Shakeup by Stuart Woods

 After I read the last Stuart Woods book, I thought he was finally returning to his early days of good storytelling. Alas, that was apparently an aberration. Shakeup is about 300 pages long--with big type and wide spacing. And in those 300 pages, Stone Barrington sleeps with an actress he just met (Lara), the president of the United States (Holly), an FBI bigwig (Maren), and the head of British Intelligence (Felicity). While I'm happy that in Stone's fantasy world there are so many women in positions of power, I find it hard to believe that 1)they would all want to sleep with Stone and 2)they would be okay with being part of his harem. 

In between all the sleeping around (and a lot of eating), there is a plot of sorts. Stone returns from Holly's inauguration to find a dead body in his hotel room. He would be the main suspect except he was televised standing on the podium at the inauguration when the murder happened. But he gets sucked into the case nonetheless.

Another aside: I also find it amusing that Stone's friend Dino--the police commissioner of NYC--has so much free time to accompany Stone on his adventures in California and Europe. That job seems like it would be kind of time-consuming. 

I think it may be time for me to give up on this series. And that's a shame because Stuart Woods is a good storyteller.