Follow me on this one. Sometimes I’ll turn on the radio and I’ll hear a song that’s either Panic At the Disco or Fall Out Boy. The only way I’ll know which band it turns out to be is whether I like it. If I like it, it’s Panic At the Disco. If I don’t, it’s Fall Out Boy. The songs sound essentially identical, there’s nothing to differentiate them, I can’t tell them apart, they have one song type. But if I hear that song and like it, it’s Panic At the Disco, and if not, it’s Fall Out Boy.
I think Christopher Moore is Fall Out Boy.
I’m lukewarm positive on Carl Hiaasen, but he’s the Panic At the Disco in this scenario, as we’re dealing with crazy characters in Florida who are borderline unbelievable and the swampy backwater they populate. He’s not always the Panic At the Disco; I’ve also read parts of books where Christopher Moore is the Fall Out Boy to other authors I’m missing, because every time I read any Christopher Moore I feel like I’m being told something is funny rather than finding something funny, so I haven’t read much. Not all of them are Florida-hijinks based, but all of them seem like someone hired Moore to ghostwrite for someone else’s stories.
This was also not the right book to win me over, as the one thing Hiaasen does indisputably well is threading the needle of absurd and plausible, and a lizard causing a town’s pheromones to go wild and amorous just doesn’t pass the test. And that’s before the B-movie star actually engages in sexual activity with it. Nope. Pass.
Your mileage may vary, and I welcome the book that will prove me wrong about Moore; even Fall Out Boy had “My Songs Know What You Did In The Dark.”
*EDIT – my metaphor breaks down slightly now that I see that FOB has changed up their style a little bit, but my larger point stands.