A collection of suspense stories, puzzle stories, whodunits and tricky whydunits involving police detectives, private eyes, talented and sometimes lucky amateurs, armchair detectives, and ethnic detectives

What would you do about a beloved pet who had lived too long? This family faced a crisis which could happen in any household

Eighteen years in organized baseball. How much longer could he be the perennial hot shot? How much longer could he kid them into thinking he was great?

Lovely night-club thrush Laura Lynn hires a man with a ready gun, so that when you next see her name in a column, it won’t be under — obituaries!

There’s wisdom for grown-ups in this poignant story of a youngster who had the courage to

Considering the late John D. MacDonald’s obvious love for boating and the sea, it’s surprising that so few of his short stories had nautical backgrounds. This one, published in a yachting magazine just a few months after his death, makes fine use of that background while reaffirming MacDonald’s position as one of the leading American mystery writers

when a double-crossing dick gets involved with a ritzy blonde and a hypo-happy psychiatrist

The plan was simple at first, and then, when we started, I knew that this conspiracy to hijack the Syndicate was the master of all of us. But I was smart... so damned smart, and I knew we could play with murder and not get burned!

With a little work I could take care of Barrow’s boat — or his wife

To trap the murder-mind who turned his frat into a slaughterhouse... brain-boy Arlin and his campus queen — played sitting duck

Mix politics and police, and the result is poison

Ex-army intelligence officer Kestrick had nothing to live for — until he got baited by a trouble-bent beauty, mauled by the tin-god politico’s musclemen... and railroaded to jail

Professor Quotient’s quiz act suddenly pays off in grim murder, with a baffling mystery as the jackpot question!

The story of a wise guy who learned an expensive lesson

Hit-and-run is a grisly crime, no matter who is involved. This was one of the worst, with a beautiful girl for the victim — and a beautiful girl for the driver

A good cop never managed to get tough enough to keep things from getting to him, and stinging the few soft parts he has left inside

With murder — or worse — in his little black bag he roamed the underworld — the timid little salesman of eternity who gagged at killing — yet killed for a gag!

To pull this job, they must have a fall guy. What could better suit their purpose than a drunken ex-cop?

When lightning plays along the baselines and match point stands between hell and glory — a wrong guy needs more than the right racket — to meet a champion’s thunder!

In the clammy recesses of the cement stairwell, she discovered the terrifying truth: she was the patsy, and her role was to die — screaming!

To a young boy there is nothing more tragic than to be left out of things — even the wrong things

Steve Harris, private-eying for a notorious gambler, had to make a play for a wild killer’s loyal sweetheart — to unearth ninety grand in bloody gold

Steve Archer, dilettante of death, crashed into the Federal case of the dipso doll — who dealt his GI buddy from the bottom of a stacked deck

He could take him alive with a bullet in the shoulder — but four inches and four thousand dollars to the left was the throat

His feet would run, while his heart stood still — until he remembered: “Death is a victory — if it comes at the hands of a coward!”

To stay alive he had to outwit a madman

Beneath the relaxed exterior of their lush beach life — the year-round sun tans, the unmeasured cocktails, the casual embraces — there pulses an insistent, blood-warm note of violence, of unspeakable desire... Before the story is done, the pulse has run wild

A successful man is not always wise — but he’s almost never foolish

No one remembered Singer Washburn now; the years had chugged by, and the old grey train had carried him far past the time when he’d be champ, past the time when he’d be retiring. Then he saw this kid Joe, with a mean streak in him, and knew that Singer Washburn wasn’t useless yet — there were a few things he could do, and maybe doing them would somehow make up for what he’d lost

We all have our value in one way or another. We all fit in somewhere and can be used as part of a clever scheme. Make it a game (after all this is intended as a fun-book). What makes you invaluable? Why should someone labor to maneuver you in some fashion to play for large stakes?

When an author turns out several stories a month — and they’re all first-rate, which is unusual — you’d think, rightly, that he’d been in the game a long time. But that’s not the case with John D. MacDonald. Even though he falls into the first category, he definitely doesn’t fall into the second, because he’s only been writing about a year. Never even wanted to be a writer

Sonia needed help and Bill was just the guy for a lady in distress. Then came the boomerang

When I first arrived at Ballantine, where I am the mass market managing editor, we were just undergoing a daunting task: repackaging all of John D. MacDonald's Travis McGee novels. We were giving him a brand-new, beautiful look; ingeniously, we used a deep blue color for THE DEEP BLUE GOOD-BY, a gold color for A DEADLY SHADE OF GOLD, a lavender hue for THE LONG LAVENDER LOOK, etc. But as I worked on the actual stories themselves, I realized that as colorful as these books now are on the outside, they're even more colorful on the inside. In order to prepare these books, we had to have them retyped from scratch; some of these books are so old that the plates had died, so we had nothing to print from. So all the books had to be proofread as if they were new books, and what a joy it was working on them. I unexpectedly rediscovered an author and character I knew very little about. Travis McGee is one of the great characters in crime fiction, and John D. MacDonald a fascinating storyteller. You never know what either is going to do next, or say next; what is going on in their minds is as important, if not more so, then what is going on outside Travis's boat. All of which add up to a heckuva fun series. Mark Rifkin, Managing Editorial

What do you do when a criminal — a violent man who seeks revenge — turns up after fourteen years and menaces you and your entire family? Sam Bowden’s testimony had helped put Max Cady, a rapist, behind bars during World War II. Now Cady appeared out of nowhere in the small town where the Bowdens led their leisurely life. Cady was doing nothing criminal. But he pointedly admired Sam’s fourteen-year-old daughter, and Sam remembered vividly another fourteen-year-old, the whimpering girl he had seen Cady brutally assault. Cady started appearing wherever the Bowdens were, but the sidewalks are free to the public. And the tension continued to mount. What do you do when the criminal breaks no laws, eludes the private detective you have hired to shadow him, and the police are powerless to throw him out of town, or stop his war of nerves on you? Sam Bowden’s approach to his profession — the law — was one of dedication and ethics, and he did his best to adhere to the code he believed in. Suddenly the code stopped working. The law simply did not protect one against verbal threats, and Cady was too shrewd an operator to go beyond them. Furthermore, he relished the squirmings of his potential victims. Then he did act, sadistically, and still Sam had nothing with which to jail him. It was enough of a warning, though, to convince Sam Bowden that Cady was now ready to strike in earnest. What do you do when the law cannot help you and your very existence is in immediate danger? Do you become the law?

The incomparable Travis McGee is back in a brand-new adventure! Poking around where he’s not wanted — as usual — McGee delves into the mystery of a rich and beautiful wanton who happens to be losing her mind, a little piece at a time. As he probes, he uncovers some of the strange corruptions that simmer behind the respectable facade of a quiet Florida town

The Good Old Stuff is a selection of thirteen of John D. MacDonald’s best mystery stories written between 1947 and 1952, at the beginning of his career. While many readers know about MacDonald’s success from recent books such as Cinnamon Skin, Free Fall in Crimson and The Empty Copper Sea, few but the hardcore mystery addicts remember when MacDonald wrote for magazines. The Good Old Stuff has been chosen carefully to give readers a taste of his early best and to show the range of his abilities in the mystery genre. “The Simplest Poison” is a straight detective story, “Miranda” psychological suspense, “Noose for a Tigress” a real thriller. “Murder for Money” gives us an early glance at the Travis McGee prototype. In “Breathe No More” and “From Some Hidden Grave” you will see an even more recognizable Travis McGee hero in Park Falkner. Contemporary MacDonald readers and Travis McGee fans will delight in recognizing these precursors to Travis McGee; and mystery readers who remember them when they first appeared will remark on that extraordinary talent for storytelling, which is as apparent in his early stories as it is in his recent novels

Painting, foreign climes, girls who were fresh, tweet and young... all could be his; now to get rid of Myra!

At rare intervals we find ourselves in the odd position of publishing a book we cannot describe on the jacket flap. This is a baffling sample of the genre. On the most obvious level, it is a wry, unsentimental, perceptive account of how to co-exist with two cats of astonishing longevity. On another level, it is an illuminating portion of informal autobiography of one of the more successful writers of fiction of our times. Additionally, it is a careful, authentic observation of the domesticated feline, of Roger and Geoffrey, gentleman cats of humor, intelligence, protocol, and delicately savage heritage. Perhaps most interesting of all is this backstage glimpse of the writer at home, his perceptions and prejudices, his use of the materials of life, in homes in Texas, New York, Mexico, and Florida, while he was publishing six hundred pieces of magazine fiction and forty-seven novels. Wondering how to classify this intriguing work, we asked Mr. MacDonald’s advice, and he wrote to us saying, “Your guess will be better than mine. All I know is that some years back I decided to do a book about cats, and related matters. Roger is pushing twenty. I think it would be nice to award him a little neighborhood adulation while he is still one of the group.” All we know is that those who never make the acquaintance of one house guest, a goose named Knees, are impoverishing themselves. And we predict Ol’ Rog is due for more than “a little neighborhood adulation.”

Once Brud had been certain there were thinas nothing in the world could make him do. But in this new world were the Black Dukes and the Sportsters

Pulp fiction has been looked down on as a guilty pleasure, but it offers the perfect form of entertainment: the very best storytelling filled with action, surprises, sound and fury. In short, all the exhiliration of a roller-coaster ride. The 1920s in America saw the proliferation of hundreds of dubiously named but thrillingly entertaining pulp magazines in America: Black Mask, Amazing, Astounding, Spicy Stories, Ace-High, Detective Magazine, Dare-Devil Aces. It was in these luridly-coloured publications, printed on the cheapest pulp paper, that the first gems began to appear. The one golden rule for writers of pulp fiction was to adhere to the art of storytelling. Each story had to have a beginning, an end, economically-etched characters, but plenty going on, both in terms of action and emotions. Pulp magazines were the TV of their day, plucking readers from drab lives and planting them firmly in thrilling make-believe, successors

The paw of the cat — reached out for the killer of that lovely doomed blonde and closed — on nothing!

His thirsty, home-made knives and his savage, warped soul made men hate — and fear!

Adam saw they were a beautiful couple, and the boy was just like his father — except for one quality Adam has discovered years before

A geometric figure is sometimes more complicated than it looks

They say laughter’s injections, and psychologists recently have found evidence of rhythm patterns in human emotions. But MacDonald’s proposing a nasty combination—

They were racketeering vultures who’d flown the coop to Mexico — and I had to cage them as stool pigeons

Reminiscing over the past sometimes changes a fellow’s plans for the future — especially when a girl like Alice is involved

Well, he was losing weight and always hungry, Michael Rigsby told his wife. But Annabelle wasn’t alarmed. She was disgustingly cheerful

Nobody ever knew why grandfather did the things he did — but somehow they always helped us grow up