Florida!!!
Honouring the weird and wonderful Sunshine State in fiction and nonfiction.
![Best. state. ever. : [a Florida man defends his homeland]](https://secure.syndetics.com/index.aspx?isbn=9781101982600/LC.GIF&client=tracsys&upc=&oclc=)
Cat tale : the wild, weird battle to save the Florida panther
Pittman, Craig, author
2020
"It wasn't so long ago when a lot of people thought the Florida panther was extinct. They were very nearly right. That the panther still exists at all is a miracle - the result of a desperate experiment that led to the most remarkable comeback in the history of the Endangered Species Act. And no one has told the whole story - until now. With novelistic detail and an eye for the absurd, Craig Pittman recounts the extraordinary story of the people who brought the panther back from the brink of extinction, the ones who nearly pushed the species over the edge, and the cats that were caught in the middle."--Provided by publisher.
Devil in the grove : Thurgood Marshall, the Groveland Boys, and the dawn of a new America
King, Gilbert
2012
Florida man : a novel
Cooper, Thomas, author
2020
"Florida, circa 1980. Reed Crowe, the eponymous Florida Man, is a middle-aged beach bum, beleaguered and disenfranchised, living on ill-gotten gains deep in the jungly heart of Florida. When sinkholes start opening on Emerald Island, not only are Reed Crowe's seedy businesses---a moribund motel and shabby amusement park---endangered but so are his secrets. Crowe, amateur spelunker, begins uncovering artifacts that change his understanding of the island's history, as well as his understanding of his family's birthright as pioneering homesteaders. As this unfolds, Crowe has to contend with Hector "Catface" Morales, a Cuban refugee, trained assassin, and crack-addicted Marielito, seeking revenge on Reed for stealing his stash of drugs and leaving him for dead (unbeknownst to Reed) in the wreckage of a plane crash in the Everglades decades ago. Meanwhile, there are other Florida men with whom Crowe must contend. There's loner and misanthrope Henry Yahchilane, a Seminole Native, who has something to hide on the island. So does irascible and pervy Wayne Wade, Reed Crowe's childhood friend turned bad penny. And there are Florida women, including Heidi Karavas, Reed Crowe's ex-wife and mother to their deceased child Lily, now a globe-trekking art curator, and Nina Arango, a Cuban refugee and fiercely protective woman with whom Reed Crowe falls in love. There are curses. There are sea monsters. There are biblical storms. There's something called the Jupiter Effect. Ultimately, Florida Man is a generation-spanning story about how a man decides to live his life, and how despite staying landlocked and stubbornly in one place, the world nevertheless comes to him"-- Provided by publisher.
Gator country : deception, danger, and alligators in the Everglades
Renner, Rebecca, author
2023
"David Grann meets Susan Orlean in this page-turning true story of an underground operation into the mysterious world of alligator poaching and its larger than life Floridian characters To catch a Florida Man, you have to become one, and that's what Officer Jeff Babauta did. As his ponytailed, whiskey-soaked alter ego, he established Sunshine Alligator Farm. His goal? Infiltrate the shady world of illegal poachers in the Florida Everglades in order to protect the natural world. A head-spinning adventure soon unfolds. Jeff deals with glow-in-the-dark alligators and high-speed airboat rides, but quickly learns that not all poachers are villains. They're simply people trying to survive, fighting against the poverty and greed holding them down. Jeff wants to solve the mystery of alligator poachers, and in doing so he must venture deeper into a strange ecosystem where right is wrong, and justice comes at the cost of those who've welcomed him into their world. Gator Country is the twisting true story of the impossible choices individuals must make to stay afloat in this world. Through its wholly unique blend of reporting, nature writing, and personal narrative, this book transports readers to vibrant and dangerous Florida landscapes and offers intimate portraits of those who call the region home. Broad in scope and vivid in detail, Gator Country is a fast paced tale of the risks people will take to survive in one of the world's most beautiful yet formidable landscapes and the undercover investigation that threatens to topple the whole scheme"-- Provided by publisher.
The guests
Hunt, Margot (Novelist), author
2024
As a hurricane besieges their coastal Florida town, the Davies family invites close friends to wait out the storm in comfort and style, but when three uninvited strangers seeking safe haven arrive, long-held secrets are revealed, one by one, until only one truth remains: not everyone is going to make it out alive.
Hotel Scarface : where cocaine cowboys partied and plotted to control Miami
Farzad, Roben, author
2017
The house on Biscayne Bay
Cleeton, Chanel, author
2024
With the Great War finally behind them, thousands of civilians and business moguls alike flock to South Florida. When wealthy industrialist Robert Barnes and his wife, Anna, build Marbrisa, a glamorous estate on Biscayne Bay, they become the toast of the newly burgeoning society. Years later, Carmen Acosta journeys to Marbrisa. On the surface, the gilded estate looks like paradise, but Carmen quickly learns that nothing at Marbrisa is as it seems. Carmen's own life is soon in jeopardy - unless she can unravel the secrets buried beneath the mansion's facade and stop history from repeating itself.
The magic kingdom
Banks, Russell, 1940- author.
2022
In 1971, a property speculator named Harley Mann begins recording his life story onto a reel-to-reel machine. Harley recounts that after his father's sudden death, his family migrated down to Florida-mere miles away from what would become Disney World-to join a community of Shakers. Though this initially saved Harley and his family from complete ruin, when Harley began falling in love with Sadie Pratt, a consumptive patient who lived on the grounds, his loyalty to the Shakers and their conservative worldview grew strained and, ultimately, broke. As Harley dictates his story across more than half-a-century, the truth about Sadie, Elder John, and the Shakers comes to light, clarifying the past into a world we recognize today.
No words : a novel
Cabot, Meg, author
2021
Arriving on Little Bridge Island for a speaking engagement, best-selling children's author Jo Wright comes face-to-face with her nemesis, writer Will Price, who, much to her surprise, wants to make amends and prove to her that he is a changed man--until disaster strikes.
The reformatory : a novel
Due, Tananarive, 1966-, author
2023
"A gripping, page-turning novel set in Jim Crow Florida that follows Robert Stephens Jr. as he's sent to a segregated reform school that is a chamber of terrors where he sees the horrors of racism and injustice, for the living, and the dead."-- Publisher's description.
Today tonight forever : a novel
Sneed, Madeline Kay, author.
2023
A bridesmaid for one of her oldest friends, 33-year-old Athena Matthias, still reeling from a messy divorce from her wife, arrives in Watercolor, Florida, for the wedding where an unexpected guest from the past throws the entire wedding party into chaos.
