Happy birthday to me!

LOL. I don't know why I ended up reading John D. MacDonald, today of all days. Although I am not a fan of the "hard-boiled" genre, Macdonald's Travis McGee, the rough, tough "salvage consultant" and philosopher-in-disguise, has always been a favorite hero of mine since I first read about him in "The Girl in the Plain Brown Wrapper."

Perhaps it is because of that "philosopher-in-disguise" thing. I make a sort of game out of it. In every Travis McGee story I search for a hidden gem, a quote, a piece of insight that you would not have believed was lifted from a hard-boiled novel. And I always find it, such as today's teaser from "Bright Orange for the Shroud" by John D. MacDonald.

"A friend is someone to whom you can say any jackass thing that enters your mind. With acquaintances, you are forever aware of their slightly unreal image of you, and to keep them content, you edit yourself to fit."
- p. 13, "Bright Orange for the Shroud" by John D. MacDonald

Teaser Tuesdays is a weekly bookish meme, hosted by MizB of Should Be Reading. Anyone can play along! Just do the following:

* Grab your current read
* Open to a random page
* Share two (2) “teaser” sentences from somewhere on that page
* BE CAREFUL NOT TO INCLUDE SPOILERS! (make sure that what you share doesn’t give too much away! You don’t want to ruin the book for others!)
* Share the title & author, too, so that other TT participants can add the book to their TBR Lists if they like your teasers!