Keeper's Book Reviews: Review: Crazy for You by Juliet Rosetti

In the tradition of Janet Evanovich and Susan Elizabeth Phillips, Juliet Rosetti ups the ante in her laugh-out-loud funny Escape Diaries series, as Mazie Maguire must use any means necessary to keep her main squeeze out of the slammer.

Once you escape from prison and ride off into the sunset with the gorgeous guy who helped you nail a killer, you live happily ever after, right? Well, not exactly—not if you’re Mazie Maguire, and the flow chart of your life looks like a pinball machine. Mazie has broken up with her guy, Ben Labeck, she can’t pay her rent, her car is infested with mice, and she’s working at a coffee shop where the dress code is teddies, thongs, and toe-cleavage heels. Now Ben is the chief suspect in a murder investigation, and Mazie’s tapping into her fugitive wiles to keep him out of jail. Strictly as friends, she vows. No kissing, no touching, no romance. But how is Mazie supposed to keep her thoughts platonic when her “buddy” is giving her erotic back rubs, and a make-believe-we’re-newlyweds charade puts her in the mood for a wedding night?

~A copy was received from Loveswept for review~

When I first saw the synopsis for this and it said that it was similar to Janet Evanovich's writing, I in no way believed it. After reading, though the writing styles weren't exactly the same, they were uncannily similar, as were the plots. However, this story focused more on the romance while Janet splits both the romance and plot pretty evenly, at least, she does in her One for the Money series. This novel is actually the second in a series, though it isn't specified on Goodreads. I knew I had to read this book, and though I tried to wait for the first book to get to me before reading this one, I failed and ended up finishing this the same night I started it. Luckily, Crazy for You can act as a stand-alone since everything the reader needs to know to read and enjoy this book is contained within.

The romance is what mainly made up the story since the beginning, but even then, it's hard to specify whether the love or the mystery was more abundant. The novel stays away from details and while I was reading, it was just a whirlwind of events that I probably won't remember in a few days. Though the mystery is reminiscent of Janet again, what caught and kept my attention was the romantic tension between Ben and Mazie. Ben was a purely original creation of Juliet's that for once, didn't have me thinking of Evanovich. He was strong and kind and really wanted to take care of and protect Mazie, something she hated. The romanticness (I know...not a word) was only amped up by the fact that Mazie hadn't seen Ben in about 6 weeks, and that was after a huge fight. Mazie, on the other hand, was a slightly more boring version of Stephanie from, you guessed it, One for the Money. She worked in a restaurant where the waitresses dressed up in corsets, super short skirts, and fuck-me pumps. Anyone thinking of Lula from OftM? And then there's the fact that Mazie's ex-boss was a sex-o-holic, kind of like Vinnie from...well, you know. But besides all those similarities, Mazie was a cute character who had some of her own independent aspects - like playing paintball - that I really liked.

Though the mystery was a unique one, once I learned the basic aspects of the mystery and got to know the main suspects, it was easy to guess (correctly!) who the "bad guy" was. That didn't take away from the appeal of the book though, and it only made me more interested to see how villain would reveal himself to the girl who trusted and was enamored with him. I didn't really get what Mazie saw in the guy, but I guess she was a bit crazy in the head. It was kind of obvious he'd be the type of guy to put people's heads in a refrigerator, not that he did that; he just had that psycho killer vibe to him that for some reason, the main character never picked up on until the end.

The prologue goes along with the very end of the story, and I think that at least one of its purposes was to give the reader a hint of the revelation at the end of the novel. Unfortunately, I completely forgot about my suspicions that Ben was younger than Mazie, and was none too pleased at the fact that I was right, even if the age difference was only by a few months. That was the most disappointing part of the story for me, and if that doesn't matter to you, then there's not much else wrong with this book.

I'd recommend Crazy for You to Janet Evanovich fans as well as any romance/mystery-lover looking for a quick, pleasing read. When looking back, the novel wasn't great, but neither was it even remotely bad. I can still remember how happy I felt while reading the book. Going off on a tangent, I want to mention the feeling I have that this would be a great book to read during the holidays. I don't know why, it may not even be true, but that's just a hunch I have. Who knows, maybe I'm psychic.