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Tourist Season
Tourist Season
Tourist Season
Audiobook14 hours

Tourist Season

Written by Carl Hiaasen

Narrated by George Wilson

Rating: 4 out of 5 stars

4/5

()

About this audiobook

Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist Carl Hiaasen's best-selling novels are funny and sardonic. Hilarious postcards of south Florida, they also decry the lurid commercialism that is draining and paving the tropical landscape. Tourist season is swinging into high gear in Miami. So are the activities of a bizarre terrorist group determined to keep the hapless "snowbirds" away. Armed with bombs, weed, and jumbled credos, they move toward their grand target, the Orange Bowl Parade, with plans to bring Miami and its tourist trade to a halt. The cast, which includes a deranged journalist, a visionary ex-jock and a lovesick detective, is just the kind of company Carl Hiaasen's fans love to keep. Narrator George Wilson's performance lures each quirky character out into the full light of the Florida sun. With over half a million copies in print, this is one of Hiaasen's most popular works.
LanguageEnglish
Release dateMar 5, 2004
ISBN9781436100557
Tourist Season
Author

Carl Hiaasen

Carl Hiaasen (b. 1953) is the New York Times bestselling and award-winning author of more than twenty adult and young adult novels and nonfiction titles, including the novels Strip Tease (1993) and Skinny Dip (2004), as well as the mystery-thrillers Powder Burn (1981), Trap Line (1982), and A Death in China (1984), which were cowritten with fellow Miami Herald journalist Bill Montalbano (1941–1998). Hiaasen is best known for his satirical writing and dark humor, much of which is directed at various social and political issues in his home state of Florida. He is an award-winning columnist for the Miami Herald, and lives in Vero Beach.

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Reviews for Tourist Season

Rating: 3.834179344839255 out of 5 stars
4/5

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  • Rating: 5 out of 5 stars
    5/5
    This one is typical Carl Hiaasen: wonderfully written; great plot; classic page-turner; funny as only a novel by Hiaasen can be.

    I truly enjoyed Tourist Season. And I hated for it to end. The ending was quite touching, but I'm no spoiler. How is it though, that Hiaasen has this great way of making his readers feel so much sympathy for even the cruelest and most loathsome of his characters? It's amazing.

    I highly recommend this entertaining caper to anyone looking for a great, fun-filled, and hilarious read. Carl Hiaasen is a true master of his craft.

    (Original Kindle review.)
  • Rating: 2 out of 5 stars
    2/5
    I just "discovered" Hiaasen last year and am trying to read all his works. This is one of his first novels and I can see his talent, although I don't think it's his best effort. He is fun to read and I'll keep reading his works.
  • Rating: 4 out of 5 stars
    4/5
    Having lived in Florida for many years I can relate to Hiaasen. This book is just downright funny. Great stuff!
  • Rating: 3 out of 5 stars
    3/5
    I wanted to read a fun mystery based in Florida and I got just that. The book has some good characters and an entertaining plot.
  • Rating: 4 out of 5 stars
    4/5
    I'm sure I've read this book in the past, but I decided to read it again and found I didn't remember anything about the book. Although the story never dragged (at least not much), I felt it would have been better if it had been a little shorter. If I was grading it as a first time novel, I would grade it 4 stars.
  • Rating: 5 out of 5 stars
    5/5
    This comic masterpiece has been around for a while, but it is as politically relevant as ever. It is also very, very funny in the darkest possible way. And it tells a great story that keeps the reader flipping those pages. Don't usually give crime fiction five stars, but this more than deserves it.
  • Rating: 4 out of 5 stars
    4/5
    Love Carl Hiaasen, but this is not one of my favorites. Of course there were some classic characters in it and it was entertaining. A good summer read.
  • Rating: 5 out of 5 stars
    5/5
    I've only recently discovered Hiaasen (thanks, actually, to a reader of this list!) and after three of his books, I'm now a lifelong fan. His black humor and quirky plot pieces are just delicious. In Tourist Season a Miami newspaper columnist has decided that Florida was better off before tourists so he sets out to fix the problem. (reviewed in 1996)
  • Rating: 4 out of 5 stars
    4/5
    More of a thriller than a mystery but even more a satire of 1980s Florida and the way PR and newspapers interact. My biggest problem with it wasn't the over-the-top characters but Brian Keyes' decision to not go to the police after he discovered that Skip Wilson was involved. His reasoning behind this decision felt forced and not once did he seem to consider that his own PI license could be revoked for this obstruction. He became in effect an accessory after the fact.
  • Rating: 2 out of 5 stars
    2/5
    Sarcastic, misanthropic, sexist so-called humor that didn't seem humorous to me. Throw in interesting ways to torture dogs and this is not a book I'd recommend to anyone, but I'm sure people who are annoyed by political correctness will love it.
  • Rating: 3 out of 5 stars
    3/5
    I don't think I clicked with Hiaasen's sense of humor. I can see the potential in the story and the plotline was interesting. I just didn't get along with the execution of the plot. Most parts seemed to drag on and I was waiting forever for the "big event". I didn't like any of the characters, and there weren't even any characters that I loved to hate. I can see how this book would appeal to fans; I just think it didn't match my reading style. The reason I gave this book 3 stars instead of a lower rating was because the ending of the book was perfect. It matched the personality of the characters and no other ending would have been appropriate. I give Hiaasen full credit for fully committing to the plan.
  • Rating: 3 out of 5 stars
    3/5

    Tourist Season is a caper about an amateur terrorist organization that wants to end the tourist industry that is ruining Florida. When the president of the Miami Chamber of Commerce is found dead inside a suitcase with his legs amputated and a rubber alligator stuffed down his throat, police and newspaper reporters prefer to believe it's simply another South Florida crime. Soon, other tourists begin disappearing. The police determine there's no connection and it's not too important. This frustrates the group who is doing the killings. They start sending letters with the name of their terrorist group, Las Noches de Diciembre, linking the Chamber of Commerce death to the disappearances of a visiting Shriner and a Canadian tourist.

    Private Detective and former newsman Brian Keyes realizes the terrorist group's goal is to convince all tourists to leave the state and never return. It's not long before Brian finds himself caught up in a bizarre string of crimes: a series of murders perpetrated by a radical group using carnivorous reptiles, both living and rubber, as weapons in an attempt to free Florida from the greed, development and reckless destruction of the environment.

    I found this to be a very entertaining book, with interesting characters, and a plot that moves briskly along through a number of twists and turns. This was my first Carl Hiasson book and I can see why he has legions of fans enjoying his stories.
  • Rating: 4 out of 5 stars
    4/5
    It's hard not to like these stories. They're engaging and fun. I'll keep reading them.
  • Rating: 4 out of 5 stars
    4/5
    This guy is one sick puppy, but he tells a good story.
  • Rating: 1 out of 5 stars
    1/5
    Maybe I should admit a bias here -- I am really not a mystery fan. When I found out that the hero of this book is a private investigator, I was immediately biased against it. That the PI came from a journalist background, just like Hiaasen, made me more dubious. With the single exception of Wiley the characters are pretty much all stereotypes. I mean, come on -- the down on his luck former football player, the hotheaded latin, the mystical Indian (argghh), the good cop and the bad cop, etc. There are some humorous turns of phrase, I will grant you, but nothing here that counts as any kind of commentary on the human condition, unless you count the now overdone and trite environmental NIMBY-ism. Oh, and the hero ends up with the brilliant beauty queen -- someone please tell me that in writing this Hiaasen wasn't just indulging in personal fantasy. Nothing here to convince me to waste my time reading any of his other books.
  • Rating: 5 out of 5 stars
    5/5
    Heartbreaking. This is not a comedic book. It's the Florida cautionary tale. I bawled at the end. If you are new to Hiaasen, start here at the beginning. All of his later works pale in comparison.
  • Rating: 3 out of 5 stars
    3/5
    A solid introduction to the bizarre world of Carl Hiassen, but without the bit of humanity that he brings to later book. Representative of his type of humor - if you enjoy it, read on with the series; if not, probably should find something else.
  • Rating: 5 out of 5 stars
    5/5
    this is hiuaasen's first solo novel and it is a rollicking romp with constant humour, descriptions, and activiites that are all natural to south florida. all he did was put thbem togetherf within a few days. what would be more natural, though, for some crackers and seminoles to get together and form a terrorist organization withn the aim to get the tourists out of florida. the idea is so compelling, i have begun fantascizing forming such a thing myself.
  • Rating: 5 out of 5 stars
    5/5
    Any book that starts out with the discovery of a dead, mutilated midgetstuffed in a bright red American Tourister suitcase will grab my attentionright away. LOL In this book, a small band of disgruntled and oddlymatched terrorists take it upon themselves to try to empty Florida oftourists and snowbirds and turn it back into the lush wilderness it oncewas. A half-crazed but extremely smart newspaper columnist, a washed upformer Miami Dolphin football star, a lunatic Cuban (born and raised in NewJersey, of all places) and a quietly lethal Seminole Indian, wealthy beyondbelief from Indian bingo parlors, all have motives of their own, buttogether they make a decidedly formidible foe. Tracked reluctantly by aprivate detective with a personal ax to grind against the columnist, theyplow their way through Miami's tourist population, kidnapping and murderingrandomly selected people, just for publicity to scare the beejezus out ofthe rest of them and make them all want to GO HOME!Like his other books, Hiaasen has created a cast of characters with so manyquirks and foibles you can't help but embrace them. Even the "bad guys"have qualities to admire. Hiaasen writes with wit and finesse and his booksare always very satisfying. This one was written back in the mid 1980s andis a little dated, but still a great read. (In one place, the detective hasa hell of a time finding a telephone and I guess I'm a creature of thecurrent times because I kept thinking, "Just use your cell phone!" LOL)I do heartily recommend any of the Hiaasen books I've read and this onehappily joins that list.
  • Rating: 2 out of 5 stars
    2/5
    I have read other Carl Hiaasen books and have enjoyed them. This one, I completely disliked. I didn't care about the characters. The plot did not carry me along. I am ashamed to admit that I even finished the book, but I did. I'm trying to decide if I should include it in the stack of books to donate to our local library, but based on other reviewers, it seems that some people enjoyed this one.
  • Rating: 5 out of 5 stars
    5/5
    This is the Carl Hiaasen we know. He turns his black comedy and satire as it relates to the ever current problem of the influx of people to South Florida. A Shriner disappears leaving only his fez behind. Another local business booster is found dead with an toy alligator in his throat. You will start to want to see what the villain of the story does next, for he is more interesting than the hero. You will not want to put this book down.What I also like about his books is if you know a bit about South Florida you can see these things really happening. I did not want to give the plot away, for their are some twist and turns you will enjoy. And the title of the book is highly suggestive. So if you want a fun read, open "Tourist Seaosn".
  • Rating: 5 out of 5 stars
    5/5
    Riotous and rollicking tale of murder, mayhem and bumbling politico-environmental activists in South Florida. Hiassen's first solo effort.
  • Rating: 3 out of 5 stars
    3/5
    For Hiassen fans, familiar territory. The story centres on a motley crew of terrorists out to sabotage the Orange Bowl festivities. Their aim: to undermine the tourist economy that is ravaging Florida's environment. The novel is an immensely thought-provoking exploration of good and evil and how in the real world the issues are seldom black and white. BTW, the book is very funny.
  • Rating: 4 out of 5 stars
    4/5
    A fun murder mystery with some South Florida politics thrown in. If you live or have lived in Florida you might want to pick up one of his books - they all have something to say about Florida politics form sugar cane millionaires buying senators to the gritty truth about Disney. This one was about the environment and diappearing everglades.