BOOK REVIEW: Bad Monkey by Carl Hiaasen

     Best selling author Carl Hiaasen is back with Bad Monkey, another mystery set in south Florida, this one as brilliantly wacky as the others. 
     Andrew Yancy is a Detective for the Sheriff's office in Key West. He's on suspension for an unspeakable act involving a vacuum cleaner he committed against the husband of his lover when Sheriff Sonny Summers has an easy assignment for him: deliver a severed arm that was fished out of the ocean to the Miami Medical Examiners office...and don't bring it back. When the Miami ME said it didn't match any of their victims, and given that the currents would make it unlikely that any crime committed originated in or near Miami would bring the arm to the Keys, Yancy was stuck with the it. Despite orders to dispose of it, he kept it in his freezer. 
     Shortly thereafter, as part of a plea bargain for the assault which Yancy viewed as an act of chivalry, he was fired from the position of Detective and began working as roach inspector for the health department. But when the owner of the arm turned up, or at least the widow of the arm's previous owner, Yancy couldn't let it go. In part because he took his (former) job as a Detective seriously, but more because he saw it as a way to get back to work on real crime, to prove his value to the Sheriff, he started his own investigation. 

Author Carl Hiaasen

     The characters in Bad Monkey are colorful, crazy, and comical. A displaced Bahamian and his pet
monkey; a not so grief stricken widow; a beautiful Miami medical examiner who likes to try new things; a washed up drug smuggling pilot looking to relive his glory days; an oversexed voodoo Queen; two stoic FBI Agents. And of course Mr. Yancy: obsessed with the cleanliness of his food (thanks to his new occupation), finding a killer that may not exist, and in his spare time sabotaging the efforts of the monstrous vacation home being built next door, ruining his view of a perfect Florida Keys sunset. 
     True to his style, Hiaasen keeps the plot moving quickly, each twist in the story more outrageous than the last. But readers won't mind, and most will appreciate the way Bad Monkey differs from the more traditional mystery fiction novel. 
     While I enjoyed Bad Monkey, it is similar to Hiaasen's previous books. Several other books feature an amputee; many others have a sub-plot about the destruction of the natural beauty of southern Florida; and the larger than life characters are standard fare. 
     But even with that mild criticism, I always look forward to a new Hiaasen book, enjoy and empathize with his protagonists, and laugh out loud as I read. Bad Monkey was no different.  


Hiaasen, Carl, Bad Monkey. Knopf Publishing, 2013.

• ISBN-13: 978-0307272591

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BOOK REVIEW: Angel Baby by Richard Lange

     "She empties herself out so she doesn't feel any pain when he grabs her hair, any fear when he draws his gun and jabs it into her cheek. It's just a body that he hauls into the bathroom, just a shell that he forces to the floor...Luz crawls toward him, but the old tricks aren't working tonight; she's not as far away as she should be...and that's when she sees it, a mother-of-pearl switchblade dangling unnoticed from his pants pocket, about to slip the rest of the way out and drop to the floor. Without pausing to think, she grabs it, presses the button to open it, and lays the blade across the top of his scrotum." 

     The tables turn that fast, with that grit, so dark and real you can feel and almost smell it. That is Angel Baby, the newest novel by Richard Lange, from Mulholland Books. 

     Luz is a beautiful Mexican woman in her early twenties. She has her every need met: a beautiful mansion to live in, clothes, drugs, an escort wherever she needs to go. But she is owned by the man that provides it all. The mansion is her prison, the drug addiction an invisible wall, the escorts her guards that will never let her out of sight. Her husband is Rolando, El Principe, The Prince, a powerful drug dealer that gets what he wants. Luz knows that an unsuccessful attempt to leave him would result in her painful and lingering death, and she plans to the last detail her escape. 
     But things don't always go as planned, and Luz finds herself relying on a broken down drunk to get her

Author Richard Lange

out of Mexico. An ex-gangster motivated by a fate worse than death sent to find her and is never far behind. And a crooked Border Patrol Officer who won't give up at the thought of stealing his fortune from the helpless immigrants he happens upon making their way across the border.

     Angel Baby is a good, but not great, thriller. The characters are motivated and dynamic, fighting for control of their lives and destinies while forces beyond their control dictate their actions. I felt a certain level of empathy for all of them at one point. But none of them were developed enough for me to care much what happened to them. Don't get me wrong, some were more likable than others, but I didn't have a strong urge for one to succeed and another to fail. 
     That said, Angel Baby is a thriller. Character development often takes a back seat to action, suspense, and page after page of excitement. And in that Angel Baby was very successful.


Lange, Richard. Angel Baby, Mulholland Books, 2013. 

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BOOK REVIEW: Murder As A Fine Art by David Morrell

     Crime fiction. Historical fiction. Thriller. Police procedural. All can describe Murder As A Fine Art by David Morrell, author of at least  twenty-nine novels and six non-fiction books, including First Blood and Rambo. Despite his success as an author, Murder As A Fine Art is my first experience with Morrell.
     The book, set in 1854 London, was inspired by the works of author Thomas De Quincy, who is most well known for a series of essays Confessions of an English Opium-Eater, which was later published as a book. The essays are autobiographical, and tell the story of a life lived mostly while addicted to opiates. At the time, in Victorian England, a book so open about addiction and life's hardships was very rare. However, it was the essay entitled On Murder Considered as one of the Fine Arts, in which De Quincy satirically detailed a series of murders in 1811, that inspired Mr. Morrell's novel.
     Mixing the De Quincy's account in On Murder with De Quincy's experiences described in Confessions, Mr. Morrell wove an intricate web of fact and fiction to produce Murder As  A Fine Art. In it, there is a murder of a shop-keeper and his family that appear to be copies of the 1811 murders. Coincidentally, the murders occur as De Quincy, who normally lives in Edinburgh, is in London promoting his work. London Detective Inspector Ryan suspects De Quincy after learning that the crime scenes are so similar to the book written by him, particularly because of the passion, knowledge, and lightheartedness in which On Murder is written. However, Det. Inspector Ryan quickly comes to believe differently and works hard with De Quincy, his daughter Emily, and ambitious London Constable Becker to find and stop the real killer.

Author David Morrell

     Murder as a Fine Art is packed with action starting in the first chapter. Witty and humorous dialogue, even about brutal murder, was also interspersed throughout the book. The De Quincy character and his daughter are out of place in 19th Century England, before their time, and the reaction of others to them works both in their favor and against them. I enjoyed Mr. Morrell's presentation of 1854 police investigations and how although things have changed so much since then, the investigative processes, politics, importance of rank and class, and more have remained the same.

     In addition to the plot and wealth of interesting and colorful characters, I found an underlying social statement about 19th Century England: the division of the classes and the sexes; the existence of two Londons, those with wealth and those without; the influence of big business in government policy; the influence of the drug trade in England and in the Orient; pollution, mob mentality and vigilantism  and the British governments role in each.
     While the book was set in London in 1854, many parallels could be applied to similar issues today: the growing gap between the rich and poor, corporate involvement in politics and government, the drug war, global warming, and the rise of the Tea Party.

     One of many indicators of a good book to me is if I don't want it to end. Mr. Morrell achieved this in Murder As A Fine Art. I stepped out of my comfort zone when I chose it, but I'm glad I did. I think you will be, too.


Morrell, David. Murder As A Fine Art. Mulholland Books/Little, Brown & Company. May 7,       2013. ISBN-13: 9780316216791

The Thirty Year Itch is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs 3.0 Unported License.