Native Tongue Quotes

“The deceased was a well-known scumbucket and they don’t usually have the decency to kill themselves. Usually someone else does the honor.”
― Carl Hiaasen, Native Tongue

“The gutted ruins of the Amazing Kingdom were razed, and the land was replanted with native trees, including buttonwoods, pigeon plums, torchwoods, brittle palms, tamarinds, gumbo-limbos and mangroves. This restoration was accomplished in spite of rigid opposition from the Monroe County Commission, which had hoped to use the property as a public dump.”
― Carl Hiaasen, Native Tongue

“Nobody from the Amazing Kingdom bothered to check with previous employers, such as the New York City Police Department, to inquire about allegations of bribery, moral turpitude, substance abuse, witness tampering and the unnecessary use of deadly force, to wit, the pistol-whipping of a young man suspected of shoplifting a bag of cheese-flavored Doritos.”
― Carl Hiaasen, Native Tongue

“You’ll never understand,” Winder said, “because you weren’t born here. Compared to where you came from, this is always going to look like paradise. Hell, you could wipe out every last bird and butterfly, and it’s still better than Toledo in the dead of winter.”
― Carl Hiaasen, Native Tongue

“You’ll never understand,' Winder said, 'because you weren’t born here. Compared to where you came from, this is always going to look like paradise. Hell, you could wipe out every last bird and butterfly, and it’s still better than Toledo in the dead of winter.”
― Carl Hiaasen, Native Tongue

“New Yorkers,” said Jim Tile, “think they’ve cornered the market on psychopaths. They don’t know Florida.”
― Carl Hiaasen, Native Tongue

“Instantly it had become a sensation among tourists at the park, a fact that edified Kingsbury's belief that the illusion of quality is more valuable than quality itself.”
― Carl Hiaasen, Native Tongue

“Some crazy shithead with a .38--it's the story of America, isn't it?'
'We live in violent times. That's what they say.'
'Guys like that, they give violence a bad name.”
― Carl Hiaasen, Native Tongue

“Lower your sights, boy,' he said to Joe Winder. 'I agree, justice is probably out of the question. But we can damn sure ruin their day.”
― Carl Hiaasen, Native Tongue

“Like everything else at the Amazing Kingdom, the Vole Project had begun as a scheme to compete with Walt Disney World. Years earlier, Disney had tried to save the dusky seaside sparrow, a small marsh bird whose habitat was being wiped out by overdevelopment along Florida's coastline. With much fanfare, Disney had unveiled a captive-breeding program for the last two surviving specimens of the dusky. Unfortunately, the last two surviving specimens were both males, and even the wizards of Disney could not induce the scientific miracle of homosexual procreation. Eventually the sparrow fell to extinction, but the Disney organization won gobs of fawning publicity for its conservation efforts.”
― Carl Hiaasen, Native Tongue

“As he was pulled underwater for the final time, terror gave way to abject humiliation: he was being fucked to death by a damn fish.”
― Carl Hiaasen, Native Tongue