Tim Dorsey ’83

Jan. 25, 1961—Nov. 26, 2023

The literary world was darkened by the passing of Tim Dorsey ’83, Auburn’s answer to Gonzo journalism and one of the most prolific and entertaining authors of the last 25 years. Dorsey is most known for his character Serge Storms, a genial but cold-blooded serial killer whose two loves in life are Florida trivia and punishing those who would do harm to his beloved state.

Timothy Alan Dorsey was born in Logansport, Indiana but grew up in Riviera Beach, Fla. As a student at Auburn, he was editor of the Auburn Plainsman, and after graduation spent 16 years as a journalist, first as a reporter in Montgomery for the Alabama Journal, and then as a crime and politics reporter for the Tampa Tribune.

His love for Florida history was deep, and he spent many hours digging up the past, uncovering lost facts and locations no longer found on maps. It all coalesced in his first novel, “Florida Roadkill,” a murder-thriller published in 1999, the year he left professional journalism for good to become a full-time author.

In the antihero Serge Storms, Dorsey created the perfect vehicle to not only celebrate everything weird, wild and wacky about the Sunshine State, but also exact vengeance on all manner of grifters, developers, polluters and worse who would bring harm to its people and history. It was a template that he would replicate with increasing success across 26 books, each with Raymond Chandler-esque noir titles like “Cadillac Beach,” “Tiger Shrimp Tango” and his last, “The Maltese Iguana,” published in February 2023.

Storms’ crisscrossing wanderings across the state mirrored Dorsey’s own. Despite raising a family, he did all his own research, roaming the backroads and forgotten highways for both material and adventure, building a community of fans around the state that culminated in “Serge A. Storm’s Stomp in the Swamp,” a gathering of likeminded Floridians held annually in Everglades City. Dorsey was often the guest of honor, but his impact on Floridians’ understanding of their state may be his most lasting legacy.

“I’ve made friends at a lot of these places and they’ll say, ‘Man, all these people have been coming by after your book came out, taking pictures and asking us questions and stuff.’ That’s probably the biggest compliment I can get.”