James Ellroy wrote Blood’s A Rover, which is a kick-ass novel full of drugs, violence and dark despair. He took the title from a poem by A.E. Housman.
Clay lies still, but blood’s a rover:
Breath’s a ware that will not keep.
Up, lad: when the journey’s over
There’ll be time enough for sleep.
A while back, Hollywood made a movie called True Romance, which was full of drugs, violence and romance. I don’t know where the title came from. But it was a rocket ship of a movie, blasting off and accelerating faster and faster as the plot moved along.
In the same way, Timothy Louis Baker has written a novella combining elements of both Blood’s A Rover and True Romance. I don’t know where Baker got the title for his book. Probably off the bumper sticker of some car or out of a travel brochure. It’s called Fantastic Florida Fun. Wherever the title came from, the book is full of brutality, drugs, and guns. With a dollop of amour mixed in to add spice. It starts off with a bang and then proceeds to ricochet wildly. Imagine Natural Born Killers as written and directed by Quentin Tarantino and you’ll have an idea of what I’m talking about.
Fantastic Florida Fun oozes freak-patrol hell-on-wheels action for serious thrill-seekers. Which means triple F bogeys.
Triple F revolves around Mark Matthew Mitchell, who, after a violent clash with his boorish stepfather, splits from Indiana and heads for Florida. On the way there, he picks up a hitchhiker named Melissa. Melissa invites Mark to come home with her. Her father owns a bunch of orange groves, which are a front for dear old daddy’s real line of work – drugs. Mark has nothing better to do, so he tags along. Pretty soon, though, Mark finds himself up to his neck in sheer craziness.
As in his other books, Baker employs his distinctive water gushing out of a dam style of writing, which consists of strong verbs and hippity-hop descriptions of people and places and events. The verbs keep the story rolling along, while the descriptions conjure up mental images that serve to ramp up the reader’s involvement. In other words, Baker has a knack for telling a story.
Essentially, Fantastic Florida Fun is a long short story that could easily be translated to the big screen. All the necessary ingredients are present: vivid characters, lots of sizzling action, dramatic tension, and dark-secrets set against a backdrop of drug trafficking. And Baker pulls all the elements together, forming a tight, explosive package.
On the Read-O-Meter, which ranges from 1 star (avoid it like the plague) to 5 stars (get it now!), Fantastic Florida Fun earns 5 stars.
Fantastic Florida Fun (Eloquent Books/ 2010) By Timothy Louis Baker
Randall Radic is a former Old Catholic priest. He is a graduate of the University of Arizona. He holds a Master of Theology, from Trinity Seminary, a Doctorate of Theology from Trinity Seminary,Th.D., and a Doctorate of Sacred Theology, S.T.D. from Agape Seminary.
After a midlife crisis, he spent time behind bars. Today, Radic has emerged a changed man. He is the author of
Gone To Hell: True Crimes of America’s Clergy (ECW Press/ Oct 2009), and
A Priest in Hell: Gangs, Murderers and Snitching in a California Jail. Radic is currently working on some unusual book projects, including one titled Raising The Dead. Visit
Randall Radic Writer's Page.
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