Skin Tight

A totally incompetent and unqualified, but highly successful plastic surgeon has caused and nastily covered up the accidental death of one of his patients, and then tries to arrange a hit on the inconvenient investigator who's getting too close to the truth. He turns out to be hysterically incompetent at that, as well. Satirical, farcical, ironic, and downright ridiculous ---what a hoot! Perfect stuff for those times when the brain wants a real vacation and the psyche needs a little nonsense.
May 2015

Carl Hiaasen must have some wild and crazy nightmares.

I normally avoid books with blood and guts kind of descriptions…but there is something about the wickedly outlandish scenarios in Carl Hiaasen’s stories that manage to keep me reading. Skin Tight is no exception, with everything from a stuffed marlin to a weed whacker used as deadly weapons.

Mick Stranahan’s peace and quiet is disrupted when a mafia hit man comes looking for him. As Mick tries to track down who hired the hit man; he unveils problems in the plastic surgery field, exposes judicial corruption, and follows the bribery money.

Another Hiaasen romp featuring "retired" Florida special investigator Mick
Stranahan. Mick's quiet life in the small house out in Stiltsville in the
bay is disrupted by people who keep trying to kill him. Who is it that
wants him dead? that's the big question. There isn't a lack of candidates,
either, after a career like his putting bad guys behind bars for years. He
keeps being shadowed by a hitman with the world's worst complexion and
manages to barely escape fire bombs, automatic gunfire, and poison. Along
the way, innocent and not so innocent bystanders are dropping like flies.
Shady lawyers, vicious plastic surgeons, starlet wannabes, a vindictive
ex-wife, and a self-important TV exposé reporter, Mick deals with everybody
with the show more same straight-forward method. All he wants to do is sit on the
dock and fish. Is this too much to ask?

I absolutely love the way Hiaasen writes. His recurring characters are like
old friends I've missed. He's got a flair for the ridiculous without going
over the top. The good guys are gritty and human, the bad guys are
deliciously bad and meet very satisfactory ends. There's always a little
sex and maybe a romance, but the story is the thing. This man spins a yarn
from multicolored fibers and draws you right in. 5 show less

Good, nearly hard-boiled fun. I laughed out loud. I didn’t cry. Stranahan is a retired dick just trying to get away from the action when the action comes to get him out in Stiltsville, Fla. And he’s had plenty to get away from: married five times to waitresses. You see, he’s a softie, really. Once he’s slept with a woman, he can’t help proposing. Oh yeah, and he’s killed five men, too.

Carl Hiaasen creates the craziest characters. I would expect no other author to create an ex-Amish hit man with a horrible facial disfigurement and a weed whacker for a hand replacement, and make him believable. Unlike some of Hiaasen’s other novels, the situation here isn’t completely outrageous… just the cast (including Reynaldo Flemm, who is so obviously patterned after Geraldo Rivera in his early days of being attacked by white supremacists). Someone is trying to kill Mick Stranahan, and once he discovers that it’s related to the disappearance of a young woman four years ago, he figures the best way for his life to return to its peaceful normality is for him to solve that mystery. It becomes a game of kill or be killed for show more Mick, and along the way he may just have met his 6th wife. I enjoyed this much more than the last Hiaasen I read, Sick Puppy. show less

This is the second adult book I have read by Hiaasen, the first being "Strip Tease". I really enjoyed Strip Tease so I had high expectations & this book did not disappoint. It was laugh out loud funny in parts and contained a crazy cast of characters, including a world renowned plastic surgeon who doesn't know how to perform plastic surgery and a hit man with a terrible complexion and a Weed Whacker for a hand!!! The first chapter features a dead body being found and someone else being killed, so there is no shortage of action or suspense! Hiaasen's books are like really good movies: they feature action, adventure, suspense, a bit of romance and several twists and turns!

Sometimes when the news is bad, the only thing you can do is to turn to the razor-sharp wit of Carl Hiaasen who never fails to make me laugh. In this book he turns his gimlet eye to Florida’s plastic surgery industry. You’ll think twice about booking a facelift after reading this book.