Poison ivy, allergies, and a stye on my eyelid that will likely need to be lanced - Egads!
So I've thought a new bi-weekly section for my blog. Every other week, I will do an Author Profile of an author I have read and liked, giving you information on him or her, what books by the author that I recommend, facts about his or her life, etc. Sound good? Let's begin with...
Carl Hiaasen
Born: Plantation Florida, 1953
Early Career: Hiaasen attended the University of Florida and was hired soon after graduating by The Miami Herald, where he has been ever since. In his tenure there, he has been a general assignment reporter, an investigative reporter, and, since 1985, arguably the paper's most famous weekly columnist, a position that allows him dig into and satirize everything Floridean.
Noted Books: He has written (or collaborated on) sixteen novels, written four young-adult novels, and four non-fiction books.
His more well-known, acclaimed adult novels: The Tourist Season (1986), Striptease (1993), Skinny Dip (2004), the young adult novel Hoot (2002). Striptease and Hoot were made into movies.
Themes, Style, etc: Since his first non-collaborative novel, The Tourist Season, Hiassen's novels are essentially screwball, madcap farces, with over-the-top violence and viciousness, always set in Florida. They're funny and fast-paced. Because they're always set in the Sunshine State, there's a certain amount of preachiness in them, for the author is one of the most highly recognizable observers of what has happened to Florida over the last half-century. He wittily (and snidely) comments on the destruction of the Everglades, the rampant tourism and Disneyification of it all, the polluters, the incessant corruption at all levels of government, etc. He is a fine satirist, and his zany plots are like Elmore Leonard lite - if more fun. One complaint, I guess, could be that if you've read one of his novels, you've read them all.
Why You Should Read Him: Isn't it obvious why? He's funny and his satire is easy-earned immediately recognizable to anyone who has ever been to Florida, especially Dade County and below.
Books I'd Recommend: Skinny Dip and Stormy Weather (1995), a romp featuring a bunch of outlandish characters, a breathtaking pace, and a devastated post Hurricane-Andrew Florida.
Books I Want to Read: Star Island (2010) and Hoot (2002)
Author's Website: http://edu.glogster.com/media/4/29/20/26/29202649.jpg
Our next stop on the list of Photographers is the Zurich-born
Robert Frank (#29)
I could give you a quick summary of Frank's career, but it almost all revolves around his landmark book of photography, one of the most important of the 20th century in the genre, The Americans. If you're interested, here's an NPR story about it:
http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=100688154
This book was so influential - and, as the article states, so hated by American photographers - that it has become a landmark in the genre. With a trademark style - blurred, out-of-focus foregrounds, tilted horizons - and alienated, lonely images ( jukeboxes, gas stations, empty/endless highways) Frank was able to convey an outsider's view of a particularly iconic and telling moment in American history.
Ah, yes, and a Happy 108th would-be birthday to Willem de Kooning. Above is a painting from his set of works from the 1950's, the notorious Woman.
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