And by classics I'm referring to the Travis McGee series by John D. McDonald. McDonald died in the late 80s. But I've looking for literature that I'm eager to read and I bounce between some sci-fi and the old spy/action books.
I read the McGee book over vacation trip to North Carolina on my Kindle. I probably own the paperback too. I have a modest collection of these kind of books.
When this book was written they were about 150 pages. The authors didn't get the 300 to 500 pages you can find today. One of the nice parts about this is that the action is pretty much non-stop. McDonald likes to pass on his thoughts about developers, society, Florida, gun control, government, etc., as he goes along. Also you will find that there are a lot of passages of color and texture, e.g., "a tan and sandy silence."
But I was disgruntled with the book. One of the hallmarks of his books are that every character besides McGee, Meyer, his foil, and a couple of ancillary characters, are rotten to the core. And if McGee finds a love interest, she is doomed. The one is this book was crazy and then got shot through the throat at the end. It never ends well for the bad guys. McGee usually gets damaged a bit too and this book was no exception. He is clobbered and Meyer has to fix the boat, schlep him to safety for recovery, and dispose of the bodies.
The technical aspects are pretty good. This book was about rare stamps. It's always nice to learn some details about different little areas.
I'm not sure I'll read any more. I want my books to end happily. Sure punish the bad guys, but get the girl for a least a little while before the budding relationship ends.
If we were to contrast this book to a Lee Child Jack Reacher novel, you would note the enormous amount of internal and external dialog that slowly drags the plot along in the Reacher book. McDonald has no such luxury and has to keep the fire a flame. Reacher doesn't get the girl much, he has a bus to catch or a ride to hitch. With the extra pages, you get more detail, more complexity, more locations. But for this genre is that more due to publishers' pushing for longer more expensive books than the authors interest in writing like that?
In both books we have a superman to deal with the baddies. Reacher is huge, but McGee has been there before.
I'll also bring up the Matt Helm series by Donald Hamilton. Matt is also a superman, fights his way out of impossible situations, punishes the bad guys, and usually gets the gal too. I like the Helm series a lot. I've listened to a number of them in audio format and they stand up. The Reacher books are done well in audio too. I've been listening to them on long airplane rides and if I can stay awake, I enjoy the experience.
From my perspective, it looks like a case of "you can't go home again." Very sad. I may have to dump my McDonald paperback collection in Ebay...
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