THE EMPTY COPPER SEA by Macdonald, John D

Philadelphia 1978, Lippincott, First US edition, hard bound in dust jacket, 6x9, VG + / Fine, - ( minor scratch on back cover under dj , & minor wear on dj lower spine edge ), 239 pages. When Hub Lawless falls overboard off the Florida coast, it's called a drowning. But no one quite believes it. Not Travis McGee, whose old friend Van Harder, skipper of Hub's boat, is blamed for the mishap. Not the insurance company, with whom Lawless had a two-milliondollar policy. And not Hub's wife, Julie, whose ESP has convinced her that he is dead, but not from drowning.McGee and his friend Meyer travel to Timber Bay, where the Lawless case has people on edge. McGee has to watch his step. Billy Jean Bailey, the piano player at the Western Sky Lounge, wants to love him or kill him, she's not sure which. And Dee Gee Walloway, whom McGee flattened at a party years ago, now wants a rematch.Only John Tuckerman and his sister Gretel have a plausible explanation for all the contradictions and dead-end leads. But can you trust a man who is half insane? Or a woman you may be in love with?Finally, there is that photograph sent anonymously to Sheriff Boggs. It's Hub Lawless, all right, looking dry and alive and pouring himself a beer in Mexico.