Fever Beach

Dale Figgo has managed something few people could: the Proud Boys threw him out for being too stupid. He is still determined to be a crusader, though, and his judgment hasn't improved. On a rainy afternoon, while out on an errand, he stops to pick up a hitchhiker, and that one choice starts a chain of events he is in no way equipped to handle. The fallout lands on Viva Morales, a sharp and stubborn woman who has moved to Florida to start over after her divorce. She rents a room in Figgo's apartment and takes a job at the Mink Foundation, which presents itself as a charity but hides something much uglier. Meanwhile, Twilly Spree prowls the edges of the story. He is a short-fused environmentalist with plenty of money and a talent for elaborate, outlandish payback. When secret political money and ugly motives collide, Viva and Twilly end up on the same side. Together they dig into a web of graft and scheming run by a billionaire couple devoted to cosmetic surgery and a dim congressman who thinks he is destined for greatness. Carl Hiaasen, the author of Squeeze Me, turns the whole sun-baked mess into a savage, laugh-out-loud satire of the way we live now.