Nature Girl Audio CD – CD, July 31, 2007

I have read several of the author's books. They are full of quirky, weird characters. I read one of his book, saying I will never read another, and then I do. There are some things that I find objectionable, such as language and sexual situations, but his writing style has me coming back. He really does have a way with words. His descriptions are picture-painting. I see the sunset, I know the man is empty and vapid, the eagle is real. This book had several situations and many characters that at times were confusing. They all wind up in the Everglades. How did he do that and yet he did. One thing I can say. Honey is not normal, but I like her need to right wrongs and set people straight. I wish she would come to my neighborhood and deal with some of the people in my HOA! Yes, I will read another. Drat.

Boyd Shreve fails at nearly everything he does. His current job as a telemarketer hits rough waters when he calls Honey Santana during supper. Honey has had too many supper interruptions and goes off on Boyd. She tracks him down and turns the tables on him by pretending to be a telemarketer herself. She sends him two tickets to south Florida to look at real estate with an eco-tour in the Ten Thousand Island national park. Boyd arrives with his mistress instead of his wife, and although accommodations are not first-class Florida, Boyd and his mistress go on the tour with Honey.The tour quickly deteriorates as the island Honey takes them to is the hideout of Sammy Tigertail, a Seminole laying low after a tourist died on his airboat tour. Sammy chased off a loud group of Florida State students, but not before one of them, Gillian, offered to be his hostage. Sammy didn't want that but had little choice in the manner.In pursuit of Honey is her ex-boss, who groped her. He wants a monogamous relationship with Honey. However, his appearance is not anywhere near being close to Adonis. In pursuit of Boyd is a private investigator trying to get the money shot for Boyd's wife so she can divorce him in grand fashion. Add into the mix Honey's son Fry, and his ex-father Perry Skinner, and you got a wild bunch of characters on an island.I didn't find this story as humorous as other Carl Hiaasen books. With lots of subplots, none of them really stood out as the main arc of the story. The characters all have their quirks, but the tale wasn't as interesting as his other stories.

The Nature Girl (Honey Santana) just wants the world to be a little more polite. Her character reminds me of the lead in the film Raising Arizona (Holly Hunter's character) -- just trying to get by in a world that ain't fair and where people have no manners. This rollicking ride begins when Honey gets interrupted one too many times by a dinner time telemarketer who pushes her wrong buttons.Honey is lovable but whacky. The other women have their issues (bad choice in men chiefly,) but are together and oh so much smarter and evolved than the men they hook too. Honey's adventure, which weaves the adventures of others together on Dismal Key in the 10,000 islands (they exist, I looked it up) off the Gulf Coast of southern Florida, is the revenge fantasy we've all had with telemarketers. She turns the table, calls the guy at home, and lures him to what he thinks is a real estate pitch in Florida. Jerk telemarketer brings his girlfriend to what Honey has planned as a "see-the-error-of-your-ways" confrontation that will teach the phone jockey just a little bit about politeness and civility.Nothing goes as planned for any of the characters - the half-Seminole trying to reconnect with his heroic ancestors, the college coed out with her idiot boyfriend, the private eye sent by bemused wife to catch her telemarketer cheating husband in flagrante dilecto, the mutilated ex-boss of Honey who sees her as his sex-slave/wife in a new life vision, telemarketer's bored-out-of-her-gourd girlfriend, or the troupe of religious zealots waiting for the second coming by kayak on the beach of one of the islands. As is the case with the other two Hiaasen books I've read, most of the characters are helplessly horny and sex provides the motivational arc for many of them (throw in avoiding sex with a specific pursuer and it pretty much figures in the motivations of all the characters save Honey's ten year old son.). As I told someone who has read one Hiaasen book, the author seems like your funniest friend from high school who turned into a pretty good writer but whose material hasn't progressed much past tenth grade.That's not a criticism. For what they are worth, Hiassen is a very good writer of laugh-out-loud whacky comedy/suspense books. The telemarketer's fake last name is Eisenhower - Boyd Eisenhower. Whenever he lies and has to invent someone, he always uses the last name of a president. It's a funny running gag in the book. I read most of this on two plane rides to and from Chicago and my seat mates both ways had the pleasure of listening to my chortles during our time aloft.

Totally recognizable as a Hiaasen take down of grifters, grafters, lowlifes and other spoilers who abound in the author's home state of Florida, this novel doesn't have the slashing edge throughout that many of his other books do. The stock characters are all there: beautiful, smart and vengeful women, loathsome male losers who have no capacity for redemption from their lechery, larceny or general social ineptness; strong and principled men with soft spots for beautiful, smart, vengeful, lovable but slightly crazy women. The context is, of course, Florida--andHiaasen's favorite place of all, the Everglades. The whole mass of characters mentioned above form a scrum on an island or two and wild things happen naturally.This is a pretty good read, with some genuine laugh-out-loud passages sprinkled throughout. But it's rather formulaic and plot-thin too often. Not the author's best effort.

I live Carl Haissen`s work. His stories are convoluted, wild and only based loosely on anything that could be real. This one is no exception and I thoroughly enjoyed it, But it was a book we chose for book club and it was uncomfortable for some of our members, But it was brilliantly written, a fast read and very entertaining, but in a silly way with sex a la Animal House. It's funny but not for everyone. Haissen is an observant storyteller and there is enough reality in the characters of Honey and the shipwrecked crew if misfits that it works.

If you're already a fan of Carl Hiassen's patented brand of Florida set light weight crime fiction Nature Girl will statisfy if not overwhelm you. If you're new to the author's work then this a reasonable place to start, even if he has written better books (his last, Skinny Dip for example). On the offchance that you've tried his work before and not found it to your taste then firstly, why are you reading this review and secondly, walk away because I doubt there's anything here that will change your opinion.The usual mix of oddball and disfunctional characters, complex, coincidental plotting that works with swiss watch-like precision, gentle humour, mild satire and real heart, Nature Girl is light weight, agreeable stuff. Its not going to change anyone's world and you get the feeling that Hiassen can churn this stuff out in his sleep, but it remains a decent, likeable and amusing way to pass the time.

Couldn't read this. The first book I bought by this guy, (Sick Puppy ??), I really loved. Then I bought two more and I read that they are supposedly FUNNY. I was so shocked. I gave away the two I bought without reading them. To Mike. Are you reading this Mike? I hope not.Zany, yes. But 'funny'???

Brilliant book definitely recommend to other readers :-)

Brilliant. Just get on and read it.

Great fun read