17 Carnations; Dirty Thirty

I've been wanting to read this one for a little while now. Morton talked about how Wallis Simpson was entangled with German Foreign Minister von Ribbentrop (the 17 carnations he sent regularly supposedly signified how many times they had slept together). The book also delved into the sheer selfishness of the Duke of Windsor--complaining about his house in Bermuda, demanding more money and respect for his wife, sending a maid to go into a Nazi occupied area to rescue their sheets, etc. He was bugging Winston Churchill and his brother, George VI, over petty nonsense while they were busy fighting a war. 

After the war ended, documents were uncovered, showing the Duke's duplicity and the German's plan to install him as a puppet king and rule England through him. I don't think the Duke and Duchess were deliberately evil, just incredibly oblivious and naïve. 

Still trying to figure out how Evanovich has been writing these for 30 years now. This one was pretty good. 

Morelli has to go out of town to testify in a case and leaves his big dog, Bob, with Stephanie. Stephanie is trying to track down Andy Manley, who worked as a security guard at Plover's jewelry store. The store was robbed one night by Andy's friend Duncan, and the next day Plover discovered jewels from the safe were missing and blamed Andy and fired him. Stephanie has to have Ranger's help (awesome). There was also a fun scene where her mom and Grandma Mazur go with her on a stakeout (Stephanie's car gets wrecked and she can't go on a stakeout in Big Blue, and Stephanie's mom won't let her drive her car) and her mom ends up really getting into chasing Andy and takes the side mirrors off in a tight alley. It was pretty funny. 

Best part: Ranger PROPOSED. Like seriously proposed. Then Morelli comes home and *he* proposes. Wowza.