As a longtime Miami Herald columnist, Carl Hiaasen covers one of the most spectacularly corrupt city governments in the country, providing a weekly dose of wry humor as a much-needed salve for his readers' woes. Last year alone, Miami suffered national embarrassment when its coffers were discovered to be empty and a bitter mayoral election was reversed when a judge found that many of the 5,000 residents who cast absentee votes had no recollection of doing so. Hiaasen's seventh novel, Sick Puppy, taps into the palm-greasing culture of the powers that be while exploring one of their favorite pastimes: destroying what few natural resources remain, from the ocean to the Everglades. If his brand of colorful Florida noir seems overwrought at times, it's important to keep in mind that no amount of cartoonishness can do justice to the area's real-life villainy. Excluding an instantly lovable Labrador retriever, there's not an entirely sympathetic character in Hiaasen's universe, but 26-year-old eco-terrorist Twilly Spree comes reasonably close. Determined to stamp out any environmental injustice, large or small, Spree happens upon the boorish Palmer Stoat, a wealthy lobbyist and incorrigible litterbug whom he sees scattering a bag of Burger King refuse on the turnpike. Spree pulls a few pranks to teach him a lesson, including dumping four tons of garbage in his BMW convertible, but resorts to more extreme measures when Stoat fails to get the message. He cooks up a complex dognapping scheme and, in the process, discovers that Stoat is pushing the new governor to approve condo development on an untouched coastal island. Hiaasen is frequently mentioned in the same breath as his genre compatriot Elmore Leonard, but he's more unbridled in his outrageous plotting and funhouse caricatures. Sick Puppy is populated with such memorably twisted contortions as a rich developer who hires two prostitutes and a plastic surgeon to bring his obsession with Barbie dolls to fruition. But Hiaasen rarely loses sight of his satirical targets: No matter how ridiculous the events in his novel may seem, he's quick to remind you that it all comes with the territory.