From Publishers Weekly
This dizzying road movie of a first novel follows a passel of comic con men (and one con woman) down and around the Florida coast. Their adventures involve deliciously caricatured characters along with delirious violence, not to mention pigeon-eating maniacs, cocaine, traffic jams, biker gangs, hot-tub accidents, mock-Satanic heavy metal bands, partially frozen crocodilians, the World Series and the space shuttle. Serge and Coleman are roommates, manic ne'er-do-wells trying to fashion a living from crime and adventure. Sexy Sharon Rhodes murders magnates for their life insurance. On the run after her last hit, she meets Serge and Coleman, and the trio start a crime spree. Former millionaire George Veale has just been released from prison when he absconds with a suitcase of drug money. The cash belongs to insurance CEO Charles Saffron, who hires sleazy private investigator Mo Grenadine to get it back. (Mo is also a corrupt right-wing state legislator and a gay-baiting talk radio host.) Serge and Coleman (themselves remotely connected to drug cartels) get wind of the suitcase and scheme for the cash. Sharon wants in on the caper, too, whether or not the two men planned it that way. Dorsey's cast of dangerous oddballs chase, rob, shoot and kill their way from Tampa to the Florida Keys and the Dry Tortugas, until their raucous evasion of law catches up with them. Dorsey is a newspaperman by trade (at the Tampa Tribune), and his sentence rhythm can be crisply journalistic: "Wilbur Putzenfus was losing hair on top and working the comb-over. No tan. No tone.... Spiro Agnew without the power." Floridian readers may laugh or wince as Dorsey skewers the state's foibles and stereotypes. But he can abandon his verbal dexterity and his social observation to get a quick laugh or a quick jolt of violence: as a result, his satire seems less serious than it might be. Admirers of Elmore Leonard and Carl Hiassen will note their influences here; as entertainment, this rollicking, over-the-top novel is a blast. Agent, Nat Sobel. (Aug.) Copyright 1999 Reed Business Information, Inc.
From Library Journal
In this debut, lots of people are after a suitcase full of money that got dropped in the wrong car: two bad guys, one obsessed with Florida history (the setting is Miami) and another with cocaine; one lady, whos also a killer; and the good-guy lawyer. Dorsey is night news coordinator of the Tampa Tribune, so expect good detail.Copyright 1999 Reed Business Information, Inc.
New York Times, Sept. 5, 1999
Vulgar, violent and gaudier than sunsets on the Keys, Dorsey's roadshow is some fun.
From Booklist
Imagine the violence of Edna Buchanan married to the skewed worldview of Dave Barry; now you're ready to meet Tim Dorsey, whose dark yet wildly funny first novel recounts several months in the lives of about 15 losers who are lower on the criminal food chain than even an Elmore Leonard character. Take the insurance executive who has turned to money laundering to save his failing business after Hurricane Andrew; or the three thug wanna-bes who end up as vigilantes defending a community of senior citizens against their rapacious landlord; or take Serge and Coleman, who can only be described as Cheech and Chong with guns. What ties these characters together is the seventh game of the 1997 World Series in which the Florida Marlins defeated the Cleveland Indians in extra innings. Dorsey's delightful novel belongs in the hands of anyone who likes the mix of Florida setting and black humor in the work of Leonard, Carl Hiaasen, and Laurence Shames (see p.1485). George Needham
From Kirkus Reviews
Hilarious set pieces distinguish this otherwise sluggishly plotted contribution to Sunbelt Baroque, the genre epitomized by Carl Hiaasen and Elmore Leonard. Such stories are generally of the ``only in Florida'' sort and feature implausible plots quilted together with diverting wit but strained logic. Newcomer Dorseys tale opens in Tampa. Serge and his dim-witted partner, Coleman, are scam artists hustling through life on whatever schemes strike their fancy. Theyre joined by Sharon, a blazing babe with an atrocious coke habit, who maneuvers Dr. George Veale into a videotaped act in the backroom of a strip club. Dentist Veale's hands are insured for $5 million, and Serge and Coleman mutilate them with a chain saw in exchange for their silence about the tape. Although Veale gets the money, he conceals it in David and Sean's car, two honest, standup guys vacationing through Florida. Who take off from the club totally unaware of their fraudulent cargo. The chase for the money is on, then, a pursuit that will include members of the Costa Gordon drug cartel, the New England Life and Casualty insurance company, a homophobic radio talk-show host, and other zany types you'd find only in Flor . . . well, enough said. All parties converge on Miami, where Dorsey has organized events around the 1997 World Series, won there by the Florida Marlins. The novel, though, shuffles on long after the seventh game is over. Much of the inessential plotting puts Serge and Coleman through more of their unpredictable paces. While some of these scenes are quite funnymurder by Fix-A-Flat, encasement in shrinking jeans, and inverted alcohol poisoningthe reader may have to be reminded that there's a story here waiting to finish up. Dorsey's voice is laconic and distinctive. And his management of single scenes is skillful. Structural weaknesses and improbable coincidences aside, then: an amusing beach read. -- Copyright ©1999, Kirkus Associates, LP. All rights reserved.
Publishers Weekly
"As entertainment, this rollicking, over-the-top novel is a blast."
The New York Times Book Review
"Vulgar, violent, and gaudier than sunsets on the Keys, Dorsey's roadshow is some fun."
Miami Herald
"Impossible as it sounds, Dorsey has muscled in on the big guns' territory and ripped the place upside down..."
The Tampa Tribune, Aug. 1, 1999
The [novel] is fiecely energetic, outrageously funny ... Imagine Hunter S. Thompson sharing a byline with Groucho Marx.
Atlanta Journal-Constitution
"A violent, funny, hyperkinetic novel...where the bizarre is downright commonplace."
James W. Hall
"A red-line, juking, jiving, manic, tequila-laced, triple-espresso ride through the flipped-out, ultra-scuzzy, bullet-between-the-eyes state of Florida...Wow, what a ride."
Book Description
Local trivia buff Serge loves inflicting pain. Drug-addled Coleman, his partner in crime, loves cartoons. Hot stripper Sharon Rhodes loves cocaine, especially when purchased with righ dead men's money.
Then there's Sean and David, who love fishing--and helping turtles cross busy thoroughfares. Unfortunately, they're about to cross paths with a suitcase filled with $5 million in stolen money.
Serge wants the suitcase. Sharon wants the suitcase. Coleman wants more drugs...and the suitcase. A hitman wants Satan to reign supreme. A slimy, insurance-frauding dentist wants his fingers back. In the meantime, there's murder by gun, Space Shuttle, Barbie doll, and Levi's 501s. Welcome to Florida!
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