Meet Travis McGee

Meet Travis McGee—beach bum, knight errant, philosopher, lady’s man. Living life aboard the Busted Flush in Bahia Mar in Ft. Lauderdale. Taking retirement in installments when he’s got the dough and going to work when he’s running low. He is without a doubt Florida’s greatest pulp hero.

Travis McGee is the brainchild of prolific writer, John D. MacDonald, who started with the pulp magazines of the ‘50s and moved onto the more lucrative novel writing when the bottom fell out of the pulp market. He wrote 38 novels and over 350 short stories before unleashing his serial character, Travis McGee, who starred in 21 novels.

While Travis McGee is well-known to many pulp and noir readers and has legions of loyal fan-pages across the Web, he is little known in the mainstream; yet as soon as a person is introduced to Travis’ adventures, the influence on today’s writings can be seen immediately, and the need to devour all of the titles becomes almost irresistible. The writing is crisp, the stories move quick, and the social commentary is spot on and fun.

That, coupled with the fact that Travis is an original Florida paperback hero, and that when the titles are read in sequential order the Florida landscape and culture changes along with the times, it is a very compelling read.

So, it is my goal in this post to introduce, or reintroduce as in some cases, Travis McGee to the masses and hopefully get them curious about this knight errant from Ft. Lauderdale.

Meet Travis McGee

Travis McGee is an adventurous beach bum, taking his retirement in installments, usually periods lasting from four to six months. He lives aboard a 52-foot houseboat moored at Bahia Mar, Ft. Lauderdale called The Busted Flush, named in honor of the poker hand he used to win it. His best friend is Meyer, a semi-retired economist who is hairy, disarming, intelligent, and lives in a nearby boat. They have many adventures together.

When the money runs low, Travis shakes off the rust from his armor and searches for a job through word-of-mouth as a “salvage consultant.” Which means if something is unjustly lost, stolen, or otherwise misplaced; he will help get it back, but at a price—half its value. So, most of Travis’ clients are desperate, afraid, and boxed in. He’s a last resort. Also, Travis isn’t beyond helping a friend.

Travis’ first adventure is 1964s The Deep Blue Good-by; followed closely by in the same year Nightmare in Pink, A Purple Place For Dying, and The Quick Red Fox (I told you MacDonald was prolific!). Each book in the Travis McGee series has a color in its title. And each book has Travis with a new smashing dame, much like as found in the James Bond series.

Also, while Travis is busy battling the baddies, saving the dames (or sometimes being unable to), he enjoys to muse, which is a staple and fan favorite of the series. We love the digressions. Examples:

It’s no good telling somebody they’re trying too hard. It’s very much like ordering a child to go stand in a corner for a half hour and never once think about elephants.

The Girl in the Plain Brown Wrapper

This is a complex culture… The more intricate our society gets, the more semi-legal ways to steal.

The Deep Blue Good-By

You can be at ease only with those people to whom you can say any damn fool thing that comes into your head, knowing they will respond in kind, and knowing that any misunderstandings will be thrashed out right now, rather than buried deep and given a chance to fester.

Darker Than Amber

There are no hundred percent heroes.

Cinnamon Skin

Way over half the murders committed in this country are by close friends or relatives of the deceased. A gun makes a loud and satisfying noise in a moment of passion and requires no agility and very little strength. How many murders wouldn’t happen, if they all had to use hammers and knives?

The Scarlet Ruse

The only thing in the world worth a damn is the strange, touching, pathetic, awesome nobility of the individual human spirit.

A Deadly Shade of Gold

The series ran from 1964-1986, with the final installment The Lonely Silver Rain and John D. MacDonald’s death. It stretched through 21 novels, plus the bonus short story/essay MacDonald wrote for the Library of Congress Reading for Survival, which entails a conversation between Travis McGee and Meyer on the importance of reading.

Today, the series has been rereleased via Random House books with slick new covers, but they cost a little more. If you want to collect the books and go the same route I did, there are a plethora of cheap, battered copies of the series available on Amazon.

I still remember the fist Travis McGee adventure I read, and I have since began the journey of “reading the rainbow” from Blue to Silver. And it is my hope that I have motivated a few of you to do the same. Have fun!

Travis McGee Book Series In Order

The Deep Blue Good-by (1964) Amazon
Nightmare in Pink (1964) Amazon
A Purple Place for Dying (1964) Amazon
The Quick Red Fox (1964) Amazon
A Deadly Shade of Gold (1965) Amazon
Bright Orange for the Shroud (1965) Amazon
Darker than Amber (1966) Amazon
One Fearful Yellow Eye (1966) Amazon
Pale Gray for Guilt (1968) Amazon
The Girl in the Plain Brown Wrapper (1968) Amazon
Dress Her in Indigo (1969) Amazon
The Long Lavender Look (1970) Amazon
A Tan and Sandy Silence (1971) Amazon
The Scarlet Ruse (1973) Amazon
The Turquoise Lament (1973) Amazon
The Dreadful Lemon Sky (1975) Amazon
The Empty Copper Sea (1978) Amazon
The Green Ripper (1979) Amazon
Free Fall in Crimson (1981) Amazon
Cinnamon Skin (1982) Amazon
The Lonely Silver Rain (1985) Amazon
Reading For Survival (1987) – this is a short essay about the importance of reading, presented as a conversation between Travis McGee and his pal Meyer. Amazon

To instantly get the complete 21 book series in one Amazon order click here.

(Updated 01/21/2023)