Bad Monkey

Bad Monkey has all of the usual Carl Hiaason elements: a down-on-his-luck or out-of-work cop or detective who repeatedly gets the shit kicked out of him (Andrew Yancy); his much smarter and more competent girlfriend (coroner Rosa Campesino); a strange animal (a mangy monkey who lives on sweets); an appendage (a severed arm); a bizarrely deployed device (a vacuum-cleaner attachment applied to the testicles); a variety of odd villains (a fake voodoo priestess, among others); and a local person bravely fighting to preserve his land from development (Neville, a Bahamian fisherman). These elements can be found in all 13 of Carl Hiaason’s adult—and all four of his young-adult—novels, but don’t dare call this formulaic—it’s more like subtle variations on a theme. A formula is predictable, and there are more twists and turns in Hiaasen’s work than your small intestine (maybe that’s why I always split a gut when reading him). Bad Monkey is a guaranteed page-turner. (Advice to authors: short chapters!) I would rate Hiaasen and Christopher Moore as our two national comic treasures.