artemis

Andy Weir wrote The Martian--big book, big movie; didn't read, did see--so I figured I'd give this book a go. Artemis is also space oriented, and I guess you could call it SciFi, where I guess you'd probably say that The Martian was more Speculative Fiction. I know they're both SF, nerds can fight it out over here-->

Artemis takes place a little further in the future, at a space station on the Moon, that has a civilian population, so I guess you'd call it a colony. The moon colony, Artemis, is a little like the early European colonies in that they are remote enough that the folks that really should be controlling them (Earth folks) are really too remote to actually control squat.

That fact, along with our gal Jasmine "Jazz" Bashara, are the engine that drives this story. Weir does a great job putting together a world that is both familiar and foreign, futuristic, yet totally grokable. yeah, I'm looking at you Robert Heinlein, you crazy, dead bastard

Artemis is fun, well written, easy to read, and a little hard to put down. Jazz Bashara is a great character, and I don't know Andy Weir very well, but if I was a betting man, my money would be on see her again in another installment.

Read this book. 

And I guess I'll have to look up the first one at some point. 

Note: According to one source I found, they may also be making a movie out of this book too.

razor girl

Razor Girl is a 2016 novel by Carl Hiaasen. I haven't read Hiaasen's stuff before, but he reads like a cross between Elmore Leonard and Tom Robbins (who shows up in my 'Favorites' list on the right.) Yeah, like that, so strap in and hang on.

Razor Girl, who is better known in the text as Merry Mansfield (that's "Merry, as in Merry Christmas!" and Mansfield, as in va-va-voom!) runs into our man Lane Coolman early on in the story, which makes me think that these two will be the main characters moving forward.

Nope.

That ends up being a guy named Andrew Yancy, who was also  in Hiaasen's Bad Monkey. Yancy is an ex-cop, living in Key West, trying to stay out of trouble--but not too hard--when Merry Mansfield drops into his life. Things start out as a simple misunderstanding, but quickly spin out of control. Throw in some petty crime, some wannabe, back-woods, racist, reality TV folks, members of the Calzone crime family from New York, a 1-800 lawyer, and some imported super-sized rats, that may or may not be intelligent, and you got yourself a romp!

This book reminds me of those frenetic, ensemble cast movies of the 60s and 70s. Movies like Its a Mad Mad Mad Mad World, and What's Up, Doc? Actually, Merry Mansfield reminds me of Streisand's character Judy Maxwell, in What's Up, Doc? I'm also reminded of things like Get Shorty, and Pulp Fiction (both movies based on books by Elmore Leonard.)

This book was a blast. I'll be looking for Bad Monkey, and others by Carl Hiaasen.

Read this book.