The Neon Flamingo by W.R. Philbrick

My rating: 3 of 5 stars

The biggest plus to this book by Philbrick is his ability to capture the feel and look of the Keys with words. This is the second of the Stash series I’ve read and I’d say he captured the location better than other books set in the area, including James Hall’s Thorn series.

Otherwise the story is pretty straightforward with a mystery lingering of the main character, Stash, in search of a kid. Lots of layabouts in the story. Everyone was portrayed as having no ambition to do much of anything. Even a couple rich central characters were stripped of any future. It all gets a bit depressing and the story stumbles from layabout to layabout. Soon, it’s hard to care about what happened to the kid as even the Stash character seems to lose interest.

Again it’s the narrative of the location that is the highlight. Philbrick accurately describes natural areas, fishing docks, boats, seedy areas of the Keys, etc.

The story is of little energy, but the setting is great. Therefore…

Bottom line: i recommend the book.

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Soon three new Swampy’s #Florida Easter cards will be available! Above is one of the images I did of the cards. I’ll post a link when available so you can purchase some! – http://swampysflorida.com/?p=9837

Here’s the first books of the year! I kicked the year off with a Vince Flynn thriller. Then I moved on to reading of the 2nd Seminole War. That lead me to read of the life of Thomas S. Jesup. I went back to Flynn’s third book. I wandered into the Everglades and back to war with ‘Discovering the Civil War in Florida’.