Genre Fiction, Rennie Airth and the Blitz

During some sleepless nights this holiday, I found myself too tense to read anything with big words. Improving books about North Korea or the American Revolution satisfied for a paragraph before my mind drifted off, and I wound up turning pages with no clue as to their contents. Eventually, I settled on a trilogy of detective stories from Rennie Airth. After speeding through them over two nights, I felt what seems like a unique reaction to a trilogy of novels: that the second was by far the best of all.

Now, if you know a Star Wars fan or are one yourself, this is not necessarily a radical idea regarding film, but it's not something I've heard stated often about books (at least in part because good books rarely have a sequel and almost never have two of them). The argument in favor of The Empire Strikes Back is that it offers the richest character study, broadens the moral and spiritual parameters of its universe and increases the stakes for everyone. What's interesting about the Airth books, though, is that despite all of them featuring the same characters going over virtually the same plot for the same stakes, the second book tries the least to convince you of how grave they are and, in that process, creates a richer story for those same characters.

Of course, immediately after thinking of writing this down, I thought about a response I'd received to another piece I'd written about historical detective fiction. Midway through last year, I got in an argument on a message board with a guy who's read this site off and on. I suggested that a book he liked didn't really count as "literature," to which he replied (I'm paraphrasing), "What the hell would you know about it? All you do is review mystery novels." Ouch.

Profiles in Florida: Unholy Unions

Democratic candidate for Florida governor Alex Sink recently caused a stir among Republicans and law-enforcement officials with a barrage of ads touting her endorsement by the Florida policeman's union. Though she received the endorsement months ago, the ads are the first time many are hearing it, which means that the rest of the state must now cope with a few people recognizing that the apocalypse is upon them. This is the first time in 20 years that a Democratic gubernatorial candidate has earned the nod.

The St. Petersburg Times has more:

Rick Cochran, vice president of Tampa's police union and a registered Republican, explains the union's reasoning:

The Florida Police Benevolent Association doesn't want Republican candidate Rick Scott to become governor because Scott supports pension reductions and the privatization of prisons.

That would cause prison guards to be laid off, and it would affect officers' pension plans, said Florida union deputy executive director Matt Puckett.

Cochran said that some local members have visited the union's office this week to ask why their group would endorse a Democrat. The party has generally carried the perception of being soft on crime.

"When we explain it, the majority get it," he said of the endorsement. "I've had a few people say that they're a Republican, and they just can't do it."

The Carl Hiaasen Fundamentals and 'Nature Girl'

Like the lines about sex and pizza, even when they're bad, Carl Hiaasen novels are still pretty good. Regrettably, his latest, Nature Girl, is like the more-of-me-to-love girl with the cute face but the dumps like "uh...what?" who you left the hotel bar with, while on a business trip, after you both got totally hammered.

As said, it was probably pretty good. But if you've any other positive frame of reference, it's also probable you took less delight in it than you'd have liked. As is the case with all Hiaasen books — even those he's written for young adults — Nature Girl entertains and provokes a few really good laughs. It only falls short in comparison to Hiaasen's earlier examples of the satiric-comic-Florida-environmental caper novel. In fact, part of the problem surely lies with the fact that Hiaasen's novels usually contain such similar characteristics that it's easy to see how they stack up against each other.

For example, almost all Hiaasen novels feature the same elements:

One (1) Wish Fulfillment Male (WFM) Character
A kind of hyper-idealized Ur-Floridian, a guy who's a native, who compulsively prevents littering, fishes for tarpon like an expert, loves swamps, snakes, bugs, toads and muck. Has a preternatural tolerance for and adoration of things like mosquitoes that even authentic Floridians find incredibly irritating. Only dislikes: development, music that is not motown or rock and roll made by white people from 1960-1980. Despite perhaps having a normal professional job, possesses a unique ability to swing shotgun stocks into the skulls of murderous thugs, cope with the horrifyingly unusual and stare down the muzzle of a gun with a well-tanned crow's-footed squint and tight-lipped grin that is probably meant to look exactly like the picture of Hiaasen on the back cover. The "oh, that's Carl" factor explains the fact that he will effortlessly bed: