience owning excessively cheap cars. In the end, you have to get out and push. And that feels a lot like exercise. Don’t get me wrong. I’m all for getting the heart rate up. I just prefer it to not involve sweating, and for the finish line to be at a breakfast buffet.

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

It’s hard to believe that Stephanie Plum is now on her twenty-seventh adventure. I’ve been blessed as a writer to have been able to immerse myself in her world for all of these years. If this is the first Plum novel you’ve read, please don’t feel like you need to read books two through twenty-six in order. I work hard to make each story stand on its own. You can go straight to FORTUNE AND GLORY/TANTALIZING TWENTY-SEVEN and not feel lost. Yes, some of the characters have changed a bit over the years, but they are still tried and true friends.