John D MacDonald,Travis McGee

I am a fan of John D MacDonald, especially the Travis McGee series of books. I have read all of the McGee series and many of his other books. Any recommendations for similar authors/series would be appreciatted.

Ever read Lee Child's Jack Reacher books? Really good, full of intrigue. I love spy and cop books, they're my favourite way to relax. I've read all of Michael Connelly's Harry Bosch books, David Baldacci, Jeffrey Deavers and John Lescroat. It's great when you stumble across authors who have a really good main character -- makes you want to hunt down all their books to follow them.

My "Brush with Greatness" story. When I was in Sarasota in 1979, I got to tell Mr. McDonald where the bathrooms were in the downtown marina. I had just spent three months in the Bahamas with my parents aboard a 34ft. sailboat, reading quite a few Travis McGee stories.

While I must admit I haven't even heard of John D MacDonald, I've read most of the authors that Lesley mentioned. If you like that sort of stuff I'd also recommend James Lee Burke's books (especially the Robicheaux ones, but everything I've read by him is good).

Potentially also the older books by Andrew Vachss, the newer ones are missing some important ingredients IMHO (mainly the old, nasty New York before Guliani cleaned it up).

Lesley wrote: Ever read Lee Child's Jack Reacher books? Really good, full of intrigue. I love spy and cop books, they're my favourite way to relax. I've read all of Michael Connelly's Harry Bosch books, David Baldacci, Jeffrey Deavers and John Lescroat. It's great when you stumble across authors who have a really good main character -- makes you want to hunt down all their books to follow them.

Vince Flynn is excellent if you like the clandestine cia genre and he's perhaps my second favorite but overall the Reacher books are consistently my favorite way to get lost in a book.

BoxheadTim wrote: While I must admit I haven't even heard of John D MacDonald, I've read most of the authors that Lesley mentioned. If you like that sort of stuff I'd also recommend James Lee Burke's books (especially the Robicheaux ones, but everything I've read by him is good).

Yes, I forgot about him, he's really good too. And one of my favourites, Carl Hiassen. Florida newspaper columnist. So damn funny I larfff out loud.

John Sandford writes the "Prey" books about Lucas Davenport; I've only read a couple, because I got into them fairly late and decided I wanted to read them in order. HOWEVER, he has also written an excellent series about a computer hacker named Kidd (not forgetting his friend LuEllen, the "spatial intrusion engineer," i.e. thief.) Be aware that he started writing the Kidd novels under his real name (John Camp) and only converted to his pen name of Sandford when the series was reissued. I assume it was his publisher's idea. Under either name, they're great stuff; so are the more recent Sandford books about Virgil Flowers, a hippie-looking cop who has to be reminded to carry his weapon, but has the best clearance rate in the state.

Thank you for all of the information. I am planning to do some reading

Although he doesn't write one character, Dennis Lehane's work is terrific, too. Reacher (Child's character) is my personal hero.