Most helpful customer reviews
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4.0 out of 5 stars
Poor Nurse Penny, Jul 8 2004
A bit overplotted and maybe resolved just a little too neatly, "The Girl in the Plain Brown Wrapper" nevertheless transcends its dated, Spillane-esque title and serves as a entertaining, mid-level McGee adventure.After two excellent introductory sections (a cool short section about Trav *actually* working in his supposed field -- salvage consulting; and a amusing backstory about his affair with an older woman), we gear into the breadth of the plot which involves a beautiful, unhinged blonde with a bottomless trust fund and her husband, a monied sociopath who's both more and less dangerous than he seems. Somewhere along the way, we find Trav actually experiencing genuine feelings for a woman (and the *wrong* woman, no less; this is one instance in which most readers can finally say *they* know better than MacDonald's endlessly shrewd, canny protagonist). The final third is a little too much Q&A, with Trav extracting exactly the information he needs from relative strangers; the fairly obvious examination of race-relations may be accurate but hasn't aged too well; and the ending -- in which MacDonald actually has to step back and explain the twists step-by-step to the reader through a deposition -- feels like a writer tip-toeing out of the corner he's painted himself into. But nevertheless, this is a vivid little page-turner with some nicely rendered characters (Pike, Biddy, Nurse Penny, screwed-up lawyer Holton and his alluring wife and especially Detective Stanger) and an apt air of melacholy, regret and loss.
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4.0 out of 5 stars
A Thinking Man's Mystery Novel, Aug 16 2001
Travis McGee gets a check for $25,000 (a lot of dough for 1969) and the dying wish of an old friend, to look after her suicidal daughter. So McGee goes to Fort Courtney to observe the daughter, her sister and her husband. What McGee encounters is a series of unusual circumstances, including dead bodies, cheating spouses, and the evidence that somebody is spying on him. Could all of these things be connected? Sure - but only McGee could figure out the complicated connection. True to most McGee novels, justice is served in the end, although in a form the reader does not expect.This is my 11th McGee novel. Clearly MacDonald writes in a more sophisticated style than 98% of the mystery writers today. A new reader may find it annoying that one must suffer through a good 100 pages before the action really begins, but this is typical MacDonald style. Not only do you get a complex mystery, but you get a lot of philosophy along the way.
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5.0 out of 5 stars
My first McGee novel. A very good start!, Mar 12 2001
By A Customer
Well, I'll keep this short & sweet. I'm not much of a mystery reader but this series was recommended to me by several people. I picked this one randomly to start the series. I liked it...the story was quick-moving, had good character development, some humor, a lot of action, and tied up nicely at the end. At 250 pages it's a quick read, perfect for an airplane ride. If you like Dick Francis, Robert Parker, et al, then you'll like this series.
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Most recent customer reviews
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by John D. MacDonald
by John D. MacDonald
by John D. MacDonald
by John D. MacDonald
by John D. MacDonald
