Tricky Business — Dave Barry

The Extravaganza of the Seas is a 5,000-ton cash cow, a top-heavy tub whose sole function is to carry gamblers three miles from the Florida coast, take their money, then bring them back so they can find more money. In the middle of a tropical storm one night, these are among the people who will be involved with it: Fay Benton, a single mom and cocktail waitress desperate for something to go right for a change; Johnny and the Contusions, a ship's band with so little talent they are, well, the ship's band; Arnold and Phil, two refugees from the Beaux Arts Senior Center; Lou Tarant, a wide, bald man who has killed nine people, though none recently; and an assortment of uglies with names like Tark and Kaz whose job it is to facilitate the ship's true business, which is money laundering or drug smuggling or ... something.