I bought this book for $2.00 at Hooked on Books in Springfield late last month; it represents the second John D. MacDonald fiction book I’ve read in the last two weeks, and I need to pace myself. If I read too many of them close together, I find myself nitpicking them by comparing them to one another; if I read them interspersed with other fiction, their quality stands in stark contrast to most books.<\/p>\n
This book details the story of Sam Brice, an insurance adjustor with a dark past who shelters for a night an escaped convict he knows. When the escaped convict calls upon Brice’s ex-flame for help in some plot, Brice wants to follow along, but a local deputy with a love of his own blackjack knocks Brice out just long enough for the plot to progress. Brice’s lover, Janice Gantry, disappears. And Brice wants to find her and to find out what made his associate into a convict and what that strange, brutal, reclusive couple in the large beachfront house have to hide.<\/p>\n
The book contains the trademark MacDonald hero, the pulpesque-but-evolving heroine, brutal and disbelieving police, and the like. Unfortunately, it slides slightly into purple prose, kinda making it into the masculine equivalent of the romance novel, but it’s still worth a read. Looks like you can get this book more cheaply than I did if you click the link below. If so, more the power to you and more the loot to me. Mmmm, loot.<\/p>\n