The Scarlet Ruse and Two Other Great Mysteries

Travis McGee #1, 2, 14

by John D. MacDonald

Contents:
The Scarlet Ruse

Travis McGee is too busy with his houseboat to pay attention to the little old man with the missing postage stamps. Except these are no ordinary stamps. They are rare stamps. Four hundred thousand dollars worth of rare. And if McGee doesn't recognize their value, perhaps Mary Alice McDermit does, a six-foot knockout who knows all the ways to a boat bum's heart. Only it's not McGee's heart that's in danger. Because a syndicate killer has put a contract on McGee. A killer who knows something about stamps . . . and even more about McGee.

The Deep Blue Good-by

TRAVIS McGEE
He's a self-described beach bum who won his houseboat in a card game. He's also a knight errant who's wary of credit cards, retirement benefits, political parties, mortgages, and television. He only works when his cash runs out and his rule is simple: he'll help you find whatever was taken from you, as long as he can keep half....

Nightmare in Pink

"A knight in slightly tarnished armor, " "the thinking man's Robin Hood, " McGee lives alone on his boat, the Busted Flush. Rejecting the modern world, adhering to a timeless sense of honor and obligation, he is more and less than a private eye.

Genres: Mystery, Fiction

505 pages, Hardcover

Published February 1, 1980

About the author

John D. MacDonald was born in Sharon, Pennsylvania, and educated at the Universities of Pennsylvania, Syracuse and Harvard, where he took an MBA in 1939. During WW2, he rose to the rank of Colonel, and while serving in the Army and in the Far East, sent a short story to his wife for sale, successfully. He served in the Office of Strategic Services (O.S.S.) in the China-Burma-India Theater of Operations. After the war, he decided to try writing for a year, to see if he could make a living. Over 500 short stories and 70 novels resulted, including 21 Travis McGee novels.

Following complications of an earlier heart bypass operation, MacDonald slipped into a coma on December 10 and died at age 70, on December 28, 1986, in St. Mary's Hospital in Milwaukee, Wisconsin. He was survived by his wife Dorothy (1911-1989) and a son, Maynard.

In the years since his death MacDonald has been praised by authors as diverse as Stephen King, Spider Robinson, Jimmy Buffett, Kingsley Amis and Kurt Vonnegut, Jr.. Thirty-three years after his passing the Travis McGee novels are still in print.

Reviews

[Robbie · Rating 5 out of 5]

This was a re-read. When I gave away most of my books before we moved 8 years ago, I kept two of the John D. McDonalds. I loved every one of them.

[Paul · Rating 5 out of 5]

If you enjoy Travis McGee you will like this one