Editorial Content for Coconut Cowboy

Tim Dorsey doesn’t really write thrillers, at least in the classical (or even contemporary) sense. His Serge A. Storms series is probably closer to fantasy and hilarity. It’s just that so many of these books ring true that one can imagine a real-life Serge, accompanied by Coleman, his perpetually toasted companion, cruising up and down and across the streets and highways of Florida, looking to right wrongs and avenge slights in a terminal and permanent way.

COCONUT COWBOY, Dorsey’s latest Serge chronicle, consists of two stories that do not converge until late in the book. The primary story finds Serge obsessed with the classic Easy Rider film, and actually leaving the state of Florida for a minute or two with Coleman to finish the celluloid journey that Captain America and Billy --- definitely not the comic book heroes --- began almost five decades ago before it was so unexpectedly and rudely interrupted. Their journey is pretty much what we might come to expect at this juncture from Dorsey and his protagonist.

"Dorsey’s penchant for the arcane and the strange that lies just beneath the swamp of the state he loves/hates is matched by his ability to devise Rube Goldberg methods of killing those who raise Serge’s ire."

Serge points out interesting, hidden locations along the way while dispensing rough and innovative justice to the rude and conniving. Coleman stays in a perpetual state of buzz while occasionally expressing a platitude or two more by accident and less by design. Their pilgrimage is a hilarious work of art, one that even has its own George Hanson in the form of a Princeton college student named Matt, who finds Coleman and Serge, rather than vice versa.

Meanwhile, the municipality of Wobbly, Florida --- a designated speed trap --- is ground zero for all sorts of corruption, a less than immovable object that is in the path of an irresistible force named Serge, for all sorts of reasons. The end result won’t be pretty, but, as is usually the case with Serge and Coleman, it’s very satisfying.

Serge is such a common-sewer of Florida trivia, obscure and otherwise, that one cannot read a Dorsey book without being tempted to jump into the car, fill up the gas tank, and engage in a madcap pilgrimage to whatever sites Serge and Coleman have visited, for better or worse. He also has unique ways of dispensing his rough justice to those who cross his path without a proper display of manners, or who take advantage of the unfortunate. Dorsey’s penchant for the arcane and the strange that lies just beneath the swamp of the state he loves/hates is matched by his ability to devise Rube Goldberg methods of killing those who raise Serge’s ire. And if you’re looking for a movie that you haven’t heard of, or maybe have forgotten, Serge always has a recommendation for one with an inevitable tie-in to the Sunshine State.

All that, and an entertaining if madcap caper novel to boot. What more could you ask for? At least reasonably?