Book Review: Scat

Title: Scat

Author: Carl Hiaasen

Publisher: Alfred A. Knopf

Date: 2009

Length: 371 pages

Quote: “‘I don’t care what it looks like, or how bad it stinks...as long as it’s oil,. All I need—or, I should say, all we need—is genuine Florida crude to drip on some sucker’s desk at the Department of the Interior...’”

Before the comic novels, Florida native Carl Hiaasen wrote news articles about the environment he loved. He even published a collection of news stories about environmental destruction n Florida. Then he tried putting those facts into rgw dien id novels and became rich and famous. All to the good, if the sales of his novels help him to buy more land to preserve from "developers." 

Each of his novels was meant to stand alone, but a few characters appear in more than one. Twilly Spree, a character in Scat, first appeared in novels for adults with more explicit vice and violence. Parents might object if a review of a book for grades five up recommended a book like Sick Puppy, but those who like Twilly will enjoy his interactions with grown-up enviro-villains. Twilly had a mentor, too, in earlier adult novels, who was even more outrageous.

In Scat, the mayhem and grotesquery haver been toned doiwn to ar level adults might find almost realistic. Nick's father is hurt, not killed, in Iraq. Nobody is eaten by wildlife. Nobody molests Maria, or even makes crass remarks about her Cuban heritage. Duane does not serve time in prison for the crime he didn't commit. A baddie will go to jail, but nobody will be sliced up by a boat propeller, or any of the other things that happen to deserving baddies in Hiaasen's novels for adults. .

Now that parents have relaxed, no more spoilers. All I'll say is that, while I don't find wildlife that can prey on humans to make very sympathetic characters, Hiaasen does. For him, if the panther survives and gets her cub back, that's a happy ending. You don't have to agree with him to enjoy this book.