Cadillac Fin Suitcase Paperback - 2011

From the publisher

Cadillac Fin Suitcase is a lightning journey with American artist Michael Walsh through the mad streets and lush countryside of the "Little Dragon"-Taiwan. Eighteen short works, including memoir, noir, black comedy, poetry, and more. Arriving in Taipei in 1998 with a Fulbright Scholarship in Photography, Walsh explored the island for years shooting buku film. Along the way, between puffs on Cuban cigars and slugs of whiskey, he began to write about his experiences. Walsh's memoirs, (some of which contain fictional "scenes" and characters) written in a crackling, improviso style-flash narratives inhabited with "wolf men and bad cops," angels and hustlers and Taoist holy men. A trove of eccentric characters light up the fiction pieces with witty dialogue and surprising antics. Cool, brash private eye Big Guava Chang assists an heiress in the hard-boiled thriller The Pigeon Racers. Vivo Lin, a vivacious Taiwanese American psychologist, has developed unconventional techniques to treat patients. Her arrogance leads to a lethal game with a con man in Lester Moore. Mr. Leonard Thing, a Taipei lawyer, receives an odd birthday gift in the hilarious and climactic black comedy Happy Go Drive Thru. Many other players throughout the pieces are sure to amuse and captivate. Blunt, original, and sometimes devilishly lascivious and profane, the collection is a highly entertaining odyssey through Taiwan's spellbinding culture.