Recently, I was on vacation and there were three Janet Evanovich books on the bookshelf where we stayed. I thought that the perfect opportunity to find out what Stephanie Plum is all about. It only took me to page 3 of Three to Get Deadly to see how far fetched the story line would be; but entertaining just the same.

My first suprise was that Stephanie Plum is a bounty hunter, rather than a bail bondsman. Not sure why this was such a surprise, people are constantly confusing me for a bounty hunter. I also found it interesting that although I was reading the third in the series, Stephanie had only been a bounty hunter for five months.

I think it was the background information about the bail industry that primarily ran counter to my experience.  For example, Stephanie tells us that bondsmen “loaned people money to post the bond.” As bondsmen, we don’t lend money at all. We charge a fee and put up a paper bond, which is a guarantee to the court that the defendant will show up for all required court dates. A bail bond is a “surety bond”.

The other part of the background that struck me is that Stephanie indicates that the bondsman charged 15% of the full bond amount as a fee to the client; as a bounty hunter she would make 10% of the bond amount if she brought back the “Failure to Appear” (known to me as a “skip“). This would indicate that the bondsman is still making money when the defendant doesn’t show up for court. Again, completely contrary to my experience. When some doesn’t show up for court and we hire a bounty hunter, we are loosing money. That’s why we bail out people we believe will show up for court.

Although I didn’t finish the book, it is always interesting to me to read something related to our industry. There are so many misconceptions about bail and bondsmen. I assume that fiction has to be the source. Of course, the reality is probably pretty boring by comparison. Plum fans, enjoy!

Photo credit: Lynn Holly