At a Glance
- Read by: Lorelei King has been narrating Stephanie Plum for long enough that her performance of Grandma Mazur in particular has become the definitive version; she carries the comedic timing of the series with complete assurance.
- At its heart: Family loyalty, comedic crime, gangster grandmothers
- Vibe: Cheerfully chaotic, light and fast
- Short version: Book 26 of the Stephanie Plum series leans fully into its comic formula with Grandma Mazur at the center, and Lorelei King makes every scene with her a small masterpiece of comic timing.
Grandma Mazur's brief marriage and rapid widowhood opens Twisted Twenty-Six by Janet Evanovich, and Lorelei King narrates the audiobook with the seasoned ease of a performer who has been doing this for over two decades. This is book twenty-six in the Stephanie Plum series, and at 6 hours and 43 minutes it is one of the shorter entries, which suits its structure: the premise is contained, the setup is brisk, and the comedic escalation from grandmother-marries-gangster to grandmother-becomes-mob-target is delivered with the efficient shamelessness that has sustained the series through a quarter century.
The setup is classically Evanovich. Grandma Mazur decides to marry Jimmy Rosolli, a local man described with the series's characteristic coyness as a gangster with business partners of the traditional variety. He drops dead 45 minutes after the ceremony. His former associates, convinced that his new widow has been left holding the keys to a substantial financial arrangement, come looking. Stephanie Plum, bounty hunter and perpetually embattled granddaughter, has to protect someone who is simultaneously a liability and the most entertaining person in the room. The formula has worked for twenty-five books before this one, and Evanovich sees no compelling reason to alter it here.
Our Take on Twisted Twenty-Six
The central pleasure of this audiobook, as with most of the later Plum entries, is Lorelei King's performance of the supporting cast. Her Grandma Mazur is a complete comic creation, a woman of a certain age operating without any apparent awareness that her behavior is unusual, and King's timing in the Grandma scenes is the reason one reviewer described the series as making them laugh themselves silly. The plot mechanics of the investigation are secondary to the character dynamics, and King has always understood that hierarchy; her Grandma Mazur gets the best of every scene she is in.
The tone is notably lighter than some of the more recent entries in the series, which several reviewers have found welcome. One described it as the typical Stephanie Plum pattern, still ruining cars and getting knocked around, still navigating the Morelli/Ranger dynamic, but with more energy focused on Grandma's situation than on Stephanie's romantic indecision. That shift gives the audiobook a clarity of comedic purpose that works well at the six-hour length.
Why Listen to Twisted Twenty-Six
The audiobook format has always suited the Stephanie Plum series better than print for one specific reason: King's voice transforms Evanovich's already-fast prose into something that feels genuinely oral, like a friend telling you a story at the kitchen table. The series was conceived for entertainment in the broadest sense, and audio eliminates the mediation of the page entirely. The jokes land faster, the set pieces build more efficiently, and the chaos of Grandma Mazur's domestic drama against a gangster backdrop has the quality of a well-delivered anecdote rather than a written narrative.
For listeners new to the series, the question of where to start is legitimate. A reviewer noted it could be read as a standalone but is more enjoyable with the series history. That is accurate. The emotional payoff in some of the recurring character dynamics, particularly Stephanie's long-running relationship complications, has more resonance for listeners who have spent time with the characters. But the central plot of the audiobook is self-contained enough that newcomers will not feel excluded.
King's comedic timing with Evanovich's dialogue is particularly effective in the confrontation scenes between Grandma Mazur and the organized crime figures who underestimate her. Those scenes work in print but they work better in audio because timing is everything, and King has spent enough years with these characters that she knows exactly where Evanovich's pauses live. The audiobook also benefits from the series's internal mythology of recurring chaos: the car destructions, the food references, the ritualized patterns of Stephanie's professional disasters. King has been present for all of them, and that accumulated history is audible in how naturally she inhabits the world.
What to Watch For in Twisted Twenty-Six
The scenes between Grandma Mazur and the wise guys looking for their financial windfall are the audiobook's most inventive sequences. Evanovich writes Grandma as someone completely undaunted by organized crime, not through ignorance but through an absolute confidence in her own centrality to any social situation, and King plays those encounters with a dry relish that makes the absurdity feel earned. Grandma Mazur functions as the series's secret weapon in these later entries: a character who can hold the center of the comedy without requiring the plot to maintain tension it does not need.
The Morelli and Ranger subplot is present in the way it always is, as unresolved background rather than developed plot, which is the right call for a book with a specific family-centered premise. Listeners who are invested in resolution to Stephanie's romantic situation will not find it here; listeners who have made peace with the series's refusal to resolve that particular triangle will find the audiobook more satisfying for not pretending to address it.
Who Should Listen to Twisted Twenty-Six
This audiobook is most rewarding for established Stephanie Plum listeners, particularly those who have a specific affection for Grandma Mazur as a character. Lorelei King's decades of series narration mean that for long-term listeners, her voice has become inseparable from the characters themselves. New listeners who want a sample of the series would be reasonably well served here, though starting earlier in the run would give more context for the recurring dynamics. Skip it if you are looking for crime fiction with genuine stakes or mystery mechanics; Twisted Twenty-Six uses crime as a comic backdrop and is making no pretense to be anything other than what it is.
Questions Listeners Ask
Is the Twisted Twenty-Six audiobook accessible to someone who has never listened to a Stephanie Plum book before?
The central plot involving Grandma Mazur and the gangster widow situation is self-contained and follows without series knowledge. Recurring characters and the Morelli/Ranger romantic subplot will have less emotional resonance without prior context, but a new listener will not feel lost. Starting at book one remains the fuller experience.
Does Lorelei King's narration of the Twisted Twenty-Six audiobook match her earlier performances in the series?
King's narration is as assured here as in any previous Plum audiobook. Her Grandma Mazur in particular remains one of the most consistent and comedically precise recurring performances in the series. Listeners who have been following her narration for years will find this entry fully consistent with what they have come to expect.
Is the Twisted Twenty-Six audiobook shorter than others in the Stephanie Plum series?
At 6 hours and 43 minutes, it runs shorter than many of the series audiobooks, which tend to land in the 7 to 8 hour range. The shorter runtime reflects the focused premise rather than thin content; the book does not feel compressed, just concentrated on a single family-centered storyline.
