Nick Fox and Kate O’Hare are back . . . in paperback!
That’s right, The Big Kahuna, the latest must-read collaboration between mother and son writing duo Janet and Peter Evanovich, is now available in paperback at airports and bookstores across the country.
A stoner, an Instagram model, a Czech oligarch, and a missing unicorn. Nick Fox and Kate O’Hare have their work cut out for them in their weirdest, wildest adventure yet in this New York Times bestseller by Janet and Peter Evanovich.
Straight arrow FBI Agent Kate O’Hare always plays by the rules. Charming Con Man Nicholas Fox makes them up as he goes along. She thinks he’s nothing but a scoundrel. He thinks she just needs to lighten up. They’re working together to tackle the out-of-bounds cases ordinary FBI agents can’t touch. And, their relationship? Well, there hasn’t been so much explosive chemistry since Nitro was introduced to Glycerin.
Next on the docket: The mysterious disappearance of the Silicon Valley billionaire, known as the Big Kahuna. Kate’s been assigned to find him but no one seems particularly keen on helping. His twenty-six-year-old adult actress wife-turned Instagram model wife and his shady Czech business partner are more interested in gaining control of his company. For that, they need a dead body, not a living Kahuna.
The only lead they have is the Kahuna’s drop-out son, who’s living the dream in Hawaii – if your dream is starting your day with the perfect wave and ending it with a big bowl of weed. To get close to the Kahuna’s son, Kate and Nick go undercover as a married couple in the big wave, bohemian, surfer community of Paia, Maui. Living a laid back, hippy-dippy lifestyle isn’t exactly in Kate’s wheelhouse, but the only thing more horrifying is setting up house with Nick Fox, even if he does look pretty gnarly on a longboard. If they don’t catch a break soon, waves aren’t the only thing she’s going to be shredding (or bedding).
To celebrate the paperback release, both Janet and Peter Evanovich agreed to go back on the record for our Five Questions segment, and I asked them about everything from how they came up with the story idea for this one to what’s next for Fox and O’Hare moving forward—to which they gave an answer that longtime fans of their series will surely get a kick out of.
Check out the full Q&A below, then make sure to pick up your copy of The Big Kahuna, now available in all formats, wherever books are sold.
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TRBS: I love the lead-in for this book: “A stoner, an Instagram model, a Czech oligarch, and a missing unicorn.” How did you come up with the plot details for THE BIG KAHUNA?
Peter: What if a tech billionaire went missing and absolutely everyone in his life, from his porn star turned Instagram model wife to his shady business partners, was more interested in Nick and Kate finding a dead Big Kahuna than a live one? The more interesting question is why?
Janet: Plot details for this series are on Peter’s side of the division of labor. Truth is, I suck at plot. And Peter is a plot genius.
TRBS: What sort of research had to be done before actually sitting down to write this one?’’
Peter: Let’s just say before I started writing a book featuring a self-proclaimed Instagram “supermodel” I never knew there were so many different kinds of selfies… and belfies (you should probably Google that yourself!). Oh, and all the intensive research I had to do in Hawaii wasn’t half bad either!
Janet: Yeah, I’d like to add that I helped with the Hawaii stuff. Spending time hiking and on the beach in Hawaii was a hardship but you do what you gotta do, right?
TRBS: How does co-writing work, and what sort of process do you guys use when working on a manuscript.
Peter: That’s like asking the Colonel how he makes his chicken taste so delicious! At the risk of sounding corny, when you work with your family, the secret ingredient is love.
Janet: Peter and my daughter, Alex, have been part of the writing/editing process since the beginning of Plum, and I have total confidence in their abilities. When Peter took over the Fox and O’Hare series, I just let him do his thing and I came in at the end and sprinkled some fairy dust around.
TRBS: What advice do you have for new or aspiring authors?
Peter: Get up every day and write. It’s your job …and it’s a great one.
Janet: Ditto.
TRBS: Lastly, what’s next for Fox and O’Hare moving forward?
Peter: That’s like asking what’s next for Han Solo and Princess Lea. They’ll either save the world or kill each other. Maybe both.
Janet: I think they should go back to Hawaii so I can do more research. Italy would also be good. I’ve never been to Italy!
Praised as “One of the hardest working, most thoughtful, and fairest reviewers out there” by #1 New York Times bestselling author Lisa Scottoline, Ryan Steck has “quickly established himself as the authority on mysteries and thrillers” (Author A.J. Tata). Steck also works full-time as a freelance editor and pens a monthly thriller column for CrimeReads. For more information, be sure to follow him on Twitter and Facebook. He currently lives in Southwest Michigan with his wife and their six children.