"Tiffany"? "Stephanie"? Is this FanFic that got published?
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Author: A. R. Winters
Title: Innocent in Las Vegas Genre: bumbling chick private eye In case you hadn’t noticed, the bottom’s dropped out of the cupcake market. It seems that every self-described entrepreneur in America jumped on that particular bandwagon, and a cupcake shop sprang up next door to damned near every Starbucks in America. Some “entrepreneurs” are just plain derivative. Speaking of “derivative,” I just read a “cupcakes and crime caper” called Innocent in Las Vegas – the first in a series of self-deprecating crime novels featuring casino dealer and rookie private eye Tiffany Black, of Las Vegas. My goodness, this seemed familiar… Tiffany’s first case is for a high-school classmate, Sophia. The gorgeous blonde parlayed long legs and big tits into a job as a stripper, which she then parlayed into the position of trophy wife of a casino owner. Her husband’s dead now, however, and the smoking gun was found in Sophia’s nightstand (wiped clean of prints, natch). Lazy-ass slackers that they are, the cops stopped looking immediately. Sophia’s stuck in that big ol’ mansion of hers with a tracking bracelet around one shapely ankle, and no “real” detective will take the case. Of course, the newbie PI – whose chief skill seems to be eating dessert – quickly finds herself in mortal danger, apparently because she stuck her nose where it doesn’t belong. As a result, Sophia foots the bill for a security service, in the person of the mononymic hottie Stone. Tiffany’s family – marriage-obsessed mother, taciturn father and goofy grandmother – are convinced she’s doing the horizontal bop with Stone, but she isn’t. She’s just hiding from bad guys and solving a murder. The plot of Innocent in Las Vegas, a first novel by A. R. Winters, is at best pedestrian. Black simply solves her mystery through deus ex machina between episodes of munching on cupcakes and cobbler, without benefit of clues or deduction. The mystery then shifts briefly into a second crime, the circumstances of which are exceedingly difficult to swallow. This is crime fiction as written by a rank amateur. What’s worse is that the characters are so familiar that it feels like fan fiction posted at a site worshipping Janet Evanovich’s Stephanie Plum series. Mom’s the same, Dad’s the same, Grandma’s just as wacky, even “Stone” is just Ranger with a different wardrobe – right down to living on the top floor of the building where his security firm is based. The only difference seems to be a lack of Morelli (though Tiffany meets a hunky cop named “Nick” near the end) and the setting in Las Vegas. It's not enough to pay homage to Stephanie Plum, though, Winters also has to shoehorn in a neighbor who's a retired pastry chef (Henry? Kinsey Millhone's landlord? anyone?). Speaking of the setting, Winters must’ve burned up google earth writing this. Though there are no superfluous U’s in “color” and “neighbor,” it was evident early on from the writing that the author doesn’t live in the States. The clues were little things like hyphenation of “no-one,” the use of “holiday” instead of “vacation,” and oddball slang like “hoons.” It turns out Winters lives in Melbourne, Oz. Nothing wrong with that, I don’t suppose, though it does make some of the action a little weird – confidential to A.R., Pahrump Valley is a lot more than “a few minutes’ drive” from Vegas; it’s halfway to Death Valley. Derivative of the Plum series, sloppily plotted and just plain weird in places, Innocent in Las Vegas was everything I expected of a book with almost 550 five-star reviews at Amazon.com: a solid two stars. all content copyright © 2001-present by scmrak
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