KILL TWO BIRDS & GET STONED

Since the mystery plots have always been the weakest parts of the Kinkster’s hilariously antic mysteries (Meanwhile, Back at the Ranch, 2002, etc.), it’s only natural that he’d try his hand at a shaggy-dog tale without a clue.

Once upon a time, Walter Snow was the successful author of The Rise and Fall of Nothing at All, but he’s been blocked for so long (seven years) that he has no idea what his second novel will be about. Luckily, the answer comes one day while he’s at the bank and seductive Clyde Potts asks him to store a package containing her grandmother’s heirloom silver in his safe-deposit box. Two weeks later, after the NYPD has informed Walter that the package actually contains something quite different, Clyde celebrates her birthday by introducing Walter to her partner-in-mayhem, Fox Harris. Maybe Clyde is a former heroin addict and Fox her rehab counselor. Maybe it’s Fox who’s the recovering addict. Whatever the case, alcoholic Walter is soon happily falling off his own wagon, joining the pair for some great booze, great smoke, and great ideas for naughty subversion that could have come right from Jack Kerouac’s Merry Pranksters. Just for fun, they con a bartender out of a hundred-dollar bill, spring a delusional street preacher from a mental institution, throw a party for a thousand homeless New Yorkers on Donald Trump’s dime, and avenge themselves on Starbucks, which is plotting to take over Walter’s neighborhood bar, in fiendishly adolescent ways. It’s not long before Walter’s juices are flowing again and he’s written his friends into a new book, The Great Armenian Novel (alternate title: The Cat Who Killed Christ), that his agent calls “racist, homophobic, politically incorrect, insensitive, and, well, frankly, unrealistic and ludicrous.”

If it’s anything like this one, it’s shaggy, clueless, winsome, sad, and funny too.