A T.D. STASH CRIME ADVENTURE DRUGS, DAMES, DEATH-A BUBBLING BREW OF DANGER IN THE FLORIDA KEYS KEYS TO TROUBLE A young kid in over his head in the kind of snow that doesn't melt but kills. An aging rock star running out of voice and money. His Brit wife, as beautiful, cold and cutting as an icicle. A female cabdriver who turned the meter off when it came to sex. A local lawman who played by the rules and a narc who made his own. A woman painter who liked her landscapes bare and her men nude. A kidnapping that was either real or faked, and a corpse that couldn't be denied. T.D. Stash thought he had seen everything in anything-goes Key West. But the laid-back fishing guide, sometimes private eye, was wrong. And unless he got to the bottom of drugs, deceit, greed and sex, he would wind up dead... THE NEON FLAMINGO.
Rodman Philbrick grew up on the New England coast, where he worked as a longshoreman and boat builder. For many years he wrote mysteries and detective novels. The Private Eye Writers of America nominated two of his T.D.Stash series as best detective novel and then selected Philbrick's 'Brothers & Sinners' as Best Novel in 1993. Writing under the pen name 'William R. Dantz' he has explored the near-future worlds of genetic engineering and hi-tech brain control in books like 'Hunger', 'Pulse', 'The Seventh Sleeper'. And 'Nine Levels Down'.
Inspired by the life of a boy who lived a few blocks away, he wrote 'Freak The Mighty', the award-winning young-adult novel, which has been translated into numerous languages and is now read in schools throughout the world. The book was adapted to the screen in 1998 as 'The Mighty', starring Sharon Stone, Gillian Anderson, James Gandolfini, Kieran Culkin, and Elden Henson.
Philbrick, a screenwriter as well as a novelist, is the author of a number of novels for young readers, including 'The Fire Pony', 'Max the Mighty', 'REM World', 'The Last Book In The Universe', 'The Journal of Douglas Allen Deeds' and 'The Young Man And The Sea'. His recent novels for adults include 'Dark Matter', 'Coffins', and 'Taken'. He and his wife divide their time between Maine and the Florida Keys.
The biggest plus to this book by Philbrick is his ability to capture the feel and look of the Keys with words. This is the second of the Stash series I've read and I'd say he captured the location better than other books set in the area, including James Hall's Thorn series.
Otherwise the story is pretty straightforward with a mystery lingering of the main character, Stash, in search of a kid. Lots of layabouts in the story. Everyone was portrayed as having no ambition to do much of anything. Even a couple rich central characters were stripped of any future. It all gets a bit depressing and the story stumbles from layabout to layabout. Soon, it's hard to care about what happened to the kid as even the Stash character seems to lose interest.
Again it's the narrative of the location that is the highlight. Philbrick accurately describes natural areas, fishing docks, boats, seedy areas of the Keys, etc.
The story is of little energy, but the setting is great. Therefore...