Stormy Weather (novel)
Encyclopedia
Stormy Weather is a 1995
novel by Carl Hiaasen
. It takes place in the chaotic aftermath of Hurricane Andrew
in South Florida
, including insurance scams, street fights, hunt for food and shelter, corrupt bureaucracy, ravaged environment and disaster tourists.
at Walt Disney World in Orlando
, are taken aback by news of a hurricane making landfall in South Florida. To Bonnie's surprise, Max is possessed by a fervent desire to visit the disaster scene after it has passed through.
Once they arrive, Bonnie is appalled to see Max hopping through hurricane debris and gutted houses with his video camera, treating the devastation as a tourist attraction. She stalks away from him to regain her temper, and is not present when Max is snatched up by "Skink
," an ex-governor of Florida now living wild in the Florida country, who attempts to teach him some manners and respect for nature (partly through the use of a shock collar
).
At the same time, con artist Edie Marsh, and her sometime partner, an ex-convict nicknamed "Snapper," travel to the hurricane zone to work a personal injury scam. Unfortunately for them, the house they pick belongs to mobile home
salesman Tony Torres. A bit sharper than the average hurricane victim, Torres quickly sees through them and takes them hostage with a shotgun. Instead of killing them, he invites them in on his own scam: he's expecting a large settlement from the insurance company, but needs his estranged wife Neria's signature to collect. If Edie poses as the wife, Tony can cut out his real wife, and Edie gets a slice of the take.
Meanwhile, after searching fruitlessly for Max, Bonnie is befriended by Augustine Herrera, an independent young man who is roaming the county in a half-futile search for a menagerie of exotic animals loosed from his deceased uncle's wildlife farm by the hurricane (these animals appear throughout the novel in various bizarre ways).
Edie and Snapper's promising new scam falls apart when Tony Torres is abducted from under their noses and murdered by Ira Jackson, a mob
enforcer whose mother lived in one of Torres's sub-standard trailer homes and was killed during the hurricane. After unceremoniously parting ways, each of them discovers a new angle to work: Edie seduces the insurance adjuster, Fred Dove, sent to the Torres home, and convinces him to help her pose as Neria for the insurance payoff. Snapper, meanwhile, partners with Avila, an egregiously corrupt building inspector, to run a phony roofing company and con as much money as possible out of desperate homeowners.
While working the scam, Snapper does two things with long-term consequences: he manages to score a $7,000 cash "deposit" from the dim-witted wife of construction mogul Gar Whitmark; later, when pulled over for a routine traffic stop, he ambushes and savagely beats Highway Patrol Trooper Brenda Rourke, who happens to be the girlfriend of Skink's best friend, Trooper Jim Tile. In the process, he steals Rourke's service weapon, a .357 revolver. Growing bored with the roofing scam, Snapper returns to the Torres house, and blackmails Edie and Fred into letting him in on their insurance scam by posing as the now-deceased Tony Torres.
Ira Jackson's next targets Avila, the inspector who approved his mother's trailer court, sight unseen. However, Avila is rescued at the last second by an escaped African lion
, that pounces on Jackson and eats him. Avila's problems do not end there, however, when a wrathful Gar Whitmark tracks the phony roofing scam back to him, and threatens to expose Avila unless Avila pays him back the money Snapper stole, plus the cost of replacing Whitmark's roof.
Skink eventually arranges to hand Max over to Bonnie, and announces that his next order of business is to track down the man who hurt Brenda.
Bonnie has become attracted to Augustine, and at the same time aware of Max's less attractive qualities. When Augustine volunteers to help Skink in his new mission, Bonnie impulsively decides to stay in Florida and go along. Max, preoccupied with a new crisis at his job, flies back to New York without her.
The three track the car Snapper was driving when he assaulted Trooper Rourke back to the Torres house, where they see something bizarre. Yet another of Torres' disgruntled former customers has shown up looking to get even. This time it is Levon Stichler, an elderly man enraged by the loss of his home (and his deceased wife's ashes) in the hurricane. Snapper, thinking Stichler is an insurance agent, identifies himself as Torres, only to be attacked with a metal spike in return. The two quickly realize that both have made a mistake.
Fearful that the scam will be exposed, Snapper quickly concocts a plan to drive Stichler south and dump him at a hotel in the Florida Keys. As he and Edie are loading Stichler into a stolen Jeep Cherokee, Skink chooses to intervene, and both he and Bonnie are likewise taken hostage by Snapper using Trooper Rourke's stolen gun. Augustine misses the abduction as he had left the pair to retrieve a weapon from his truck, but quickly deduces what must have happened when he finds everyone missing upon return. By hitting the redial button on the house phone, he learns of their hotel destination in the Keys and notifies Jim Tile.
Tile catches up to the Jeep on the highway and begins to shadow it, but loses the tail when he gets cut off by an opening draw bridge. The sudden involvement of three more unwanted people into the scam has put Snapper on edge and soon his nerves begin to fray. He and Edie argue during the drive and the deteriorating situation is punctuated by Snapper shooting a hole in the roof of the Jeep. Snapper forces them to stop at a liquor store to get him a bottle of whiskey, making the situation even worse. However, it delays him long enough for Augustine to reach the hotel ahead of him.
Upon reaching the hotel, Snapper checks Stichler into a room. To make sure he stays there for at least a couple days, Snapper has hired a pair of prostitutes to keep him "entertained". Unknown to Snapper, the two women blabbed their part in the plan to Avila earlier in the day, and he has also come to the Hotel, demanding Snapper fix the fallout from the roofing scam. Snapper chases Avila away, forcing him to jump off a bridge into the ocean. Augustine uses this opportunity to conceal himself inside the getaway Jeep with a tranquilizer gun. When Snapper and the rest of the hostages return and attempt to leave, Jim Tile arrives and is immediately shot by Snapper, but survives thanks to a bulletproof vest.
Convinced he's killed Tile, Snapper decides to dump the Jeep and transfers everyone to a Cadillac he carjacks at gunpoint from a convenience store parking lot. Augustine emerges from hiding and follows them in the Jeep. Catching up, he manages to steer alongside and shoot Snapper through the window with a tranquilizer dart that quickly renders him unconscious.
Knowing that Tile's shooting will bring the police out in full force, the party abandons the vehicles and retreats into the Crocodile Lake National Wildlife Refuge
to wait until the coast is clear. Around a campfire that night, Skink enacts revenge on Snapper for his actions against both Rourke and Tile before knocking him out with another tranquilizer dart. Skink decides that Edie deserves a second chance but Snapper is irredeemable. Edie, Bonnie and Augustine are led back to civilization by Skink while Snapper is left to fend for himself in the wild.
1995 in literature
The year 1995 in literature involved some significant events and new books.-Events:*The Dylan Thomas Centre in Swansea is opened by Jimmy Carter....
novel by Carl Hiaasen
Carl Hiaasen
Carl Hiaasen is an American journalist, columnist and novelist.- Early years :Born in 1953 and raised in Plantation, Florida, of Norwegian heritage, Hiaasen was the first of four children and the son of a lawyer, Kermit Odel, and teacher, Patricia...
. It takes place in the chaotic aftermath of Hurricane Andrew
Hurricane Andrew
Hurricane Andrew was the third Category 5 hurricane to make landfall in the United States, after the Labor Day Hurricane of 1935 and Hurricane Camille in 1969. Andrew was the first named storm and only major hurricane of the otherwise inactive 1992 Atlantic hurricane season...
in South Florida
Florida
Florida is a state in the southeastern United States, located on the nation's Atlantic and Gulf coasts. It is bordered to the west by the Gulf of Mexico, to the north by Alabama and Georgia and to the east by the Atlantic Ocean. With a population of 18,801,310 as measured by the 2010 census, it...
, including insurance scams, street fights, hunt for food and shelter, corrupt bureaucracy, ravaged environment and disaster tourists.
Plot
Young newlyweds Max and Bonnie Brooks, on their honeymoonHoneymoon
-History:One early reference to a honeymoon is in Deuteronomy 24:5 “When a man is newly wed, he need not go out on a military expedition, nor shall any public duty be imposed on him...
at Walt Disney World in Orlando
Orlando, Florida
Orlando is a city in the central region of the U.S. state of Florida. It is the county seat of Orange County, and the center of the Greater Orlando metropolitan area. According to the 2010 US Census, the city had a population of 238,300, making Orlando the 79th largest city in the United States...
, are taken aback by news of a hurricane making landfall in South Florida. To Bonnie's surprise, Max is possessed by a fervent desire to visit the disaster scene after it has passed through.
Once they arrive, Bonnie is appalled to see Max hopping through hurricane debris and gutted houses with his video camera, treating the devastation as a tourist attraction. She stalks away from him to regain her temper, and is not present when Max is snatched up by "Skink
Clinton Tyree
Clinton Tyree, a.k.a. Skink, is a fictional character who has appeared in several novels by Carl Hiaasen, beginning with Double Whammy in 1987. He is an opponent of sprawl and development, and partakes of roadkill cuisine.-Personal history:...
," an ex-governor of Florida now living wild in the Florida country, who attempts to teach him some manners and respect for nature (partly through the use of a shock collar
Shock collar
The term shock collar is a term used in order to describe a family of training collars that deliver shocks of varying intensity and duration to the neck of a dog via a radio controlled electronic device...
).
At the same time, con artist Edie Marsh, and her sometime partner, an ex-convict nicknamed "Snapper," travel to the hurricane zone to work a personal injury scam. Unfortunately for them, the house they pick belongs to mobile home
Mobile home
Mobile homes or static caravans are prefabricated homes built in factories, rather than on site, and then taken to the place where they will be occupied...
salesman Tony Torres. A bit sharper than the average hurricane victim, Torres quickly sees through them and takes them hostage with a shotgun. Instead of killing them, he invites them in on his own scam: he's expecting a large settlement from the insurance company, but needs his estranged wife Neria's signature to collect. If Edie poses as the wife, Tony can cut out his real wife, and Edie gets a slice of the take.
Meanwhile, after searching fruitlessly for Max, Bonnie is befriended by Augustine Herrera, an independent young man who is roaming the county in a half-futile search for a menagerie of exotic animals loosed from his deceased uncle's wildlife farm by the hurricane (these animals appear throughout the novel in various bizarre ways).
Edie and Snapper's promising new scam falls apart when Tony Torres is abducted from under their noses and murdered by Ira Jackson, a mob
Mafia
The Mafia is a criminal syndicate that emerged in the mid-nineteenth century in Sicily, Italy. It is a loose association of criminal groups that share a common organizational structure and code of conduct, and whose common enterprise is protection racketeering...
enforcer whose mother lived in one of Torres's sub-standard trailer homes and was killed during the hurricane. After unceremoniously parting ways, each of them discovers a new angle to work: Edie seduces the insurance adjuster, Fred Dove, sent to the Torres home, and convinces him to help her pose as Neria for the insurance payoff. Snapper, meanwhile, partners with Avila, an egregiously corrupt building inspector, to run a phony roofing company and con as much money as possible out of desperate homeowners.
While working the scam, Snapper does two things with long-term consequences: he manages to score a $7,000 cash "deposit" from the dim-witted wife of construction mogul Gar Whitmark; later, when pulled over for a routine traffic stop, he ambushes and savagely beats Highway Patrol Trooper Brenda Rourke, who happens to be the girlfriend of Skink's best friend, Trooper Jim Tile. In the process, he steals Rourke's service weapon, a .357 revolver. Growing bored with the roofing scam, Snapper returns to the Torres house, and blackmails Edie and Fred into letting him in on their insurance scam by posing as the now-deceased Tony Torres.
Ira Jackson's next targets Avila, the inspector who approved his mother's trailer court, sight unseen. However, Avila is rescued at the last second by an escaped African lion
Lion
The lion is one of the four big cats in the genus Panthera, and a member of the family Felidae. With some males exceeding 250 kg in weight, it is the second-largest living cat after the tiger...
, that pounces on Jackson and eats him. Avila's problems do not end there, however, when a wrathful Gar Whitmark tracks the phony roofing scam back to him, and threatens to expose Avila unless Avila pays him back the money Snapper stole, plus the cost of replacing Whitmark's roof.
Skink eventually arranges to hand Max over to Bonnie, and announces that his next order of business is to track down the man who hurt Brenda.
Bonnie has become attracted to Augustine, and at the same time aware of Max's less attractive qualities. When Augustine volunteers to help Skink in his new mission, Bonnie impulsively decides to stay in Florida and go along. Max, preoccupied with a new crisis at his job, flies back to New York without her.
The three track the car Snapper was driving when he assaulted Trooper Rourke back to the Torres house, where they see something bizarre. Yet another of Torres' disgruntled former customers has shown up looking to get even. This time it is Levon Stichler, an elderly man enraged by the loss of his home (and his deceased wife's ashes) in the hurricane. Snapper, thinking Stichler is an insurance agent, identifies himself as Torres, only to be attacked with a metal spike in return. The two quickly realize that both have made a mistake.
Fearful that the scam will be exposed, Snapper quickly concocts a plan to drive Stichler south and dump him at a hotel in the Florida Keys. As he and Edie are loading Stichler into a stolen Jeep Cherokee, Skink chooses to intervene, and both he and Bonnie are likewise taken hostage by Snapper using Trooper Rourke's stolen gun. Augustine misses the abduction as he had left the pair to retrieve a weapon from his truck, but quickly deduces what must have happened when he finds everyone missing upon return. By hitting the redial button on the house phone, he learns of their hotel destination in the Keys and notifies Jim Tile.
Tile catches up to the Jeep on the highway and begins to shadow it, but loses the tail when he gets cut off by an opening draw bridge. The sudden involvement of three more unwanted people into the scam has put Snapper on edge and soon his nerves begin to fray. He and Edie argue during the drive and the deteriorating situation is punctuated by Snapper shooting a hole in the roof of the Jeep. Snapper forces them to stop at a liquor store to get him a bottle of whiskey, making the situation even worse. However, it delays him long enough for Augustine to reach the hotel ahead of him.
Upon reaching the hotel, Snapper checks Stichler into a room. To make sure he stays there for at least a couple days, Snapper has hired a pair of prostitutes to keep him "entertained". Unknown to Snapper, the two women blabbed their part in the plan to Avila earlier in the day, and he has also come to the Hotel, demanding Snapper fix the fallout from the roofing scam. Snapper chases Avila away, forcing him to jump off a bridge into the ocean. Augustine uses this opportunity to conceal himself inside the getaway Jeep with a tranquilizer gun. When Snapper and the rest of the hostages return and attempt to leave, Jim Tile arrives and is immediately shot by Snapper, but survives thanks to a bulletproof vest.
Convinced he's killed Tile, Snapper decides to dump the Jeep and transfers everyone to a Cadillac he carjacks at gunpoint from a convenience store parking lot. Augustine emerges from hiding and follows them in the Jeep. Catching up, he manages to steer alongside and shoot Snapper through the window with a tranquilizer dart that quickly renders him unconscious.
Knowing that Tile's shooting will bring the police out in full force, the party abandons the vehicles and retreats into the Crocodile Lake National Wildlife Refuge
Crocodile Lake National Wildlife Refuge
The Crocodile Lake National Wildlife Refuge is part of the United States National Wildlife Refuge System, located in north Key Largo, less than 40 miles south of Miami off SR 905...
to wait until the coast is clear. Around a campfire that night, Skink enacts revenge on Snapper for his actions against both Rourke and Tile before knocking him out with another tranquilizer dart. Skink decides that Edie deserves a second chance but Snapper is irredeemable. Edie, Bonnie and Augustine are led back to civilization by Skink while Snapper is left to fend for himself in the wild.
Epilogue
- Max and Bonnie's marriage is annulledAnnulmentAnnulment is a legal procedure for declaring a marriage null and void. Unlike divorce, it is usually retroactive, meaning that an annulled marriage is considered to be invalid from the beginning almost as if it had never taken place...
; a chance meeting between Edie and Max leads to her accompanying him back to New York, where they become engaged, while Max re-starts his advertising career, and Edie becomes active in organizing charity relief for victims of natural disasters; - Bonnie and Augustine move to a house in Chokoloskee, on the edge of the Ten Thousand Islands, where Bonnie becomes an avid outdoor photographer;
- Avila is picked up by a Coast GuardCoast guardA coast guard or coastguard is a national organization responsible for various services at sea. However the term implies widely different responsibilities in different countries, from being a heavily armed military force with customs and security duties to being a volunteer organization tasked with...
cutter, passes himself off as a CubanCubanCuban may refer to:* Something of, from, or related to Cuba, a country in the Caribbean* Cubans, people from Cuba, or of Cuban descent. For more information about the Cuban people, see Demographics of Cuba and Culture of Cuba...
refugeeRefugeeA refugee is a person who outside her country of origin or habitual residence because she has suffered persecution on account of race, religion, nationality, political opinion, or because she is a member of a persecuted 'social group'. Such a person may be referred to as an 'asylum seeker' until...
, and is repatriated to Florida, where he resumes his career as a corrupt building inspector under a false name; a few months later, he dies after being bitten by a rabidRabiesRabies is a viral disease that causes acute encephalitis in warm-blooded animals. It is zoonotic , most commonly by a bite from an infected animal. For a human, rabies is almost invariably fatal if post-exposure prophylaxis is not administered prior to the onset of severe symptoms...
rabbitRabbitRabbits are small mammals in the family Leporidae of the order Lagomorpha, found in several parts of the world...
, while fumbling an attempt to sacrifice it for a santeriaSanteríaSantería is a syncretic religion of West African and Caribbean origin influenced by Roman Catholic Christianity, also known as Regla de Ocha, La Regla Lucumi, or Lukumi. Its liturgical language, a dialect of Yoruba, is also known as Lucumi....
rite; - Gar Whitmark escapes the wrath of his homeowner customers by declaring bankruptcy and reviving his construction companies under different names; after he is killed in a freak accident at one of his construction sites, his widow donates his entire estate to the Church of ScientologyChurch of ScientologyThe Church of Scientology is an organization devoted to the practice and the promotion of the Scientology belief system. The Church of Scientology International is the Church of Scientology's parent organization, and is responsible for the overall ecclesiastical management, dissemination and...
; - Brenda Rourke recovers from her injuries, and eventually marries Jim, who gives her a replica of her mother's wedding band for Christmas;
- Snapper's skeleton is discovered in the Crocodile Lake Refuge, except for his skull, which joins Augustine's collection.
Minor Characters
(many of these characters are one-off characters, appearing only in brief vignettes, illustrating Hiaasen's overriding theme of the chaos unleashed by the Hurricane)- Keith Higstrom: a young man and ardent hunting enthusiast, whose love for guns greatly outweighs his proficiency with them (his father abruptly terminated the family hunting tradition after a teenaged Keith accidentally shot off his ear with a rifle). After the hurricane unleashes livestock from nearby farms into the Miami suburbs, Keith decides to "hunt" in his own neighborhood. Seeing a Cape Buffalo escaped from Augustine's uncle's farm, he excitedly tries to shoot it, but misses, and is impaled to death when the animal charges at him.
- Christophe Michel: a French engineer for a home construction company, with somewhat shaky credentials; in designing and building upscale suburban homes, he has, with his superiors' full encouragement, foregone structural soundness for cost-cutting. When the subdivision he designed is annihilated by the hurricane, he quickly withdraws his life savings from the bank and prepares to flee the country, only to have them stolen by Snapper.=D
Allusions to real-life persons, places, or events
- Edie refers to the William Kennedy SmithWilliam Kennedy SmithWilliam Kennedy Smith is an American physician whose work focuses on landmines and the rehabilitation of people disabled by them....
Trial when devising her plan to blackmail the family by seducing one of them. - Snapper's real name is "Lester Maddox Parsons." His parents, both white supremacists, named him after GeorgiaGeorgia (U.S. state)Georgia is a state located in the southeastern United States. It was established in 1732, the last of the original Thirteen Colonies. The state is named after King George II of Great Britain. Georgia was the fourth state to ratify the United States Constitution, on January 2, 1788...
governor Lester MaddoxLester MaddoxLester Garfield Maddox was an American politician who was the 75th Governor of the U.S. state of Georgia from 1967 to 1971....
, a famed segregationist, at his mother's insistence; his father favored James Earl RayJames Earl RayJames Earl Ray was an American criminal convicted of the assassination of civil rights and anti-war activist Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr....
, the assassin of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.. After his parents' ignominious expulsion from the Ku Klux KlanKu Klux KlanKu Klux Klan, often abbreviated KKK and informally known as the Klan, is the name of three distinct past and present far-right organizations in the United States, which have advocated extremist reactionary currents such as white supremacy, white nationalism, and anti-immigration, historically...
, Snapper's mother became a volunteer for the several political campaigns of segregationist J.B. Stoner. - Several references are made to past hurricanes passing through the Southern U.S., including CamilleHurricane CamilleHurricane Camille was the third and strongest tropical cyclone and second hurricane during the 1969 Atlantic hurricane season. The second of three catastrophic Category 5 hurricanes to make landfall in the United States during the 20th century , which it did near the mouth of the Mississippi River...
and DonnaHurricane DonnaHurricane Donna in the 1960 Atlantic hurricane season was a Cape Verde-type hurricane which moved across the Leeward Islands, Puerto Rico, Hispanola, Cuba, The Bahamas, and every state on the East Coast of the United States...
. Augustine claims his parents conceived him during Donna. - Hiaasen makes a mocking reference to a passing visit to the scene of the disaster by the President of the United StatesPresident of the United StatesThe President of the United States of America is the head of state and head of government of the United States. The president leads the executive branch of the federal government and is the commander-in-chief of the United States Armed Forces....
. Though the novel was published in 1995, during the Bill ClintonBill ClintonWilliam Jefferson "Bill" Clinton is an American politician who served as the 42nd President of the United States from 1993 to 2001. Inaugurated at age 46, he was the third-youngest president. He took office at the end of the Cold War, and was the first president of the baby boomer generation...
Presidency, Hurricane Andrew occurred in 1992; this date, coupled with Hiaasen's description of the unnamed President as a RepublicanRepublican Party (United States)The Republican Party is one of the two major contemporary political parties in the United States, along with the Democratic Party. Founded by anti-slavery expansion activists in 1854, it is often called the GOP . The party's platform generally reflects American conservatism in the U.S...
, accompanied by his son, is a clear reference to George H. Bush, accompanied either by George W. BushGeorge W. BushGeorge Walker Bush is an American politician who served as the 43rd President of the United States, from 2001 to 2009. Before that, he was the 46th Governor of Texas, having served from 1995 to 2000....
or his younger son, JebJeb BushJohn Ellis "Jeb" Bush is an American politician who served as the 43rd Governor of Florida from 1999 to 2007. He is a prominent member of the Bush family: the second son of former President George H. W. Bush and former First Lady Barbara Bush; the younger brother of former President George W...
(Jeb served as governor of Florida from 1999–2007). - The aftermath of Hurricane Andrew was fertile ground for several news stories exposing real-life corruption and incompetence in the construction industry and local and state governments; Hiaasen wrote several scathing columns in the Miami Herald. In particular, he derided the industry's and government's apologists for describing Hurricane Andrew as "the storm of the century," or "The Big One" - in other words, excusing their own shoddy construction or incompetence by exaggerating the force of the hurricane.
See also
- Hurricane AndrewHurricane AndrewHurricane Andrew was the third Category 5 hurricane to make landfall in the United States, after the Labor Day Hurricane of 1935 and Hurricane Camille in 1969. Andrew was the first named storm and only major hurricane of the otherwise inactive 1992 Atlantic hurricane season...
- Tropical cyclones in popular culture