MIAMI TWILIGHT by Tom Coffey
Pocket Books - August, 2001
ISBN 0671028294 - Hardcover
Suspense for explicit content

Reviewed by Susan McBride, MyShelf.com
Buy a Copy

This was the first book I've read by Tom Coffey, though I had heard of THE SERPENT CLUB, his mystery debut and a bestseller. If MIAMI TWILIGHT is any indication, Mr. Coffey certainly has a way with words and his writing is snappy and fast-paced. My problem was with everything else. The plot centers on public relations hack Garrett Doherty (pronounced Dock-erty, as we're reminded throughout the book) and his obsession with a married Hispanic woman with whom he begins an affair that tosses the rest of his life to hell in a handbasket. Everything else is rather peripheral. If I had understood Doherty's motives--beyond keeping his brain tucked behind the zipper of his pants--maybe I could've gotten at least a little emotionally involved in MIAMI TWILIGHT. There is what should have been an interesting mystery angle involving a "land developer" named Ernesto Rodriguez and his purportedly crooked past. But Doherty's fixation on the lovely Magdalena consumes the book, and I felt nothing for him, just sorry for the pregnant wife he treats like trash and sorry that trees had to die so that this tale of a self-absorbed, selfish, sexually obsessed fellow could be told. I will give THE SERPENT'S TALE a shot and hope Mr. Coffey doesn't disappoint me in that one.