01/06/2006 10:43 PM
Posted by VeggieSteph

Tourist Season by Carl Hiaasen

Carl Hiaasen is another one of those authors I accidentally found through my Quality Paperback Book Club. I forgot to send in my monthly card, so I got a surprise delivery. I am glad I forgot to send in that card, because that shipment turned me on to a wonderfully funny and entertaining author. The book I received was Skinny Dip, and later, when wondering around a bookstore unsure of what to buy, I found Mr. Hiaasen again. Enter Tourist Season, Hiaasen’s first book. The murder mystery caper is deliciously snarky and very Floridian, much like the other book of his I read.


Tourist Season is part murder mystery and part environmental treatise. Brian Keyes is an ex-reporter turned private eye. He’s called in to investigate the mysterious death of a local Miami city chamber of commerce man and a missing Florida tourist – a Shriner who was in Miami for a convention. One body appeared dressed in garish tourist clothing and a plastic alligator in his throat, the other is still missing. As more tourists begin disappearing, Keyes begins to put together the crimes and discovers a crazy group of eco-terrorists made up of people he unfortunately knows. He is stuck in the middle of things, and must come up with a solution outside of the police to save the woman from his past and the possible woman of his future.

Hiaasen’s prose is highly entertaining. This is his first book, so it is a bit clunky in spots, but you can tell he has talent that will only get better (and it has – Skinny Dip was sharp.) He recreates the hot, sticky atmosphere of Florida so well you can hear the Miami Vice tune in your head. The dialogue is snappy and reminiscent of Elmore Leonard. He truly cares about the protection of the natural Floridian landscape, but he is able to incorporate it into his stories without banging you over the head with rhetoric. His characters are funny; sometimes they reach caricature, but it’s okay. After all, this isn’t War and Peace. This is a light-hearted, Ellroy-esque murder mystery with a very hungry crocodile and gray-haired retired grannies.

Carl Hiaasen is an author I just love to read. In fact, I added all of his books to my wish list, and my brother and his girlfriend were kind enough to pick me up a few for Christmas. I can’t wait to get to reading the rest of his work. If you like to read mysteries, like snappy dialogue and funny characters, and like movies like Elmore Leonard’s Be Cool, Jackie Brown, or Get Shorty, you’ll like Tourist Season.