Bad Monkey
*Starred Review* Booklist reviews of recent Hiaasen novels (Nature Girl, 2006) have noted his step back from apocalyptic plots. That trend continues with a shambolic comic tale of garden-variety Florida crime: a wealthy Medicare fraudster appears to have died in a boating accident. The only evidence of death is his arm, which is reeled in by a hapless vacationer. Enter Andrew Yancy, once and future Monroe County detective. He thinks the fraudster was murdered by his wife, and if he can prove it, he can get his old job back and leave restaurant inspections behind. Think of Yancy as a Hiaasenian knight aberrant. He means well, but many of his problems are hilariously self-inflicted. His efforts take him from Key West to Miami to Andros Island, Bahamas, and back again. A huge cast of characters and a stunningly polyfurcated plot offer Hiaasen room to wow readers with information on grave robbery, restaurant-kitchen horrors, autoerotic asphyxiation, and even tips for beating Homeland Security’s radar to fly into South Florida. And there is also a delightful interlude of canoodling on the tuna tower of a Key West charter boat as well as no-holds-barred portraits of the Dragon Queen—a loopy, libidinous, old Bahamian “woo-doo” practitioner—and the titular Bad Monkey. Plot convolutions twice cause him to insert multipage explanations of what’s going on, but as always, Hiaasen is laugh-out-loud funny and thoroughly entertaining.      HIGH-DEMAND BACKSTORY: Hiaasen’s crime fiction crossed over to mainstream bestsellerdom early on in his career, and his fan base continues to grow. --Thomas Gaughan