Every now and then a perfectly serviceable novelist writes something that makes you fear for his sanity. And every now and then, one of these clangers is published.
And you wind up with John D. MacDonald babbling about a nude yacht with an “all-girl crew”… and your flesh just crawls.
This book was one of JD’s Travis McGee series, solid, kind of offbeat, highly entertaining thrillers. Why he ever felt the need to write about a nude all-girl yacht crew is a poser for the ages. I mean, gee! Editors are supposed to protect you from making a fool of yourself! What was MacDonald’s editor thinking?
PS–Hats off to Lisa for correctly identifying the Travis McGee book in question.
I knew that there was some of this going on, back in the ‘70s, but didn’t realize that it was still happening. I always assumed that that nude cruises were a euphemism for prostitution. International waters are fair game for lots of things that aren’t allowed on land.
That book was from the 1970s. I have not investigated whether nude all-girl cruises are still available.
The ‘70s were very sexually libertine. The social changes of the ‘60s led immorality to be rebranded as “the new morality” and for some people, that was an invitation to cast off all restraint. By the end of the decade, herpes began to spread and caused a lot of concern. By the early to mid ‘80s AIDS hit with full force and at least some people were given pause. My impression is that adults in the ‘80s took a step back from, at least, the more egregious practices, but youth felt that they were safe, as long as they stayed within their own age peers.
If there is less going on in the way of such things as nude cruises in our day, it is probably only because the overall standard of sexual morality has dropped to the point that the isolation and concealment of being on a cruise would no longer be important to many would-be clients, but using international waters as a way to get around prostitution laws may still be a motivating force.
I remember when accusing someone of fornication was considered an insult to their character. These days, if you state that you do not fornicate, you may be called a nasty name. I speak from personal experience.
Really, you couldn’t get a thriller published in the late 60s and the 70s unless you laced it with fornication of some kind.
This would make a clear example for the reason I wrote my article titled “The Shame of Nakedness” several years ago. Another web site lifted my article, without permission, published it on their website, and took comments from tons of people. A few were in agreement with me, but most called me every name in the books and these were supposed to be people who regularly read Christian blogs. Hmmm. In spite of the fact that I noted that all 104 references in Scripture concerning nakedness were very negative, a lot of the writers on the blog said things like “you are just an old prude, I love nudity, …” So, that is how people are, I guess. They don’t give a hoot about ordinary decency or God’s view of things.
“I love nudity…” Why does that sound like a big fat lie?
It certainly sounds ludicrous, indecent, etc.
Mostly it was very, very silly.
So what was MacDonald’s story about? There isn’t much mystery when people have no clothes on 🙂
I don’t remember. That one preposterous scene erased all the rest of the book.
No concealed anything, in that setting.
This book about the editor made me think about how there’s an apologetics book that bragged the author was also the editor and the guy also is the CEO of the publishing house…it was horrible and he attacked my book reviews on my blog, on Amazon and on FB…nutty guy
Sounds like a swelled head.
Big time; he was a horrible guy that think Mao’s not that bad; I need to make a future post on him
Don’t let me miss it!
Will have to dig up some old stuff, research Mao and will be one of my posts that go all out refuting something stupid from the woke crowd
Take it to ’em!
THanks!
Don’t forget to point out that Mao was by far the most prolific mass murderer in all of human history. The Chicom governemt **admits** he killed at least 40 million Chinese. The really number is surely much higher.
Good point!