The Dreadful Lemon Sky

John D. MacDonald was born in Sharon, Pennsylvania on July 24, 1916. He received a B.S. from Syracuse University in 1938 and an M.B.A. from the Harvard Graduate School of Business Administration in 1939. During World War II, he served in the Army.

His first novel, Brass Cupcake, was published in 1950. He wrote about 70 books during his lifetime including the Travis McGee series, Condominium, No Deadly Drug, Nothing Can Go Wrong, and A Friendship: The Letters of Dan Rowan and John Dann MacDonald. A Flash of Green was adapted into a movie by the same name and The Excuse was adapted into a movie entitled Cape Fear. He received numerous awards including the Ben Franklin Award for the best American short story in 1955, the Grand Prix de Litterature Policiere for A Key to the Suite in 1964, the Mystery Writers of America's Grand Master Award in 1972, the American Book Award for The Green Ripper in 1980.

He died from complications of an earlier heart bypass surgery on December 28, 1986 at the age of 70.

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