A humorous take on the traditional Florida crime novel, Key Monster is the perfect read while relaxing on a tropical beach or flying off to one.
A burnt-out Chesapeake charterboat captain, a failure at life, Eugene "Winch" Winchell pilots the "Stuffed Ham", a plush cruiser he found at an IRS auction. Twice divorced, twice busted, and nearing 40, Winch is deeply in debt, financially and emotionally. His parents have recently died, he finds himself slipping back into old addictions, and he may have just seen a sea monster in the bay. Winch handles trouble as he always does: he gets trashed. Seeking a safe harbor, he flees his monsters, heading for Key West aboard the "Ham", but the unwitting captain is being followed. One pursuer wants his boat back, over Winch's dead body; a second wants the money Winch owes him; and another is just a fish who wants some more food.
In tropical Key West, Winch finds himself running a tour boat business, teamed with Laura Chadwick, a beautiful blonde with a dark secret, and Daiquiri Taylor, a 6-foot, black, Rutgers-educated drag queen. And though they are all fleeing (or fighting) their personal monsters, only one of the monsters has scales and a taste for live tarpon.
Populated by a Cuban ballplayer plucked from a sinking raft, the world's richest man and his B-movie starlet wife, rampaging skinheads, and a nasty-tempered investment banker packing a grudge and a .38, Key Monster follows in the footsteps of Carl Hiaasen and Lawrence Shames, and then goes one step farther. The first novel from short-story writer Lee Dravis, Key Monster confronts the fact that everyone has a monster in their lives: a pompous boss, a negligent spouse, a nasty in-law, a dangerous stranger, or even a (possibly) mythical sea creature.
Excerpt
For a long moment, he gazed down at the corpse. Then he noticed Brant's sketchpad on one of the deckchairs, the pages flapping in the wind. Winch reverently picked it up and stared at Brant's last drawing, one he had made only minutes ago at the Oarhouse. It depicted the face of a killer.
He took the pad below and stowed it. When he reemerged, he was grasping the neck of a bottle of rum. Winch tilted it back, overfilling his mouth and splashing the warm liquor down his chin, onto his denim shirt where it mixed with the tears he didn't even know he was spilling.
A raw in your face story of teenage love, lust, murder, and revenge set in the Bronx in the early seventies, where the cold business world of organize crime melds with the brutality of street gang warlords that ignites a winner takes all battle for u
A jaded cold case investigator finds himself trying to solve a thirty year old mystery when the skeletal remains of two missing teenagers are found in a national park.
