Star Island

Hiaasen fans will love his latest, which finds him as acerbic and hilarious as ever. Narrator Stephen Hoye throws himself into the material with zeal. Hoye is a great fit for this material. With perfect timing he delivers one comic zinger after another. Hiaasen creates wonderful over-the-top characters, and Hoye delivers them with exactly the right personalities. Cherry Pye is a 22-year-old pop star whose meteoric rise to stardom at age 14 is fast flaming out in a haze of drugs, alcohol, and bad choices in the love department. Hiaasen surrounds her with a host of parasites who will do whatever it takes to keep their meal ticket afloat and lets the mayhem ensue. D.G. (c) AudioFile 2010, Portland, Maine

July 5, 2010
The career of singer Cheryl Bunterman (aka Cherry Pye), who debuted with Jailbait Records at age 15, is foundering due to her lack of talent and indiscriminate appetite for drugs, booze, and sex in this outrageous, offbeat novel from Hiaasen (Nature Girl). Among those struggling to keep Cherry's career afloat are her mother, Janet Bunterman; producer Maury Lykes; and "undercover stunt double" Ann DeLusia, who will, say, mislead the press into thinking Cherry is out and about when she's really in rehab. Hiaasen has easy targets in misbehaving celebrity sightings, tabloid stalkings, and spin control experts, and he makes the most of them. Crooked real estate developer Jackie Sebago and paparazzo Bang Abbott, who plans to hitch his wagon to Cherry's star, add to the madcap fun. Mayhem follows after Bang kidnaps Ann instead of Cherry by mistake, and ex-Florida governor and eco-vigilante Clinton "Skink" Tyree, who was smitten with Ann after a chance encounter, rushes to her rescue. The torrent of pop culture barbs are bound to please Hiaasen's ardent fans. 500,000 first printing; 12-city author tour.