Max Mingus and his partner Joe Liston are members of the STF, a "salt and pepper" team who work hard to be clean cops while surrounded by the effluvia of crime.

They are first on the scene of a bizarre situation at a primate park which results in apes of all sizes escaping into the urban landscape and some into the Everglades. They discover a body writhing with blowflies, completely shaved with the mouth and one nostril sewed shut and a rare Tarot card in its gut along with a weird concoction of drugs and other substances. Death, drugs and voodoo - oh, and the victims' family has been slaughtered as well.

As Max and Joe try to uncover the layers of mystery surrounding this death they learn that most of the crimes can be traced to a powerful man whom no one has seen. If there are any witnesses they all give a different description. To some he suddenly appears in a darkened room or the back seat of a car - his only distinctive feature a forked tongue that flickers like a lizard's. He bears the name of a historical figure prominent in the Haitian slave revolt. His resources are legendary and those who dare to cross him are cruelly tortured before they die.

The action is fast, the descriptions often gory and the whole tenor the book is of a miserably hot, humid, fetid Miami where Evil seems to have the upper hand. Max and Joe are two lonely crusaders who realize the quagmire of vileness which surrounds them threatening to drag them to join the other corrupt ones in this morass of Wrongdoing and Wretchedness.

Author Nick Stone writes well if sanguinely, his British roots virtually hidden except when "kerb" and "nail varnish" appear to reveal his nationality. He is a master of the period and definitely brings those times to life so much so that one wants to have a long cool drink and wash one's hands after reading. Well done.

--Jane Davis