This blog has been dormant for a while, and that’s been due to time constraints. I’m bringing it back online. More on that later.

Today, July 24, is the birthday of John D. MacDonald (1916-1986). MacDonald wrote for the pulps and transitioned to paperbacks when the pulps died. (I wish someone would collect all his science fiction.) For today’s birthday post, I want to look at One Monday We Killed Them All.

Dwight McAran beat a girl to death and went to prison for it. He’s about to get out. Dwight is Fenn Hillyer’s brother-in-law. Fenn is a cop. They don’t get along.

Dwight’s sister Meg, Fenn’s wife, thinks Dwight has made some bad but is basically a good person. He just needs the police and powerful businessman whose daughter Dwight killed to get off his back and give him a chance. She’s said he can stay with her and Fenn and everything will eventually be fine.

She couldn’t be more wrong.

Do you think Fenn’s family life is about to get…complicated? Continue reading →

John D. MacDonald was born on this date, July 24, in 1916.  I’ve written about him before (see here, here, and here).

Although he’s probably best remembered today as the author of the Travis McGee series of men’s adventure thrillers, MacDonald learned his chops in the pulps, albeit during the tail end of the pulp era.

MacDonald’s work is lean and crisp, whether it’s a Travis McGee novel, a stand-alone thriller, or one of his few (but excellent) science fiction tales.  His work is worth seeking out.  And while some of the attitudes expressed may seem dated to anyone who thinks literature began sometime after the year 2000, there’s plenty of philosophy integrated into the action to raise his work above that of pulp hackwork.  This is literature, and deserves to be kept in print.