Tiger Shrimp Tango by Tim Dorsey
After watching "Ace Ventura, Pet Detective," Florida-phile Serge A. Storms and his druggie sidekick Coleman decide to become private investigators. They team up with Mahoney, a noir-ish P.I. who specializes in assisting victims of Internet scams, because of course, Florida is the capitol of scam-dom. When one of Mahoney's clients, an innocent woman named Brooke, is robbed by scammers on the day of her father's funeral (who was himself scammed by those people pretending to be from the IRS), Serge swings into action and dishes out his own brand of Serge-justice to scammers in need of learning how to be nice to other people. All while taking in the myriad sights of Florida.
This isn't the strongest title in the series, but it is still has a lot of humor, as well as some creative and gruesome executions - Serge's knowledge and use of science is pretty awesome. Many of the characters from previous titles in the series reappear in this one, including Johnny Vegas, the Accidental Virgin. Serge is a lovable psychopath who lives by his own strange code of ethics like any good detective (although unlike most noir detectives, Serge does score with the ladies and is highly resourceful when in need of some fast money). Coleman is along for the ride, always high, and sometimes spouts unexpected wisdom. Mahoney is a riot - he talks like a detective right out of Mickey Spillane or Raymond Chandler using tough-guy slang that is largely unintelligible, and he refers to himself in the third person. Tim Dorsey's series is a refreshing change of pace, like mental sorbet when you've been reading too much literary or historical fiction. Oliver Wyman reads the audio version and does a great job.
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