Sick Puppy
First edition
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| Author | Carl Hiaasen |
|---|---|
| Cover artist | Ross McDonald |
| Country | United States |
| Language | English |
| Publisher | Alfred A. Knopf |
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Publication date
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February 2000 |
| Media type | Print (Hardback & Paperback) |
| Pages | 352 |
| ISBN | |
| OCLC | 41565087 |
| 813/.54 21 | |
| LC Class | PS3558.I217 S53 2000 |
| Preceded by | Lucky You |
| Followed by | Basket Case |
Sick Puppy is a 2000 novel by Carl Hiaasen.
Florida's vapid, corrupt Governor, Richard "Dick" Artemus, has no agenda beyond unquestioning obedience to the whims of his major campaign contributors. One of these contributors, a former drug smuggler-turned-developer, Robert Clapley, plans to bulldoze the small Toad Island and remake it into "Shearwater Island," with high rise condominiums and golf courses. The project requires the construction of a massive new bridge to the mainland, to accommodate Clapley's cement trucks. On Artemus's recommendation, Clapley hires Palmer Stoat, a lobbyist, to expedite the government funding for the bridge construction.
By random happenstance, Stoat becomes subject to the wrath of Twilly Spree, an independent ecoterrorist. Spree obsessively pursues Stoat after watching him litter the highway from his luxury Range Rover, and tracks him back to his Fort Lauderdale residence where he and his wife, Desirata, live.
Twilly begins by arranging ironic pranks - hijacking a garbage truck and dumping its load into Desirata's open convertible, and filling Stoat's Range Rover with dung beetles - but is aggravated when the "unfathomably arrogant" Stoat fails to get the point, and continues to litter. When Twilly breaks into Stoat's home, he is followed out by Stoat's massive Labrador Retriever, "Boodle", and then by Desirata herself. "Desi", who is increasingly unhappy with her marriage, tells Twilly that he is "aiming low" if he is trying to correct Stoat's misbehavior. She guides him to Toad Island, the site of Stoat's latest "fix," and Twilly becomes vehemently opposed to the despoiling of the island. Even Desi is appalled to see that Clapley's construction crew deliberately buried thousands of oak toads (the island's namesake) to avoid later protest by environmentalists.
Twilly orders Desi to return to Stoat and tell him that Twilly will murder Stoat's beloved dog if he doesn't kill the bridge project. At first, Stoat doesn't take the threat seriously, until Twilly sends him a Labrador's severed ear via FedEx (actually sliced from the corpse of a roadkill Labrador Twilly found). The dog becomes Twilly's companion, after he changes his name to "McGuinn."
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