Cuban Death-Lift

Table of Contents

 

 

“What James Lee Burke has done for Louisiana, Tony Hillerman for the Southwest, John Sandford for Minnesota, and Joe R. Lansdale for east Texas, Randy Wayne White does for his own little acre.”

—
Chicago Tribune

 

“White takes us places that no other Florida mystery writer can hope to find.”

—
Carl Hiaasen

 

“White brings vivid imagination to his fight scenes. Think Mickey Spillane meets
The Matrix
.”

—
People

 

“A major new talent . . . hits the ground running . . . a virtually perfect piece of work. He's the best new writer we've encountered since Carl Hiaasen.”

—
The Denver Post

 

“White is the rightful heir to joining John D. Mac-Donald, Carl Hiaasen, James Hall, Geoffrey Norman. . . . His precise prose is as fresh and pungent as a salty breeze.”

—
The Tampa Tribune

 

“White doesn't just use Florida as a backdrop, but he also makes the smell, sound, and physicality of the state leap off the page.”

—
South Florida Sun-Sentinel

 

“This satisfying madcap fare could go seismic on the regional bestseller lists.”

—
Publishers Weekly

 

“He describes southwestern Florida so well it's easy to smell the salt tang in the air and feel the cool Gulf breeze.”

—
Mansfield News Journal

SIGNET

Published by New American Library, a division of Penguin Group (USA) Inc., 375 Hudson Street, New York, New York 10014, USA

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Penguin Books Ltd., Registered Offices: 80 Strand, London WC2R 0RL, England

 

Published by Signet, an imprint of New American Library, a division of Penguin Group (USA) Inc.

 

First Printing, February 1981
First Printing (Author Introduction), April 2007

Copyright © New American Library, a division of Penguin Group (USA) Inc., 1981

eISBN : 978-1-101-53061-0

Introduction copyright © Randy Wayne White, 2006
All rights reserved

REGISTERED TRADEMARK—MARCA REGISTRADA

 

Without limiting the rights under copyright reserved above, no part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in or introduced into a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form, or by any means (electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise), without the prior written permission of both the copyright owner and the above publisher of this book.

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In the winter of 1980, I received a surprising phone call from an editor at Signet Books—surprising because, as a Florida fishing guide, the only time New Yorkers called me was to charter my boat. And if any of my clients were editors, they were savvy enough not to admit it.

The editor said she'd read a story by me in
Outside Magazine
and was impressed. Did I have time to talk?

As a mediocre high school jock, my idols were writers, not ball players. I had a dream job as a light-tackle guide, yet I was still obsessed with my own dream of writing for a living. For years, before and after charters, I'd worked hard at the craft. Selling a story to
Outside,
one of the country's finest publications, was a huge break. I was about to finish a novel, but this was the first time New York had called.

Yes, I had time to talk.

The editor, whose name was Joanie, told me Signet wanted to launch a paperback thriller series that featured a recurring he-man hero. “We want at least four writers on the project because we want to keep the books coming, publishing one right after the other, to create momentum.”

Four writers producing books with the same character?

“Characters,” Joanie corrected. “Once we get going, the cast will become standard.”

Signet already had a template for the hero. He was a Vietnam vet turned Key West fishing guide, she said, talking as if the man existed. He was surfer-boy blond, and he'd been friends with Hemingway.

I am not a literary historian, but all my instincts told me the timetable seemed problematic. I said nothing.

“He has a shark scar,” Joanie added, “and he's freakishly strong. Like a man who lifts weights all the time.”

The guys I knew who lifted weights were also freakishly clumsy, so . . . maybe the hero, while visiting a local aquarium, tripped during feeding time?

My brain was already problem-solving.

“He lives in Key West,” she said, “so, of course, he has to be an expert on the area. That's why I'm calling. You live in Key West, and I liked your magazine story a lot. It seems like a natural fit.”

Actually, I fished out of Sanibel Island, on Florida's Gulf Coast, a six hour drive from Sloppy Joe's, but this was no time for petty details.

“Have you ever been to Key West?” I asked the editor. “Great sunsets.”

Editors, I have since learned, can also be cagey. Joanie didn't offer me the job. She had already settled on three of the four writers, she said, but if I was willing to submit a few sample chapters on speculation, she'd give me serious consideration.

Money? A contract? That stuff was “all standard,” she told me, and could be discussed later.

“I'll warn you right now,” she said, “there are a couple of other writers we're considering, so you need to get at least three chapters to me within a month. Then I'll let you know.”

I hung up the phone, stunned by my good fortune. My first son, Lee, had been born only a few months earlier. My much adored wife, Debra, and I were desperate for money because the weather that winter had been miserable for fishing. But it was
perfect
for writing.

I went to my desk, determined not to let my young family down.

At Tarpon Bay Marina, where I was a guide, my friend Ralph Woodring owned a boat with
Dusky
painted in big blue letters on the side. My friend, Graeme Mellor, lived on a Morgan sailboat named
No Mas.

Dusky MacMorgan was born.

Every winter, Clyde Beatty-Cole Bros. Circus came to town. Their trapeze artists, I realized, were not only freakishly strong, but they were also freakishly nimble.

Dusky gathered depth.

One of my best friends was the late Dr. Harold Westervelt, a gifted orthopedic surgeon. Dr. Westervelt became the Edison of Death, and he loved introducing himself that way to new patients. His son, David, became Westy O'Davis, and our spearfishing pal, Billy, became Billy Mack.

Problems with my hero's shark scar and his devoted friendship with Hemingway were also solved.

Working around the clock, pounding away at my old black manual typewriter, I wrote
Key West Connection
in nine days. On a Monday morning, I waited for the post office to open to send it to New York.

Joanie sounded a little dazed when she telephoned on Friday. Was I willing to try a second book on spec?

Hell, yes.

God, I was beginning to
love
New York's can-do attitude.

The other three writers (if they ever existed) were fired, and I became the sole proprietor of Capt. Dusky MacMorgan—although Signet owned the copyright and all other rights after I signed Joanie's “standard” contract. (This injustice was later made right by a willing and steadfast publisher and my brilliant agent.)

If Joanie (a fine editor) feels badly about that today, she shouldn't. I would've signed for less.

I wrote seven of what I would come to refer to as “duck and fuck” books because in alternating chapters Dusky would duck a few bullets, then spend much-deserved time alone with a heroine.

Seldom did a piece of paper go into my old typewriter that was ripped out and thrown away, and I suspect that's the way the books read. I don't know. I've never reread them. I do remember using obvious clichés, a form of self-loathing, as if to remind myself that I should be doing my
own
writing, not this job-of-work.

The book you are now holding, and the other six, constituted a training arena for a young writer who took seriously the discipline demanded by his craft and also the financial imperatives of being a young father.