Island of the Sequined Love Nun

Pilot Tucker Case has a weakness--well, Tuck really has two--and the combination of drinking and sex in the cockpit of the pink Mary Jean Cosmetics Learjet puts him on the front page of papers all over the planet. But he finds another job with a mysterious employer--someone with a brand-new Lear 45-- who's willing to pay Tuck generously and ask no questions about his record. The jet and job are on Alualu, a speck in the Pacific Ocean, and Tucker has nowhere else to go. But first he has to get to Alualu, and once there, he faces a hurricane, Shark People, atypical missionaries, and boredom ... and the responsibilities assigned to him by Capt. Vincent Bennidetti, U.S. Air Force, deceased bomber pilot and present-day deity of the Shark People. From Library Journal Here's a recipe for one very funny book: Take Tucker Case, a disgraced airline pilot whose unseemly in-flight behavior has destroyed his career (along with a pink Lear jet) and damaged what's politely called his manhood. Add Kimi, a Filipino transvestite navigator, and a talking fruit bat named Roberto and send the three off in a typhoon to an island in Micronesia (its inhabitants only a generation away from cannibalism) where dastardly deeds are being done by a greedy medical missionary and his beautiful but amoral wife. Toss in a dead World War II aviator who plays cards in heaven with a Jewish carpenter. Stir well. Read fast. Fans of Kurt Vonnegut and Douglas Adams will especially enjoy Moore's (Bloodsucking Fiends: A Love Story, LJ 8/95) peculiar take on the world. Recommended for general fiction collections.?Nancy Pearl, Washington Ctr. for the Book, SeattleCopyright 1997 Reed Business Information, Inc. From Booklist Reminiscent of the work of the king of anarchic comedy, Mark Leyner ( Et Tu, Babe, 1992), Moore's fourth novel features the redemption of reprobate pilot Tucker Case. Grounded for crashing the corporate pink jet owned by Mary Jean Cosmetics while fulfilling the sexual fantasy of a call girl, Tucker is forced to take a job as a pilot for a medical missionary on a remote Micronesian island. En route, he teams up with a transvestite Filipino navigator and her talking fruit bat before being waylaid by a typhoon and a cranky cannibal. When he finally shows up for his first day of work, Tucker must deal with the shady doctor and his High Priestess wife. With a high-octane plot and a truly original cast of crazies, Moore spins a skillful comic caper that is bolstered by his ditzy logic and hysterical dialogue. Joanne Wilkinson From Kirkus Reviews Another farce about feckless mortals exploited by sarcastic supernaturals--all for a good cause--from Moore (Bloodsucking Fiends, 1995, etc.). Corporate jet pilot Tucker Case, ``a geek in a cool guy's body,'' gets into trouble when, after downing seven gin-and-tonics, he agrees to take a prostitute on a quick trip to the stratosphere for some ``mile-high'' cockpit sex, only to lose control of the jet while making his final approach. A strange flight-suited fellow appears in the copilot's seat, helps Tuck (and his passenger) survive the crash, and vanishes. Case wakes up in a hospital bed to find himself a tabloid celebrity, and unemployed. The hapless Case gets a job offer from Dr. Sebastian Curtis, a missionary physician who wants Case to pilot his island-hopping jet, currently based on the fictional Micronesian island of Alualu. During an error-prone odyssey across the Pacific, Case meets a variety of chatty, smart-alecky island denizens, including a transvestite navigator with a pet bat who takes him over shark-infested waters in an open scow right into a typhoon. Case washes up half dead on Alualu to find that its primitive, former cannibal inhabitants, who call themselves the Shark People, have been enslaved by a silly cargo cult involving Dr. Curtis and his trashy sexpot wife (the sequined love nun of the title), who are selling the organs of Shark People sacrificed to the Sky Priestess to a Japanese firm. His ghostly copilot returns, revealing himself to be a divinity (more or less), and charges Case with saving the Shark People, which he does with ingenuity and hilarious, if graceless, aplomb. A lightweight traipse on the gross side of paradise, packed with sick jokes, intentionally hokey dialogue, shameless parodies of Hamlet, the bibical book of Exodus, organized religion, and WW II flyboy movies. The best yet from Moore. (First printing of 35,000) -- Copyright ©1997, Kirkus Associates, LP. All rights reserved. Christopher Moore is the author of seventeen previous novels, including Shakespeare for Squirrels , Noir , Secondhand Souls, Sacré Bleu, Fool, and Lamb . He lives in San Francisco, California. Read more