#1 Florida Straits published 1992
"People go to Key West for lots of different reasons. Joey Goldman went there to become a gangster..."

So begins this classic Key West caper, the hilarious and touching book that launched a much-loved series and introduced the world to Bert the Shirt and his chihuahua Don Giovanni, two of the most unforgettable characters in contemporary fiction.

Joey, the illegitimate son of a major NY mafioso, decides to break away from a decidedly unpromising future in the old neighborhood of Queens. But will the old neighborhood and the Family let him go in peace? Not if knucklehead half-brother Gino has anything to say about it. As Joey is finally establishing his new life in sunny Florida, Gino involves him in a disastrous scam featuring a boatload of stolen emeralds and several squads of very nasty thugs. Finding within himself resources of smarts and courage he never knew he had, Joey beats long odds and muddles through to a brilliant solution to the problems dumped on him by Gino.

Cleverly plotted, enlivened by pitch-perfect dialogue, FLORIDA STRAITS is a completely satisfying mystery, but it's more than that as well. Think of it as a fish-out-of-water coming-of-age novel, a comedy of very bad manners with an unlikely hero you will root for from page one.

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#2 Scavenger Reef published 1994
"In this business, nothing is as good as dead..."

The business in question is the high-end art world, and everyone in this darkly comedic mystery wants a piece of it.

When painter Augie Silver is lost at sea in a sailing accident, his many friends among Key West's artists, writers, and hangers-on mourn--until, that is, they realize that Augie's death has sent the prices for his pictures skyrocketing. What at first seemed a tragedy turns out to be a windfall--until, that is, Augie, rescued at sea, limps back to town alive. Not everyone is thrilled by the artist's resurrection. Someone, in fact, is upset enough to start trying to bump off Augie for real.

Full of steamy Key West atmosphere and sometimes brutal insights into the wacky world of creative types, SCAVENGER REEF is both a taut whodunit and a wise meditation on loyalty real or faked, friendships sincere or toxic.

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#3 Sunburn published 1995
"More than a thriller—it’s an escape from reality and the perfect tonic at the end of a hard day.”—The Orlando Sentinel

It's not easy being the Godfather. All those secrets and all that guilt add up to a terrible burden--a weight that's killing Vincente Delgatto. When the old man travels to Key West for a visit with his illegitimate son--Joey Goldman, the unlikely hero of FLORIDA STRAITS--Joey floats the idea of a conscience-easing memoir, to be written in collaboration with a local reporter.

It's a well-intentioned but extremely dangerous idea, since no one--not the Mafia, not the FBI, not the legitimate heir to the Delgatto family business--wants to see that memoir published. Will Vincente live long enough to get a lifetime's worth of secrets off his chest? Will writer Arty Magnus ever actually finish a book? For that matter, will Bert the Shirt and his chihuahua Don Giovanni ever enjoy a completely successful walk, and are there punishments enough on earth for Gino, the ingrate son who'd rat out his own father?

Balancing suspense and humor, double-crosses and tenderness, SUNBURN is both a full-throttle crime novel and a touching meditation on family, old age, and the many shades of human loyalty.

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#4 Tropical Depression published 1996
Murray Zemelman—lingerie mogul, a.k.a. the Bra King—wakes up one morning, starts his car in the confines of his airtight garage, and contemplates the worst. But instead of doing himself in, he pops a Prozac and hits the road, waving good-bye to his trophy wife, the thriving brassiere business, and the streets of New Jersey for good. He's headed to Florida, home of his first wife, Franny, whom he was stupid enough to leave all those years ago. But now he wants to start fresh. Is it a brilliant insight? A glitch in his Prozac dosage? Who cares? He's off to Key West. There, he meets Tommy Tarpon, a local Native American—beaten down and made bitter by the unfairness of life around him, and the last surviving member of his small Florida tribe. Together they cook up a plan: with Murray's business acumen and Tommy's ability to make the most of government statutes, Key West could very well get its first legal gambling parlor on Tommy's tribal grounds—a tiny, alligator-infested island just off the coast. But gambling in Key West isn't an original idea, and a whole other species of reptiles is interested in the plan. With the "assistance" of Key West's crookedest politician, a local Mafioso makes Murray and Tommy an offer they can't refuse. All Murray wanted was to woo his first wife away from her reading group and into the Jacuzzi—but he ends up getting her, himself, and Tommy into more hot water than he ever bargained for.

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#5 Virgin Heat  published 1997
Mafia princess Angelina Amaro has only ever loved one man-and that lone affair was never consummated. Why not? Because her would-be lover, Sal Martucci, fled into the Witness Protection Program after ratting out Angelina's father.

When Sal is discovered working as a bartender in Key West, the wildly dysfunctional Amaro clan heads south-one member with love on her mind, the others with murder in their hearts.

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#6 Mangrove Squeeze published 1998
Key West seduces people--then asks them to leave in the morning. Take Aaron Katz. He chucked his NY nine-to-five to restore the Mangrove Arms, a rotting wreck of a guest house. Suki Sperakis, aspiring journalist, sees opportunity in Florida, too, though in the meantime she's peddling ad space for a third-rate freebie paper. Then she stumbles upon a nefarious plot revolving around a handsome Russian and his string of T-shirt shops. Can't a guy manufacture plutonium in peace?

Now, with the Russian mafia on her trail, freewheeling Suki is running for her life--and leaving in her wake a mix of sunken Cadillacs, abandoned Cold War missile silos, and the occasional corpse. With only the mild-mannered Aaron, his slightly demented father Sam, and an old gangster named Bert the Shirt as allies, can she possibly survive the squeeze?

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#7 Welcome to Paradise published 1999
"The Key West locale was so real I felt my hair frizz.”—The Los Angeles Times

For friendly, easygoing furniture salesman Al Tuschman, frizzy hair is the least of his problems. Before he'd left New Jersey for a week's vacation in Key West, he hadn't an enemy in the world. But a series of puzzling assaults on his privacy, his sanity, and his life has turned his stay at the tasteful Paradise Hotel into a tropical hell. Maybe it's just the humidity. Maybe the Sambuca. Or maybe it's the nickname emblazoned on his license plate: Big Al.

For Big Al Marracotta, Mafia capo, a Florida getaway means outrunning a career in crime and rancid calamari. For Katy Sansone it's a bid for sunshine and self-respect--until a case of mistaken identity pits the confused woman against a bafflement of Als and more danger than any one of them had reason to pack for. Now, if Tuschman doesn't watch his back, somebody's going to be reporting the death of another salesman. . . .  

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#8 The Naked Detective published 2000
“A light-hearted, sardonic homage to the detective novel…The charm of this literary exercise comes with the self-conscious indulging of a fantasy…that we can have the thrill of adventure and risk and danger in our lives and that we would acquit ourselves well in conflict with gamblers, goons and crooked cops.”—The New York Times Book Review

Meet Pete Amsterdam, the world's most reluctant sleuth.

Naked in his hot tub, Pete is idly reviewing his morning tennis game when trouble arrives in the form of the inevitable blonde. This being Key West, the blonde is not quite what she seems, and it's useless to explain to her that he's not a real detective--that, in fact, he got his P.I. license strictly as a tax dodge, a way to pretend his new wine cellar is an "office." She's got troubles of her own--big troubles that are utterly foreign to the cozy little paradise Pete has crafted for himself.

Why, then, does the unwilling gumshoe allow himself to be squeezed ever tighter against Key West's humid underbelly--involved with the likes of local bully Lefty Ortega, his nympho daughter, and the sleazeball who controls the island's gambling boats? And why does he feel that his life is being taken over by the demands and traditions of the detective story?

Will Pete blunder his way through to solving the crime? Will he penetrate the leotard of the lissome yoga teacher who is his only ally? The answers will be found in these fast-moving and hilarious pages, where the hard-boiled flirts with the postmodern. Think of this novel as Raymond Chandler meets Woody Allen meets the Coen brothers, and as a romp that somehow breaks through to serious consideration of the themes of community and responsibility, and the notion that maybe all of us could be heroes--even if mostly in spite of ourselves.

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#9 Shot on Location published 2013
Take three speedboats, a disgruntled ghostwriter, and a hit TV show starring a gorgeous but impossible diva and created by a driven genius who may be losing his marbles. Add a fearless and gleefully profane stuntwoman, an ancient Mafioso with a chihuahua, and a revenge-crazed blonde in gladiator sandals. Stir in a thug with a heart of gold and an inveterate slacker who yearns for glory. Whisk a loopy but tender romance into the mix, turn the whole crew loose in the liberating and seductive sunshine of the Florida Keys—and what do you have?
SHOT ON LOCATION, the new and long-awaited Key West novel by Laurence Shames.
Hilarious and suspenseful, wisecracking and wise, this is the most intoxicating story yet from the author of such cult classics as FLORIDA STRAITS and SUNBURN. Longtime Shames fans will rejoice at his return to the fictional turf of Key West and the reappearance of some of his most beloved characters. And new readers will find themselves in for a hell of a ride as Hollywood glitz meets Florida funky.

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#10 Tropical Swap published 2014
Wanted: NY apartment in exchange for a great Key West house with swimming pool. In February.

Who wouldn’t take a swap like that? Then again, if a deal seems too good to be true, it probably is, as Meg and Peter Kaplan soon discover. Heading south for a supposed dream vacation, what they find instead is a panic attack waiting to happen. Coconuts crash through windows, bearing cryptic death threats. People fall from palm trees while spying on the pool. Neighbors whisper of Mob connections, leaving the Kaplans to wonder if they’ll get whacked by mistake in the Southernmost City or if their cozy West Side co-op has been transformed into a convenient Mafia morgue.

Enter an FBI agent going rogue, a very good girl determined to be very bad, and the irrepressible Bert the Shirt with his chihuahua, and the cast is complete for this riotous Florida romp. Told with Laurence Shames’ trademark mix of suspense and comedy, mayhem and romance, crackling dialogue and lush description, TROPICAL SWAP is a vacation you can savor without ever leaving home.

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#11 Key West Luck published 2015
Sometimes small dreams are the ones most worth fighting for…

Phoebe has a dream—a very modest dream. She wants to own a Sno-Cone truck at the beach in Key West. Nicky, her would-be boyfriend, also dreams small. All he wants is a decent gig as a guitar player in a bar.

Doesn’t seem like too much to ask of life, does it?

So why do things keep going so dreadfully wrong for Phoebe and Nicky? Is it just plain bad luck? Or is it the decidedly bad intentions of a sleazy local cheat, a Miami gangster desperate to stay in business, and a murderous Cuban smuggler looking for a fall guy?

Against these enemies, and with only a pair of mangrove-dwelling philosophers and an ancient Mafioso as allies, Phoebe and Nicky will need more than a major shift in fortune to keep their hopes, and themselves, alive. They’ll need a kind of smarts and courage they never knew they had.

Lush with Florida atmosphere, deftly balancing suspense and comedy, romance and mayhem, KEY WEST LUCK will leave you cheering for the exploits of its unlikely heroes.

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#12 One Strange Date published 2017
Perfect romance. Perfect nightmare. Sometimes it’s a fine line.

Meet Key West native Renita Daughtry--22, wide-eyed, gorgeous, and very much in love with love. In other words, an irresistible target for professional impostor and pathological liar Richie Pestucci, who plans to charm her into utter helplessness.

But there’s just one problem. Renita’s seeming naivete masks a lot of savvy and a will of velvet-coated steel, and it isn’t long before Richie, now smitten with his intended victim, starts to wonder just who is gaming who. As his cynical poise dissolves and the lovers’ game of cat-and-mouse grows subtler and sexier, things start going dangerously and hilariously wrong. So wrong, in fact, that setting them right will require the combined efforts of a heroic twin brother, a fiercely loyal uncle who takes his pest control job very seriously, and a sharp-dressing retired mobster with a singing chihuahua.

Seamlessly blending tender romance with raucous caper, One Strange Date massages the heart-strings even as it tickles the funny bone and explores the deep everyday mystery of how and why we choose to believe.

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#13 One Big Joke published 2018
“What is with you lately?” Lenny’s wife would like to know. “You’ve been acting like everything is one big joke.”

And it’s true—unemployed TV writer Lenny Sullivan has been having trouble seeing his life and times as anything more than fodder for edgy wisecracks. But when he bolts to Key West to refresh his lighter side, things suddenly turn serious. Well, sort of serious. A bullying businessman in league with a pair of bumbling mobsters is plotting to burn down his best friend’s struggling comedy club. The pill-popping star of his last best chance at a hit show is under a death threat from a very sore loser in a love triangle. And Lenny’s staunchest ally in the fight to keep the club, the star, and the laughs alive happens to be a 90-something named Bert the Shirt. Fortunately, Bert has a soft spot for comedians and is the savviest if not the most grammatical guy in town…

Deftly balancing suspense and humor, mayhem and romance, Key West color and showbiz glitz, ONE BIG JOKE uproariously entertains while making a sly but impassioned argument for the saving grace of comedy in tough times.

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#14 Nacho Unleashed published 2019
Key West has a new hero…

He weighs four pounds and stands eight inches off the ground. His name is Nacho and he’s the bravest, shrewdest, funniest Chihuahua you will ever meet. He’ll do anything to help his master, the retired Mafioso Bert the Shirt, and his friends—especially the beautiful Rita, with whom Nacho is smitten from the very first time she reaches down to scratch his ears.

Wise-cracking Rita, straight out of Jersey, is new in town and needs a job. A gig at Wreckers Rum seems promising, but there’s something, well, a little off about the place. It doesn’t sell much booze, yet maintains a classy tasting room on prime Key West waterfront. Where’s the money coming from? Who’s the oddly chivalrous mobster behind the operation? What’s up with the crazy scientist in flip-flops toiling away in his triple-locked lab behind the distillery? And how might Rita get closer to the irresistible but aloof young chief distiller whose only passion seems to be for making rum? Determined to find both answers and true love, undaunted Rita lands herself in some very hot water—hot rum, actually—and it will take a special kind of devoted and unleashed hero to rescue her.

Oh…and one more thing about Nacho. He’s not just brave; he talks, lending plenty of loopy canine wisdom to this rollicking, sun-drenched story of rum and romance, chemistry and crime, friendship, family, and the sacred responsibilities of loyalty.

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#15 The Paradise Gig published 2020
FACT: In September 1964, the Beatles, their private flight diverted by Hurricane Dora, made an unplanned visit to Key West.

FICTION: Poolside at their motel, the Fab Four fell into conversation with a snappy-dressing local named Bert the Shirt, who listened as the band worked out a harmony to the most beautiful song he’d ever heard--and wouldn’t hear again for over half a century.

FACT: That night, the Beatles played an unannounced free concert in the motel bar. Everyone was welcome. Local musicians showed up with guitars and keyboards, and had the once-in-a-lifetime experience of jamming with the Beatles till 4 am. This legendary event has forever after been known to Key West locals as THE PARADISE GIG.

FICTION: Next day, hung over and exhausted, the Beatles left for the airport, having somehow lost a stained and battered notebook that held a priceless stash of unrecorded songs.

NOW CUT TO THE PRESENT: A beautiful woman is doing a yoga headstand on a Key West beach when she’s abducted by a pair of thugs. An aspiring young singer is offered a recording deal that seems a bit too good to be true. Bad things happen to a couple of one-hit wonders…And old Bert hears a new song that is hauntingly familiar, but that he can’t quite place.

Could it possibly be the same song he’d heard at poolside so many years before? Could it be that all the present mayhem circles back through the decades to THE PARADISE GIG? Could the precious, even sacred, Beatles notebook possibly turn up after all these years? Could Bert be the hero who would rediscover that stash of unheard songs for music lovers everywhere—and save a young singer’s life in the process? With Nacho, his intrepid Chihuahua, at his side, and with no one but bumbling detective Pete Amsterdam for an ally, the undaunted Bert the Shirt sets out through the Florida haze to piece it all together, learning along the way how much the world has changed—and how much it has not.

In equal parts suspenseful and nostalgic, funny and romantic, this time-bending caper celebrates the power of music and the many tricks of memory, the joys of youth and the comforts of age, and the free and funky spirit of Key West.

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#16 Key West Normal published 2021
So, what, exactly, is Key West Normal?

Well, Key West Normal is when two friends in need of a place to live drag away an abandoned hot dog truck in the middle of the night…

But an insomniac New Yorker has got himself trapped inside it while searching for his neurotic cat…

And the truck is the secret hub of a global smuggling operation and holds a stash worth millions…

But the tough guy sent to recover the fortune is way more interested in being reunited with his one true love.

Most of all, though, Key West Normal is when none of the above seems at all improbable. It’s just the way things are. Or at least how they are in the funky, funny, palm-shaded, all-accepting town at the end of the road.

And when it falls to the unlikeliest pair of heroes—a homeless man named Pineapple and an ancient Mafiosoknown as Bert the Shirt—to sort through all the many twists and turns and save the day, well, that’s Key West Normal to the max.

Full of tropical sunshine and crackling dialogue, loopy wisdom and touching revelations from characters you’ll root for, this feel-good novel will lift you like an ocean wave and remind you how good it feels to forget your worries and laugh out loud.

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#17  Relative Humidity published 2023
Ever notice that things get sticky when family comes to town?

Pete Amsterdam, world’s most reluctant private eye, is living the bachelor dream in Key West, Florida. Then his mother, the undaunted Gertie, shows up with her new hip, her large suitcase, and her gift for cutting remarks.

Penelope Calabro, world’s most fetching pickleball instructor, has been managing to outrun her troubled, secret past. Until her Uncle Gianni appears one humid day with a mysterious hit-man following much too close for comfort.

Before long, Gertie has guilt-tripped Pete into taking on Gianni’s very complicated problems, since Gianni is her last best hope for a scintillating late-life romance. But Pete has fallen for the irresistible Penelope…and run headfirst into a perplexing question: Who’s the hit-man really after—the uncle or the niece?

With a midnight deadline to solve the puzzle looming, Pete finds himself with only the most improbable of allies—an ancient Mafioso named Bert the Shirt and his neurotic chihuahua, Nacho, along with a couple of ragged locals who live in an old food truck in the mangroves. Can this ill-assorted team beat the odds and save a couple of lives?

Told with Laurence Shames’s trademark mix of comedy, suspense, and romance, Relative Humidity raises the temperature with crackling dialogue, steamy Key West atmosphere, and achingly on-point observations about the genetic accidents known as families.

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