Earlier this week, I described Flashman as the most heroic anti-hero you’ll encounter. Now we’ve got the most likeable serial killer you’d better hope to meet only on the pages of Tim Dorsey’s books.
Serge Storms is appropriately named. A force of nature, he dominates every situation he walks into simply by doing whatever he wants. And what he wants can run the gamut from bizarre to bizarrer (hunh, spellcheck says that word is ok). And that quality is necessary, because Serge is actually quite a reasonable fellow alongside the lowlifes he gets entangled with. And don’t assume those lowlifes are all low—some are big in state politics; some have wealth, influence and mob connections; and some use any tool at hand to manipulate other people. Serge doesn’t care about any of that.
His dominant characteristic is his love of Florida trivia, and his exploration of the state provides the vehicle for his jet-fueled adventures. Nothing escapes his encyclopedic knowledge, from the location of the first drive-in restaurant to the hotel room where the Beatles stayed, and he insists on sharing that knowledge by visiting all those sites, usually with hapless parties in tow.
In Florida Roadkill, a whole host of unsavory characters is chasing a suitcase filled with $5 million in cash. There’s the ex-socialite stripper who prefers her men rich and dead. There’s the shock-jock radio commentator who rode his infamy to a spot in the Florida legislature. There’s the dentist whose insurance scam cost him his hand (courtesy of Serge), and the insurance executive who paid out that $5 million. The inept motorcycle gang, the ruthless mobile home retirement king, the…. Well, you get the picture. Unfortunately, the suitcase is in the trunk of a car driven by a couple of nice guys out for their annual friendship-maintenance vacation, and they don’t even know it.
The real attraction of the series is not necessarily the specifics of whatever caper Serge involves himself in, but by the careening speed with which the characters move. Dorsey creates some quirky ones, including Serge’s laid-back fulltime stoner sidekick Coleman. Knowing that they are all going to collide at some point is half the fun—seeing how they get there is a good portion of the rest.
A good portion? What about the rest? Well, Serge is, after all, a serial killer who uses his restless creativity to appropriately punish (err, murder) lowlifes who make life difficult for the rest of us. Like the guy who plays his stereo too loud at intersections and discovers to his regret that the noise from a space shuttle launch is capable of vibrating a Rube Goldberg-esque contraption that sets off his doom.
Florida Roadkill is Dorsey’s first novel and, to my mind, the darkest of the series. In later books, Dorsey trimmed down the cast of bad guys, amped up the comedy level, and added more supporting characters who turn up in different entries. He also steered a little more away from Serge’s past, which included a stint in a seriously scary prison, and towards a legacy from Serge’s grandfather. Best of all, Dorsey’s writing has also improved over the course of the series.
Florida has long competed with Los Angeles as the location for crime stories, and Dorsey joins a parade of other writers who base their characters there. You’ll see elements of John D. MacDonald’s Travis McGee series (the wealthy sociopaths), Carl Hiaasen (the unpredictable capers), and the quirky characters of Elmore Leonard. The only thing missing is the earnest Doc Smith from Randy Wayne White’s series. Otherwise, Serge Storms is a wholly original, extremely puzzling, and thoroughly enjoyable bad guy hero.
Check the WRL catalog for Florida Roadkill
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