Her veneer was big city ... but one look and you knew that Toni Rassell's instincts were straight out of the river shack she came from. I watched her as she toyed with the man, laughing, her tumbled hair like raw blue-black silk, her brown shoulders bare. Eyes deep-set, a girl with a gypsy look. So this was the girl I had risked my life to find. This was the girl who was going to lead me to a buried fortune in stolen loot.

Tal Howard, a disillusioned Korean War veteran, breaks away from his old life, looking for answers. He's convinced he's going to find them in the small town of Hillston, the location of 60 grand in embezzled funds that Howard learned about from a dying friend in a POW camp. He just needs to find out where the money is hidden and contend with another former POW who has come looking for it--Earl Fitzmartin, a psychopath of whom they were all terrified in the camp. Howard soon learns that the secret to the money's location lies in the dead man's past, which must be discovered through the women...

From a beloved master of crime fiction, The Deep Blue Good-by is one of many classic novels featuring Travis McGee, the hard-boiled detective who lives on a houseboat.

Travis McGee is 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.

"John D. MacDonald was the great entertainer of our...

From a beloved master of crime fiction, "A Purple Place for Dying" is one of many classic novels featuring Travis McGee, the hard-boiled detective who lives on a houseboat.
Travis McGee s taking his retirement in installments while he s still young enough to enjoy it. But sooner or later, his money runs out and he has to work. This time McGee s lured out West to a strangely secretive meeting with a woman in trouble, in a place whose beauty hides some ugly, dangerous secrets.
John D. MacDonald created a staggering quantity of wonderful books, each rich with characterization,...

From a beloved master of crime fiction, Nightmare in Pink is one of many classic novels featuring Travis McGee, the hard-boiled detective who lives on a houseboat.
Travis McGee s permanent address is the Busted Flush, Slip F-18, Bahia Mar, Lauderdale, and there isn t 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 wasn t for him, McGee might not be alive. For that kind of friend, Travis McGee will travel almost anywhere, even New York City. Especially when there s a damsel in distress.
As a...

From a beloved master of crime fiction, One Fearful Yellow Eye is one of many classic novels featuring Travis McGee, the hard-boiled detective who lives on a houseboat.
It only takes one word to get Travis McGee to leave the sunny deck of his houseboat in Ft. Lauderdale for the gray cold of Chicago. The word is help, and it's uttered by Glory Geis, an old girlfriend of McGee's and the pretty young widow of world-renowned neurosurgeon Dr. Fortner Geis. The trouble is, the good doctor converted his considerable estate into cash before he died. But where he stashed it,...

From a beloved master of crime fiction, Dress Her in Indigo is one of many classic novels featuring Travis McGee, the hard-boiled detective who lives on a houseboat.

Travis McGee could never deny his old friend anything. So before Meyer even says please, McGee agrees to accompany him to Mexico to reconstruct the last mysterious months of a young woman's life--on a fat expense account provided by the father who has lost touch with her. They think she's fallen in with the usual post-teenage misfits and rebels. What they find is stranger, kinkier, and far more...

From a beloved master of crime fiction, The Long Lavender Look is one of many classic novels featuring Travis McGee, the hard-boiled detective who lives on a houseboat.
A lovely young thing, wearing little more than a determined look, streaks out of the darkness and into Travis McGee s headlights. McGee hits the brakes, misses the fleeing soul by inches, and lands upside down in ten feet of water and right into the heart of a violent mystery.
To diggers a thousand years from now, the works of John D. MacDonald would be a treasure on the order of the tomb of...

From a beloved master of crime fiction, The Scarlet Ruse is one of many classic novels featuring Travis McGee, the hard-boiled detective who lives on a houseboat.

Travis McGee's getting lazy. Drinking Boodles on the Busted Flush has become a full-time job. But when he hears that six figures' worth of rare stamps have wandered off, McGee finds himself back in the salvage business. To deliver on this case, McGee will have to be suspicious of everyone he meets--because what he's looking for is property of the mob.

"The Travis McGee novels are among the finest...

From a beloved master of crime fiction, The Turquoise Lament is one of many classic novels featuring Travis McGee, the hard-boiled detective who lives on a houseboat.

Funny thing about favors. Sometimes they come back to haunt you. And Travis McGee owes his friend a big one for saving his life once upon a time. Now the friend's daughter, Linda "Pidge" Lewellen, needs help five time zones away in Hawaii before she sails off into the deep blue with a cold-blooded killer: her husband.

"The Travis McGee novels are among the finest works of fiction ever penned by an...