JOHN D. MacDONALD
John Dann MacDonald (born 1918 in Sharon, Pennsylvania - 1986) was one of the 20th Century’s most successful popular authors. Almost 30 when he sold his first short story, he made up for lost time with hundreds of short stories under a variety of names and went on to write 78 books which sold over 70 million copies by one estimate. After that notable birth in our state, he grew up in Utica, New York, attended the Wharton School at the University of Pennsylvania, quit during his sophomore year, went to Syracuse University, graduated in 1938 (meeting his wife-to-be), and went on to an MBA at Harvard University, ‘39. The Second World War intervened in what could have been a great business career. He entered as a lieutenant, worked for the OSS in the China-Burma-India Theater of Operations, and was discharged as a lieutenant colonel in September 1945.
In 1949 he moved his family to Florida, eventually finding Sarasota to be home, and there the writing legend began. After an insanely obsessed stint at breaking into the pulp magazines (which were dying in the postwar years), his first novel, the excellent The Brass Cupcake, was published in 1951. His first Travis McGee mystery, a series that made his name golden and international, was The Deep Blue Good-by, published in 1964. Twenty-one novels make up the series, ending with The Lonely Silver Rain in 1985. They are listed here in alphabetical order by title, but the order in which they were written, which is useful, is appended below. On this page, after the McGee novels, those stand-alone titles still in print are listed.
As popular as he was and remains, MacDonald was also a writer’s writer, acclaimed and claimed as influential by scores of later writers from Kurt Vonnegut to Stephen King, from Carl Hiaasen to Dean Koontz. In his novels the cost is always counted, the right thing to do is the hard thing to do, and people in pain call out for justice and sometimes, always at cost, find it.
(1964) The Deep Blue Good-by
(1964) Nightmare in Pink
(1964) A Purple Place for Dying
(1964) The Quick Red Fox
(1965) A Deadly Shade of Gold
(1965) Bright Orange for the Shroud
(1966) Darker than Amber
(1966) One Fearful Yellow Eye
(1968) Pale Gray for Guilt
(1968) The Girl in the Plain Brown Wrapper
(1969) Dress Her in Indigo
(1970) The Long Lavender Look
(1971) A Tan and Sandy Silence
(1973) The Scarlet Ruse
(1973) The Turquoise Lament
(1975) The Dreadful Lemon Sky
(1978) The Empty Copper Sea
(1979) The Green Ripper
(1981) Free Fall in Crimson
(1982) Cinnamon Skin
(1985) The Lonely Silver Rain
Audio Book MP3-CD: Nightmare in Pink
Audio Book MP3-CD: Nightmare in Pink
Audio Book: Insert disc into MP3-CD Enabled Player OR Insert into computer, transfer MP3 files to iTunes and then listen!
1 MP3 Disc
5 Hours and 39 Minutes
Read by: Robert Petkoff
Travis McGees permanent address is the Busted Flush, Slip F-18, Bahia Mar, Lauderdale, and there isnt a hell of a lot that compels him to leave it. Except maybe a call from an old army buddy who needs a favor. If it werent for him, McGee might not be alive. For that kind of friend, Travis McGee will travel almost anywhere, even New York City. Especially when theres a damsel in distress.
Travis McGee is the last of the great knights-errant: honorable, sensual, skillful, and tough. Donald Westlake
The damsel in question is his old friends kid sister, whose fiancé has just been murdered in what the authorities claim was a standard Manhattan mugging. But Nina knows better. Her soon-to-be husband had been digging around, finding scum and scandal at his real estate investment firm. And this scum will go to any lengths to make sure their secrets dont get out.
Travis is determined to get to the bottom of things, but just as hes closing in on the truth, hes knocked out and taken captive. If hes locked up in a mental institution with a steady stream of drugs being siphoned into his body, how can Travis keep his promise to his old friend? More important, how can he get himself out alive?