Laurence Shames: Welcome to Paradise (USA 2007)

From the Publisher:
What's in a license plate? Plenty, if the tag reads BIG AL.
In this "wickedly inventive" (Los Angeles Times) and "darkly comic tale" (People), mild mannered Al Tuschman, a salesman from New Jersey, is mistaken for Al Marracotta, a major New York mobster with some very nasty enemies -- enemies who hire a pair of bumbling hitmen to turn the paradise of Big Al's Key West vacation into a living hell. When the wrong Big Al is targeted, cries of Why me? fill the tropical night -- and the gentle Tuschman must turn tougher than his namesake to save his own life.

Laurence Shames: Welcome to Paradise. iUniverse, ISBN: 0595469140 (September, 2007), 220 p., $14.95.

Laurence Shames: Welcome to Paradise (USA 2000)

From the Publisher:
Before mild-mannered furniture salesman Al Tuschman left New Jersey for a week 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 Tropical Hell. Maybe it's 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...

Laurence Shames: Welcome to Paradise. Fawcett Books, ISBN: 0345432185 (June, 2000), 256 p., $6.99.

Laurence Shames: Welcome to Paradise (USA 1999)

From the Publisher:
Laurence Shames, whom the Chicago Tribune calls "one of our best crime fiction writers," is back. This time he brings us a hilarious novel of mistaken identity and tropical crime that proves that while we all love the idea of a vacation, the truth is we often end up wishing we'd stayed home.

For Alan Tuschman -- mild-mannered furniture salesman from New Jersey, a man without an enemy -- a vacation in Key West turns out to be not paradise but a hell of bizarre assaults on him, his property, and his sanity. Why? It might have something to do with the nickname emblazoned on his license plate.

For Big Al Marracotta -- Mafia capo and boss of New York's Fulton Fish Market -- vacation is the time when a long career of crime and rancid sea-food finally threatens to catch up with him.

And for lissome Katy Sansone, who is seeking no more than some sunshine and a little self-respect, Key West serves up a bafflement of Als, and way more danger than she'd packed for.

Rich in the loopy insights and surprising tenderness that have become Shames's hallmarks, Welcome to Paradise is his best novel yet.

Laurence Shames: Welcome to Paradise. Villard Books, ISBN: 0375502521 (April, 1999), 220 p., $22.95.