The things I find.

As many of us do,  I have an extensive paperback collection that I have amassed over the years, that only grows bigger with each passing day.   Sometimes when I am at a loss for something to read, and nothing new is jumping out at me,  I like to peruse the "stacks" as it were to discover a hidden gem that I have always meant to read but haven't as yet got around to doing so.

Hence, the John D. MacDonald you see before you.   I had a friend who loved the Travis McGee novels, and I have since discovered that I own three of them.   I selected this one as my first, appears to be written in 1964, the year before I was born.

Travis is an interesting character.  He is a self proclaimed "beach bum" that lives on a houseboat and goes through money rather quickly.  Whenever he needs some new cash, he takes a case, rakes in some dough and then goes back to spending it.   In this novel, he meets a new woman who is having trouble divorcing her husband.   He had control of all her finances and the trust left from her father, but had told her the trust ran out and she has nothing.   She doesn't believe him.  Travis is not about to get involved, thinking this a case best left to lawyers but then a shot rings out and she ends up dead at his feet.   Great start to a mystery.  It surely pulled me right in.   Now, back to reading.