SKINNY DIP

Heiress overboard! Joey Perrone is flipped over the railing of a cruise ship by her husband, a marine biologist who thinks she's on to the scam that would earn him a fortune to rival her inheritance. Husband Chaz is concocting falsified phosphorus tests for Red Hammernut, a politically connected prince of Everglades polluters. But Joey Perrone survives the plunge, and, aided by a typical Hiaasen swamp-land loner, fashions her revenge. When you add a world-weary old-school cop with a pair of canine-consuming pythons, Red's dogged Man Friday, and Chaz's not-as-naïve-as-you-think girlfriend--you just know you're in Hiaasen country. Actor Barry Bostwick, an exemplar of versatility, shapes and retools his voice to bring out the best--and the worst--of the author's human menagerie. M.J.B. (c) AudioFile 2004, Portland, Maine [Published: OCT/ NOV 04]