#39 from macdonald for me...and this will be the 6th (i think) travis mcgee story...missed #4 was it? which is coming in the mail i believe. just finished A Deadly Shade of Gold which might be the best of the lot so far.25 may 15i start to read.strange, how the travis mcgee stories seem to get top billing here and abroad. having read 38 stories, more if you count the shorts individually, but having read many not-travis-mcgee, and knowing the others get even less traction that the mcgee stories, sad...unfortunate...as the other stories rock the casbah. oh well. say la v as they say on the spanish riviera.moving right alongthis one has me wondering how macdonald will address the 'conflict' as it has been presented. arthur wilkinson says hello to the boat and comes aboard to faint on the deck of the busted flush, having been away for a year or almost, victim of a con game that according to the law is above board, legal. but still theft.so it isn't, does not involve, as yet (bout halfway into the read) bloodshed. by now the telling has laid out the pertinent facts of the case, travis, chookie mccall, the dame in this story, and a reluctant arthur have left fort lauderdale aboard the busted flush, have moved to the area of florida in question--the conflict, emphasis on con, involves money and property. pretty tame if measured against the standard of the previous mcgee story...death by knife, an abundance of death by blade, an abundance of bloodshed. yeah...so...26 may 15finished. excellent story. a sleeper, curiosity satisfied, big time. i guess i didn't spend a lot of time...didn't spend any time, really, thinking what direction this one would take. best i did was wonder where it would go. some brutal scenes here. a few flaws, too...this that the other. it's a story and even with some of the willing suspension of disbelief pausing...i didn't pause long and i wouldn't be put off by my take on the ease with which some things happened. hey, it was cbs news, "murphy" and "robinson"...setting up. heh! time place scene setting* fort lauderdale, the busted flush at bahia mar* mid-may, story opens and time passes, noted with phrases like "on monday"..."friday morning"...or in the case of arthur, one year ago, paraphrased or not, close...at least eight months have passed since arthur left with a woman name of wilma, part of the con game played against a stupid arthur* the alabama tiger's flush deck wheeler, neighbor boat to mcgee's busted flush* the busted flush, mcgee's 52' barge-type houseboat, 21' beam, 38-tons* the open range, a restaurant* miss agnes, mcgee's rolls royce truck...30s model, car cut down to a truck, painted blue, called miss agnes after a teacher mcgee had as a child* naples, florida area* thru whitewater bay...mouth of the shark river into the gulf of mexico...cape romano* marco pass...hurricane pass...roy cannon island...marco village* florida bay...two miles off candle key* the buccaneer...calvin stebber's 100' yacht, a previous coast guard cutter i think it was described as* back end of a hotel...now permanent housing, where chookie lives* the citrus blossom, cheap motel arthur stayed in after things fell apart in naples area* three crowns, hotel calvin stebber stayed, sarasota* royal palm bath club...where travis meets vivian & crane watts, others* car rental place, dark green chev, 4-dr, a/c, travis rents* the ratfink, a 16' fiberglass boat travis rents from arlie mission near naples or goodland* goodland...a mile west of goodland, boo has his place, naples area* a hospital* the climax of the story, oe onf of them, comes on the last day of may, a thursday...and then below, a kind of epilogue in july* story end we're at the 4th of july, the 5th* palm city marina...the story ranges up and down the gulf coast of florida, naples to tampa, points in between* tampa terrace hotel bar* west harbour, 4-8a, 8th floor, tower four, calvin stebber's offices* stecker's boat yard* area near school where cindy attends* a food fair supermarket...tampa international airport* a number of places on the water, west coast florida* clementis drive...where the watts' home is locatedcharacters major* travis mcgee, our hero, 1st-person eye-narrator* arthur wilkinson, gone for year, shows up at the busted flush half-dead, faints, is nursed back to health by chookie and travis, is originally from upstate new york, little falls, where the family had a furniture business for generations. victim of a con game involving money, all his, property, a dame (wilma ferner) and a number of other characters, a con that is nevertheless judged legal by a lawyer arthur visited for advice, alas, too late* chookie mccall, the main dame in the story, a dancer, a mover and shaker in that sense. her name is barbara jean mccall...chook or chookie is the nickname* wilma ferner...she'd been dropped off at fort lauderdale from a boat where it is presumed (later) she'd been running a con, and she sets her hook into arthur and together with a handful of others, takes arthur for a ride, takes his money, and runs* frank durkin...really, not much more than a name...bit player...a kind of foil to arthur's character...reader learns that frank has been sent to raiford prison for a likely five years for felonious assault* the alabama tiger...neighbor and boat owner to travis...holds an on-going houseboat party...and in this story, he is a bit more than simply a name...although he doesn't play a large role...we see him more so than in the other stories. reader learns he was an all-american tackle* the ching sisters...mary li and mary lo...not much more than names, one of them keeps the alabama tiger's party going* calvin stebber, #1, or two, if you count wilma first...in the con* g. harrison gisik, old, sick, tall, quiet, from montreal...not much more than a name in on the con* crane watts, local attorney, in on the con, married to vivian, larger role* boone waxwell, known as "boo"...with a non-wife dilly starr, more profane than he is, in on the con, beats arthur, spends time with wilma, the stud-muffin of the story, from a local swamp* christine canfield...17-year-old, pregnant by a stone crab fisherman, is available and leafy dunning tries to match arthur with her* sam & leafy dunning, rescue arthur in south florida as he stumbles on a road, poor folk, kids, leafy has a child born in january, the 3rd boy* vivian harney watts, married to crane, athletic, plays tennis,* dave sablett, plays tennis with vivian, young, 19-year-old* miss debra brown...stebber's...fellow con-artist* cindy ingerfeldt...15-year-old involved with boo, the swamp apeminor characters, no name, some with names, setting-type characters* meyer, travis's hairy economist friend in fort laurderdal* boat guests in various condition of disrepair* arthur's widower father, grandfather, a girl he was to be with but who left him for another...all the past* hal, the bartender at mile o'beach* wassener, the new manager...at a place, one of several, where chookie dances/entertains* frannie...someone chookie knows* 'their nephew'...the ching sisters* dirty-mind cop...via one of the ching sisters* muriel hess...name associated with chookie...someone chookie works with, another dancer presumably* mack...name associated with frank durkin...someone who fought with him* mary lou king...one of the ladies in chookie's troupe of dancers, the most naive* korea, a big gentle kid fresh out of the hill school, died in korea* platoon sergeant, korea* travis big brother...who dropped a hammer on travis years ago* an animal had gotten to mary lo with a knife* man who came twice a week to take care of the grounds...at a fancy house where arthur and wilma had near naples* woman who came in about noon every day except sunday for arthur & wilma at the fancy expensive house* mario...kind of bartender on the stebber yacht* kippler...name associated with the con...the kippler tract* another lawyer...arthur sought his advice...too late* leafy borrowed old clothes from a neighbor* foreman, maintenance crew, rod & gun club, where arthur worked laborer after things fell apart* christine canfield is the youngest of three daughters of* cobb canfield* young woman, miss brown, part of the con in a minor way...meets arthur at a bar, he is rolled into the next county, palm county* man in a red coat* sheriff's deputy...drunk tank...arthur, palm county* road worker/tolerant guards/arthur, doing his 30 days drunk* roger bliss, character actor...part of travis's reverse con...only, he never comes into play...just a name, a suggeston* a sallow, thoughtful young man* jimbo, a man hosing her down* arlie mission, travis rents the ratfink, a 16' fiberglass, from him* two scrawny elderly gentlemen* a few people down on the beach* club pro, timmy, playing tennis with vivian* stetson, who was crane's roommate* truman vokeler, with the state's attorney general's office in tallahassee* several doctors...redhead...and older doctor* a harried, burly nurse* a tall, narrow, pock-marked nurse* a deputy* a boy from copeland...christine will marry* two small boys fishing from a skiff* bruno...part of the crew of the buccaneer, the 100'+ yacht* rowdy teenagers at one of the counter sections* mrs mildred mooney, worked for arthur/wilma* she had three babies that died, a husband of 12 years* mary alice, mary cathering, michael francis, the babies* clete ingerfeldt, cindy's father...his missus* rike jefferson, executor on the kippler tract* sam jimper, a lawyer that boo knows* melly, a girl he knows, from claviston* a kid wearing a plastic raincoat with hood* a gnarled old party...who advises travis about boo* joe bradley, who caught a big fish* captain andy...of the buccaneer* the moaner, benny, and old con artist...his partner, who had a cop uniform* benny lives with his son-in-law in nashville, phone under t.d. notta* "hooper" a travis name, field investigator for state beverage control...to talk to cindy through "mossbutt"...woman on the phone* mr fowley, foam flex industries, vice president in charge of sales and promotion...to do with the buccaneer yacht...owners* mr robinelle...associated the gibson yards, where the yacht is kept* two men were working topsides* a thin woman with a limp* a husky kid with a blunt indifferent face* harris, beefcake security for stebber, takes chook from the car and delivers her upstairs to tower four* "murphy" and "robinson"...travis and arthur, as the advance crew for cbs news* a sergeant who answered travis call to report crime* two men squatted on their heels in the shade (cops)* charlie is one of them...bernie is at the property with a shotgun* a handsome negro girl was singing (tv)* new cons of stebber/debra...who will be a mulatto...husband of four months, father-in-law ex-governor of southern state* al, in the men's locker room at the bath tennis club* francine benedict, kind of secretary, receptionist at the club...provides travis with a card good for two weeks* frank and mandy hopson...vacationing elsewhere...travis uses their name for an in at the club* gabbling, shrieking, belly-whomping mass of kids (pool/club)* a pudgy chap with a statesman's face...(lecturing all within hearing at the club about politics, the nation so forth so on)* several grim tables of male bridge* a bartendernames of real people, famous, famous fictitious, so forth so on* custer* rock hudson* maid marian* bach* zen* onassis, niarchos * ? hurricane donna* names like 'marco' pass...'marco' island...'romano' pass* calusa indians* other names like 'roy cannon' island* stoney burke?..."and i smiled at her like stoney burke admiring a speckled calf."* jesus* the goths* mr goodman (sing sing sing)* whitey ford* collier (county named after him, i believe)* samson* alice in wonderland* bluebeard* boghart, mitchum, gable, flynn* ruby braff* a john collier story* narcissus* graziano...queensberry rules* stanley steamer? heh! the name is used like it is a real person, famous...but all i got is the company that cleans carpets. ooga booga* ben casey, doctor in an old television show...i was doctor ben casey on halloween...i think i was five, open up and say ah.story beginsanother season was ending. the mid-may sun had a tropic sting against my bare shoulders. sweat ran into my eyes. i had discovered an ugly little pocket of dry rot in the windshield corner of the panel of the topside controls on my houseboat, and after trying not to think about it for a week, i had dug out the tools, picked up some pieces of raw mahogany, and excised the area of infection with a saber saw.
After a few books in the series where McGee gads about the country or the hemisphere, Trav stays right at home in Florida for the sixth in the Travis McGee series. But boy does he get around Florida. This book is fun to review with Google Maps as Trav stalks his prey around Naples, on Florida's West coast, and many places around there and in the Everglades. His prime villain, among a few co-conspiritors, is a slimy, horny swamp thing named Boo Waxwell—a sensuous hairy good ole boy who loves his sex and violence, preferably in combination.Chookie McCall, the exotic dancer with Native American blood who had a brief role in the first TM book, is a main character here, as she uses her sexual healing to nurse back to health a tall, nervous old friend of McGee's named Arthur Wilkinson, who has been swindled out of all his money by a group of shakedown artists—a key member being Wilma, a castrating sexual predator who has married him and milked him dry. This book doesn't have the ambitious scope of its predecessor, A Deadly Shade of Gold, so four rather than five stars here, but it is satisfying. I find it slightly annoying that there is very little continuity in the series: there's a bit about Travis getting himself back in shape after a knife wound, when he was actually shot towards the end of the previous book. MacDonald used to work on three or four books at the same time. Part of the book, which was written in 1965, is reminiscent of hypersexual movies of the time like Our Man Flint, for instance when MacDonald beautifully describes a gorgeous femme fatale dressed in the height of mid-sixties fashion, cool, confident, yet utterly subservient to Calvin Stebber, the brains of the shakedown crew, who controls her. There's a nice bit where Stebber describes how they broke in Wilma through training and ruthless discipline. He offers to do the same to Chookie, as a kind of favor to McGee. Sweetly chilling. It's somewhat mystifying and disappointing that we don't get much of the usual regret and self-loathing introspection as this one wraps up, considering McGee's fuckups have resulted in the rape and death of a key character. But it's clear that by now MacDonald was well into his groove with McGee, and this is a pretty good one, just not great.
Do You like book Bright Orange For The Shroud (1996)?
"Το δίχτυ της αράχνης", εκδόσεις ΒΙΠΕΡ.Έκτο βιβλίο της σειράς με ήρωα τον Τράβις ΜακΓκι και ποιοτικά είναι στο ίδιο καλό επίπεδο με τα προηγούμενα. Ο ΜακΓκι περίμενε να περάσει ένα ήσυχο καλοκαίρι, δίχως κάποια δουλειά στα σκαριά και ξέφρενα πάρτι, έλα όμως που ένας φίλος του, ο Άρθουρ Ουίλκινσον, φτάνει στο σκάφος του σε μαύρα χάλια. Ο Άρθουρ έπεσε θύμα μια καυτής γκόμενας και κάποιων απατεώνων, που με νόμιμα μέσα τον ξαλάφρωσαν απ'όλα του τα χρήματα και τον άφησαν στον άσο (και η γκόμενα με το πουλί στο χέρι) και έτσι είπε να ζητήσει βοήθεια από τον ειδικό σ'αυτές τις περιπτώσεις. Δουλειά του ΜακΓκι, ως γνωστών, είναι να βοηθάει ανθρώπους που με κάποια απατεωνιά έχασαν χρήματα, με την αμοιβή του να είναι το πενήντα τοις εκατό των χρημάτων που θα καταφέρει να πάρει πίσω. Η δουλειά δεν είναι καθόλου εύκολη, έχει πολλές απαιτήσεις, τόσο διανοητικές όσο και σωματικές και οι κίνδυνοι για την ζωή του είναι πολλοί με τους τύπους που μπλέκει κάθε φορά. Και εδώ ο ΜακΓκι θα μπλέξει μ'έναν σκληρό τύπο που όσο μυαλό του λείπει τόσο θράσος και δύναμη έχει... Οι ιστορίες με ήρωα τον ΜακΓκι δεν είναι για όλα τα γούστα, εκτός του ότι δείχνουν τα χρονάκια τους, οι απόψεις για το γυναικείο φίλο ίσως ενοχλήσουν μερικούς και μερικές. Εμένα πάντως μου αρέσουν πολύ. Και η συγκεκριμένη ιστορία έχει όλα τα καλούδια, μυστήριο, δράση, ζωντανούς διαλόγους, γαμάτη ατμόσφαιρα και ωραίες περιγραφές της Φλόριντα. Λίαν συντόμως θα διαβάσω και το επόμενο βιβλίο της σειράς.
—George
I am continuing my project of reading all the Travis McGee books in order (rereading some and catching those I missed the first time around).At the start of Bright Orange For The Shroud, the sixth Travis McGee book, McGee is looking forward to a quiet summer. He has sufficient funds stashed away and needs to take some time get back in shape physically. But, of course but that is not to be. An old acquaintance stumbles up from the dock and collapses on the deck of McGee's houseboat. After reviving him and nursing him back to a semblance of health, McGee finds that the fellow's ex-wife and a gang of grifters have conned him out of his life savings, and he has subsequently fallen on very hard times. McGee agrees to try to recover what he can (after all that is what McGee does).This is quintessential Travis McGee, mixing action, danger, and introspection. Unusually, in this book McGee doesn't "get the girl". Also, I am reminded again that it is dangerous to be around Travis McGee, as more than one person he runs across doesn't make it to the end of the book.This is one of the better Travis McGee stories in my opinion.
—Clyde
My third read of the Travis McGee series and I'm paying particular attention to how Travis relates to women. My interest is due to a nice conversation I had a few months ago as to whether Travis treated women well, took advantage of them and/or was a misogynist. Hey, or anything in between. Bright Orange... was a non-stop read from beginning to end and in my mind, the touchstone of the entire series. The quintessential Travis McGee with all the elements found in the best of the series. The only thing missing is Meyer who has been mentioned in series 1-5, but has not played a significant role in the story yet. Was this JDM as good the third time around as it was the first and second? For me, a big yes. Probably even more so although if you ask me to explain why, I can't answer. Ok, one answer might be that I'm reading more carefully with more thought. Amazing to me that more than 50 years later, the series is being talked about like it was just reviewed in the NYT and is on the bestseller list. Last read, about seven years ago, gave it four stars. Today, five stars and if I could give more...you bet I would. Nobody loves Travis more than I do.
—Cathy DuPont
