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Book Review of Star Island

Star Island
perryfran avatar reviewed on + 1223 more book reviews


It's been a while since I've read a Hiaasen novel. This one is full of his usual wacky characters and full of lol humor. The novel includes a couple of my favorite characters from prior novels: Chemo, the disfigured criminal from Skin Tight with the weed-whacker prosthesis; and Skink, the ex-governor of Florida who lives in the wild and is fighting to try to preserve Florida's natural habitat. In the novel, Ann DeLusia, a "stunt double" for habitually intoxicated and drug-addicted pop star "Cherry Pye", is mistakenly kidnapped by an obsessed paparazzo, Bang Abbott. Now, the star's entourage must find a way to rescue Ann, and do it without revealing her identity to the star herself, or the world at large. Chemo is a bodyguard for Cherry who is on the verge of releasing a comeback album and going on tour.

The novel includes some very funny scenes including when Skink hijacks a bus full of real estate investors and ties the main developer to a tree and attaches a spiny sea urchin to his scrotal area. Overall I enjoyed this outing from Hiaasen but not quite as much as some of his other novels including Skin Tight, Lucky You, and Native Tongue.