Plot Summary
Swamp Death and Secrets
On a cold January day, Sammy Tigertail, a young half-Seminole, finds himself in trouble after a drunken white tourist named Wilson dies of a heart attack on his airboat. Fearing blame and prosecution, Sammy dumps the body in the river, haunted by guilt and the sense of being cursed by his mixed heritage. This act sets off a chain of events that will draw together a cast of misfits, each with their own secrets and grievances, into the wilds of the Ten Thousand Islands.
Honey's Fury Unleashed
Honey Santana, a single mother with a history of overreacting to rudeness and injustice, is fired from her job after attacking her lecherous boss, Mr. Piejack. She's fiercely protective of her son Fry and obsessed with civility. When a telemarketer interrupts her dinner and insults her, Honey's compulsion for justice is triggered. She becomes fixated on tracking down the caller, setting in motion a plan for revenge that will take her—and others—deep into the Florida wilderness.
Telemarketer Sparks Revenge
Boyd Shreave, a failed salesman now working as a telemarketer, makes the fateful call to Honey. His own life is a mess: he's in a loveless marriage, having an affair with his coworker Eugenie, and is about to be fired for losing his temper on the phone. Honey's response to his rudeness is not to hang up, but to hunt him down, using her brother's investigative skills to find his real identity and location. Honey's plan: lure Boyd to Florida under false pretenses and teach him a lesson about decency.
The Unraveling of Boyd
After being fired, Boyd's affair with Eugenie becomes his only solace. His wife Lily, suspecting infidelity, hires a private investigator, Dealey, to gather evidence. Meanwhile, Honey, posing as a telemarketer herself, offers Boyd and Eugenie a free Florida ecotour as part of a fake real estate promotion. Desperate for escape and adventure, Boyd accepts, dragging Eugenie into Honey's elaborate trap.
Sammy's Exile Begins
Haunted by the dead tourist and his own sense of not belonging, Sammy leaves the reservation, taking a guitar and a rifle, and heads into the Ten Thousand Islands to find peace and isolation. Along the way, he encounters Gillian, a restless college student who insists on joining him after a drunken night with her friends. Sammy's attempt at solitude is quickly derailed by Gillian's presence and the ghosts—literal and figurative—that follow him.
The Ecotour Plot
Honey secures kayaks and prepares for her "ecotour," enlisting her ex-husband Perry Skinner's help for supplies and tickets. She convinces Boyd and Eugenie to come to her makeshift "eco-lodge"—her trailer painted with garish wildlife murals. The plan is to take them deep into the islands, away from civilization, and confront Boyd about his behavior, hoping to reform him through nature and forced reflection.
Stalkers and Schemes Collide
As Honey, Boyd, and Eugenie paddle into the wild, they are trailed by Louis Piejack, Honey's vengeful ex-boss, who is obsessed with her and bent on revenge. Dealey, the private investigator, is also in pursuit, hoping to catch Boyd in the act for Lily's divorce case. Meanwhile, Sammy and Gillian, now joined by Dealey (who is kidnapped by Piejack and then by Sammy), are hiding out on another part of the island, their fates soon to intersect with the others.
Kayaks Into the Wild
Honey's ecotour quickly devolves as Boyd and Eugenie prove inept and ungrateful. The kayaks are stolen by Sammy, who needs supplies, leaving Honey, Boyd, and Eugenie stranded. Honey tries to deliver her lecture on civility, but Boyd is unreceptive and increasingly panicked. Eugenie, bored and frustrated, eventually leaves with Sammy when he returns for more supplies, seeking adventure and escape from Boyd.
Hostages and Hauntings
As night falls, the island becomes a crucible for all the characters. Honey ties up Boyd to prevent further violence. Piejack, now deranged and physically deteriorating, kidnaps Honey, intent on possessing her. Fry, worried for his mother, convinces his father Perry to search for her, despite his own injuries. The various threads—Sammy's guilt, Gillian's longing, Dealey's misadventures, and the pursuit of Honey—begin to converge in the darkness.
The Island's Dark Night
Piejack's obsession turns violent as he drags Honey through the island, but she resists fiercely. Fry, wearing a football helmet due to a concussion, finds his mother and tries to protect her. Perry and Sammy arrive just as Piejack threatens the family with a gun. In a chaotic struggle, Sammy hands Perry his guitar, which Perry uses to kill Piejack, saving Honey and Fry. The violence is both comic and cathartic, ending Piejack's reign of terror.
Showdown at Dismal Key
The Coast Guard, summoned by Dealey's call to Lily, arrives to rescue the wounded and lost. Eugenie and Gillian are airlifted out, Dealey is saved, and Sammy slips away, still haunted but free. Boyd, abandoned by everyone, is left to fend for himself, eventually stumbling into a group of religious campers who mistake him for a messiah. He is ultimately left alone, forced to confront his own emptiness.
Family, Forgiveness, and Farewell
Honey, Perry, and Fry return home, battered but alive. Honey's jaw is wired shut, Perry is recovering from a gunshot wound, and Fry is healing from his concussion. The family, once fractured, finds a new equilibrium, with Perry moving back in "temporarily." Honey's obsession with civility is tempered by the ordeal, and Fry, wise beyond his years, urges his parents to be cautious but hopeful about their reunion.
The Aftermath and New Beginnings
Eugenie and Gillian, now friends, enjoy a spa day and reflect on their wild adventure, both changed by their time in the islands. Sammy, still in exile, finds solace in music and the company of a symbolic bald eagle, pondering his place between two worlds. Boyd, ever the survivor, reinvents himself as a real estate agent, exploiting the very paradise he never appreciated. The story ends with Honey, Fry, and Perry sharing a quiet dinner, the phone ringing unanswered—a small victory for peace and civility.
Characters
Honey Santana
Honey is a single mother with a history of mental health struggles, driven by a deep sense of justice and a low tolerance for rudeness. Her obsession with civility and her inability to let go of perceived slights propel the plot, as she seeks to reform Boyd Shreave through an elaborate, nature-based intervention. Her relationship with her son Fry is central, and her dynamic with ex-husband Perry is fraught but loving. Honey's journey is one of self-awareness, learning to temper her crusading instincts with compassion and humility.
Boyd Shreave
Boyd is a failed salesman and telemarketer, whose arrogance and lack of self-awareness make him both comic and pitiable. His affair with Eugenie and his disastrous trip to Florida expose his weaknesses and force him into humiliating situations. Boyd's inability to change or appreciate the world around him is both his flaw and his fate; he ends the novel unchanged, exploiting paradise for profit, a satirical emblem of American obliviousness.
Sammy Tigertail
Sammy is a young man caught between two cultures, never fully accepted by either. His accidental involvement in a tourist's death and his subsequent flight into the wilderness are both literal and symbolic acts of exile. Sammy's encounters with Gillian, the ghosts of the dead, and his own heritage drive his internal conflict. His journey is one of reluctant self-acceptance, finding solace in music and the wild, and ultimately choosing solitude over surrender.
Eugenie Fonda
Eugenie is Boyd's mistress and a former "famous mistress" herself, having been involved in a notorious murder case. Intelligent, tall, and sexually confident, she is both drawn to and repelled by Boyd's mediocrity. Her arc is one of self-realization, as she rejects Boyd, befriends Gillian, and finds a new sense of purpose and independence by the novel's end.
Gillian St. Croix
Gillian is a college student who latches onto Sammy in search of adventure and escape from her own ennui. Her chatter and impulsiveness mask a deeper longing for meaning and connection. Her brief romance with Sammy is transformative, giving her a story to tell and a new sense of self, even as she ultimately chooses to return to her own world.
Perry Skinner
Perry is Honey's ex-husband, a former smuggler turned respectable citizen. He remains deeply connected to Honey and Fry, providing support and rescue when needed. His willingness to kill Piejack to save his family is both a return to his old ways and an act of love. Perry's arc is one of redemption and reconciliation, as he and Honey tentatively rebuild their family.
Fry Santana
Fry is Honey and Perry's son, caught between his parents' eccentricities and the chaos around him. Mature beyond his years, Fry is both a voice of reason and a source of comic relief. His loyalty to his mother and his ability to adapt to danger make him a quietly heroic figure.
Louis Piejack
Piejack is Honey's former boss, whose sexual harassment and subsequent obsession with her drive much of the novel's danger. His physical deterioration and increasing madness make him both a threat and a darkly comic figure. Piejack's end is violent and fitting, a victim of his own depravity.
Dealey
Dealey is the private investigator hired by Lily Shreave to catch Boyd in the act. His misadventures—being kidnapped, shot, and ultimately rescued—provide both comic relief and a satirical take on the genre. Dealey's pragmatism and adaptability allow him to survive and even profit from the chaos.
Lily Shreave
Lily is Boyd's wife, determined to catch him cheating and profit from the divorce. Her obsession with "penetration" as evidence and her willingness to pay for it satirize both the legal system and marital dysfunction. Lily's arc is one of liberation, as she sells her business and moves on, unconcerned with Boyd's fate.
Plot Devices
Intersecting Quests and Coincidences
The novel's structure relies on a web of intersecting quests—Honey's for justice, Sammy's for peace, Boyd's for escape, Piejack's for revenge, and Dealey's for evidence. These threads are drawn together by coincidence and the isolating geography of the Ten Thousand Islands, creating a farcical collision of characters and motives.
Satire and Irony
Hiaasen uses satire to skewer American culture: telemarketing, real estate scams, environmental destruction, and the self-absorption of his characters. Irony abounds—Boyd, the least appreciative of nature, survives by exploiting it; Honey's quest for civility leads to chaos; and the "eco-tour" becomes a stage for human folly.
Ghosts and Hauntings
Sammy is haunted by the ghost of the dead tourist, a device that externalizes his guilt and sense of not belonging. The past—personal, cultural, and historical—haunts all the characters, shaping their actions and fates.
Role Reversals and Parody
The novel parodies survival stories, detective fiction, and romance, with characters constantly forced into roles for which they are ill-suited: Boyd as a messiah, Honey as a kidnapper, Dealey as a hostage, and so on. These reversals highlight the absurdity of their situations and the randomness of fate.
Environmental and Social Commentary
The wilds of the Everglades are both a literal and symbolic backdrop, representing both the beauty and indifference of nature and the folly of those who try to exploit or escape it. The novel's environmental themes are woven into its satire, critiquing both the destruction of paradise and the commodification of the wild.
Analysis
Nature Girl is a riotous satire that uses the wilds of Florida as both a playground and a crucible for its cast of misfits, exposing the absurdities of modern American life. Through intersecting storylines, Hiaasen lampoons everything from telemarketing and real estate scams to environmental exploitation and the quest for civility in a rude world. The novel's characters are all, in their own ways, exiles—estranged from family, culture, or self—seeking connection, redemption, or simply escape. Yet, in the chaos of the Ten Thousand Islands, their flaws are laid bare, and their fates are shaped as much by accident as by intention. Hiaasen's message is both comic and cautionary: the wild cannot be tamed, justice is rarely neat, and the search for meaning or decency is as messy as it is necessary. In the end, the only real victories are small ones—choosing kindness, letting the phone ring, and finding peace, however fleeting, in the company of those we love.
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Review Summary
Nature Girl receives mixed reviews, with some praising Hiaasen's trademark humor and zany characters, while others find it predictable or uncomfortable. The novel follows Honey Santana's quest for revenge against a rude telemarketer, intertwining various eccentric characters in the Florida Everglades. Readers appreciate Hiaasen's satirical take on environmental issues and Florida's quirks, but some feel the plot is convoluted and the characters lack depth. Overall, fans of Hiaasen's style enjoy the book's absurd humor, while critics find it less engaging than his earlier works.
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