A modern treasure hunter of sorts comes to Hawaii in search of the knife Mishima used to kill himself.

(from McSweeney’s Enchanted Chamber of Astonishing Stories, again)

This is more or less an old school pulpy detective story, full of wisecracks, shady characters, bizarre twists, heavy drinking, almost-sex, false leads and a wacked out surprise ending. If it wasn’t for the final pages (which were way out there) I would say this is the kind of amusement parky, attitude-driven story I’d enjoy reading all the time. It felt like a series in development, Fletch-meets-Hunter S. Thompson-meets-Dirk Gently, or something. The ending wasn’t bad, just not on the same planet as the rest of the story. Occasionally the language and tone were a bit overdone, but not distractingly so.

Now I will attempt to do some shoveling, as per the terms of my lease.