{"id":20833,"date":"2025-06-17T20:02:18","date_gmt":"2025-06-18T00:02:18","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/brandywinebooks.net\/?p=20833"},"modified":"2025-06-17T20:02:18","modified_gmt":"2025-06-18T00:02:18","slug":"death-trap-by-john-d-macdonald","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/brandywinebooks.net\/?p=20833","title":{"rendered":"‘Death Trap,’ by John D. MacDonald"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
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Realization was a long time in coming, and when it came in all its intensity, I knew that the world seldom saw as great a fool as I. She had magic, integrity, passion and a rare loveliness. And I had gone at her the way you go at one of those coin machines where you try to pick up the prize with a toy crane. I could have had the whole machine, with all the prizes and all the candy. But I had settled for gilt and glass.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n

Hugh MacReedy, hero-narrator<\/strong> of John D. MacDonald\u2019s Death Trap<\/a><\/em>, has never gotten over the mistake he made two years ago, when he was working as an engineer on a highway project near the town of Dalton (no state given). He had met the lovely Victoria Landry, and dated her. He then treated her as a score on a card and cast her off, hurting her deeply. Now he knows he blew the best thing that ever happened to him. But he also knows he\u2019ll never get another chance with her. Until, back in Chicago from a job in Spain, he happens to pick up a newspaper and read that Vicky\u2019s brother Alister, an awkward and arrogant genius, is scheduled to be executed for murder in a few days.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

On impulse, Hugh cancels a vacation he\u2019d planned and drives to Dalton instead. He finds Vicky, a shadow of her old self, devastated by her brother\u2019s tragedy. At first she refuses Hugh\u2019s help, still hurting from his rejection, but at last she offers him a deal. If her brother is executed, she says, she knows she\u2019ll never be able to be any man\u2019s wife. But if Hugh can find evidence to prove him innocent, she\u2019ll give him another chance.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Hugh is strong and healthy, bright enough, and not shy. He can afford to spend money on an investigation. He\u2019s in.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

I call that a pretty good set-up for a mystery thriller. Death Trap<\/em> was written in 1957, when author MacDonald was hitting his stride as a novelist, and Death Trap<\/em>, it seems to me, is right up there with the very best. The town of Dalton is realistically portrayed, a town that\u2019s experienced tragedy and corporately settled on a unanimous narrative, in which the truth is secondary. The girl Alister is supposed to have killed is remembered as a sweet, lovely child. In fact she was prematurely promiscuous, openly defiant of authority, and casually manipulative. Anyone questioning the accepted narrative, though, has to expect pushback \u2013 and Hugh gets it in spades, though he gives as good as he gets.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The book involves several vicious fights, but \u2013 interestingly \u2013 it\u2019s psychology and a smart trap that nail the real murderer down in the end. Few things in literature age as poorly as old psychology \u2013 and the analysis does creak a little here \u2013 but all in all it works.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Death Trap<\/em> is a top-notch, old-school pulp action mystery with added class. Recommended, with cautions, as you\u2019d expect, for violence and non-explicit sexual situations.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Realization was a long time in coming, and when it came in all its intensity, I knew that the world seldom saw as great a fool as I. She had magic, integrity, passion and a rare loveliness. And I had gone at her the way you go at one of those coin machines where you … Continue reading ‘Death Trap,’ by John D. MacDonald<\/span> →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"nf_dc_page":"","_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[7,15],"tags":[5593,3868],"class_list":["post-20833","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-fiction","category-reviews","tag-death-trap","tag-john-d-macdonald"],"jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/brandywinebooks.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/20833","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/brandywinebooks.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/brandywinebooks.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/brandywinebooks.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/brandywinebooks.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=20833"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/brandywinebooks.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/20833\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":20836,"href":"https:\/\/brandywinebooks.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/20833\/revisions\/20836"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/brandywinebooks.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=20833"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/brandywinebooks.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=20833"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/brandywinebooks.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=20833"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}