Kinky Friedman (1944–2024)

It needed more armadillos and less lace.

Aside from that, this is a pleasant and occasionally delightful read. Kinky reminds me of no one so much as a menopausal Izzy Spellman. He shuttles between NYC to his family’s remote Texas ranch for kids, dragging nostalgia around like a suitcase.

“I’d become somewhat ambivalent about performing country music gigs lately and I’d come to realize that anyone who uses the word ‘ambivalent’ probably shouldn’t have been a country singer in the show more first place.”

After a send-off from the NY crew, he and his cat head to Texas. Plans to relax at the ranch and resume his job of hummingbird feeder-filler and laundry lackey are derailed by the spitfire justice of the peace, Pat Knox, who is convinced there is a serial killer bumping off little old ladies. Kinky thinks Pat is crazy as a betsy-bug and tries to avoid investigating, as his track record seems to have been problematic.

“Over the past few years I’d tried my fine Hebrew hand as an amateur detective in the city, resulting in both the criminals and the policemen not being my friends. I was an equal opportunity offender.”

It’s true; between his sideways humor and ever-present cigar, Kinky does have a habit of offending, even when he is kind enough to leave his cigar outside the library. But when some preliminary research gives him unique insight, he feels he has a duty to investigate.

The best part about this story isn’t the mystery; its the route you take getting there. In a strange way, Kinky reminds me of Bertie Wooster, perhaps because he is so relentlessly himself as he cultivates obliviousness. Between the conversations with the cat and his car– “the door is ajar“– I find the ol’ nasolabial folds curving upward.

“With the cat gone, there wasn’t even anyone around to talk to. When you have to talk to a cat that isn’t there, you might as well be talking to yourself.”

That said, the mystery is decent, although it has an obvious red herring. The reader can’t really solve it before Kinky, so at least it avoids the desire to shake the main character into awareness. As the story progresses, more attention shifts to the mystery and less to Kinky’s life at the ranch. The armadillo, ‘Dilly,’ only makes one brief appearance–I would have enjoyed a bit more of Kinky’s shenanigans and maybe one less elderly lady, as the best part is definitely the clever writing along the way that gives rise to more than a few smiles.

I had this one in my personal library for years, attracted by the title and the great cover. I finally read (reread?) in an effort to clean off shelves, but guess I won't be sending it on to the used book store.

“You’ve never held a real job as long as I’ve known you,” Rambam was saying. “What makes you think you need a vacation?”
“It’s not a vacation,” I said, quoting my sister Marcie. “It’s a lifestyle.”


Three and a half stars, rounding up for smiles. show less

To be honest, all of the Kinky Friedman books start to sound the same, and I needed a few prompts to remember Armadillos and Old Lace.

The Kinkster leaves his New York domicile to return to his Texas roots and gets mixed up in a murder investigation. Of course, the plot is really just an opportunity for Kinky to muse on a range of issues near and dear to his heart, although yet again I was disappointed that he made no mention of his brontosaurus foreskin boots.

Kinky, or the Kingster, as he likes to call himself is a Jewish detective who likes cats. But he only changes the litter box every seven years whether it needs it or not. So the cat will often find other places to take care of things, a situation that Kink's friends find unsettling to say the least. He finds that as cat scats age they become dried out and stiff enabling them to be collected by stabbing with a boning knife.
You're probably beginning to get the idea that this book has some show more humorous overtones. That's putting it mildly. I suspect the family might have been wondering about my sanity watching me mow the lawn laughing out loud listening to this hysterical romp.
The whole thing starts when Kinky gets stuck with a pink little valise left in the airplane seat next to him by a very attractive woman. She leaves for the lavatory just before landing and to Kinky's consternation never is seen leaving the plane. He collects the little bag and the woman's suitcase assuming that she will call him using his business card that he had given her during the course of their conversation.
It turns out that many people are interested in the valise. He can't bear not to peak inside and finds several illegal passports that were obviously intended to be used by persons of less than high moral character, e.g. international terrorists. Soon the State Department, the Mossad, and Arab terrorists are all trying to find the passports. They know they are in his apartment because, as Kinky and his friends discover, a miniature transmitter was hidden in one of them. Kinky had decided to hide them in the only place he know no one would look: his cat's little box. That leads to all sorts of scatological remarks.
The book is filled with all sorts of double-entendres and puns. His toilet is called the dumper but using it for its intended purpose is "taking a Nixon." And when the terrorists delivery the cutoff finger of someone as a warning all sorts of "let the fingers do the walking" jokes permeate the chapter.
It's really a lot of fun, and the audio version is read by one of my favorite readers, Dick Hill. show less

God bless Kinky Friedman. I think I'm in love with the little pervert. Kinky puts himself in harm's way yet again, this time to help establish NY Ratso's origins. Scary thought that. Kinky has a wonderful way of crucifying the English language, but the result is a truly enjoyable escape.