Randy Wayne White

Randy Wayne White's thirteen years as a full-time, light-tackle fishing guide at Tarpon Bay Marina, Sanibel Island, on Florida's Gulf Coast, inspired many of the characters and stories in his New York Times best-selling Doc Ford series. The second edition of Randy Wayne White's Gulf Coast Cookbook pairs more than 125 recipes with photos of the real Tarpon Bay and the most appetizing food-related passages from this acclaimed writer's essays and novels. The result is a veritable memoir of food and adventure, true friends and favorite characters, all in an enjoyable presentation promising satisfying food, drink-and reading.

From New York Times bestselling author Randy Wayne White, the latest thriller following Doc Ford and his perilous journey into Mesoamerica after a world-shattering earthquake threatens his squad's safety--and all of their livesIn the wake of a killer hurricane, Doc Ford's best friend, Tomlinson, insists that he died when his beloved sailboat hit a reef off the Mosquito Coast of Honduras. He now lives to tell the tale, but only because he was brought back to life--temporarily--by a runaway orphan who is the direct descendent of the last king of the ancient Mayan people.Corrupt politicians want the child out of the picture before he catalyzes a revolution among the Indigenous population. But the boy, a charismatic twelve-year-old, has gone underground with the help of Tomlinson and a network of street urchins. They're all on the run and in the crosshairs when Ford arrives and picks up his friend's trail. This is not his first trip to the most dangerous country in Mesoamerica, and no one is better equipped to deal with flesh traffickers, paramilitary killers, an archaeologist addicted to sex and a homicidal giant known locally as Iron Baby.Their spiritual home on Sanibel Island, Dinkin's Bay Marina, has already suffered the death of one key member, and Ford is determined not to burden that quirky little family with yet another funeral wake. What no one is prepared for, however, is a cataclysmic earthquake that hits the area with the impact of a meteor that nearly destroyed all life on earth more than sixty million years ago.

"Anyone who insists mysteries can't also be 'real literature' should be duct-taped to a chair and handed a novel by Randy Wayne White." --Washington Times After the deadliest hurricane to hit Florida's Gulf Coast in a century, Doc Ford must stop a gang of thieves-- and worse-- during the twelve hours of chaos that follow the passing of a storm's eye. A Russian diplomat disappears while Doc is tagging great white sharks in South Africa, and members of a criminal brotherhood, Bratva, don't think it's a coincidence. They track the biologist to Dinkin's Bay Marina on the west coast of Florida, where Brotherhood mercenaries have already deployed, prepared to pillage and kill in the wake of an approaching hurricane. No one, however, is prepared for a cataclysmic event that will forever change the island and leave Doc to deal with escapees from Russia's most dangerous prison, including a serial killer--the Vulture Monk--who has a taste for blood. His only ally is an enigmatic British inventor whose decision to ride out the storm might have more to do with revenge than protecting a priceless art collection. Doc has a lot at stake--the lives of his fianc e, Hannah Smith, and their son, plus the fate of his hipster pal, Tomlinson, whose sailboat has disappeared in the Gulf of Mexico. The greatest threat of all, though, is a force that cannot be escaped--a Category 5 hurricane that, minute by minute, melds sins of the past with Florida's precarious future. "Packed with finely drawn characters, relevant social issues, superb plotting and an effortless writing style. White has produced a virtually perfect piece of work." --Denver Post "White is willing to take risks, which is why he is one of the few best-selling authors today worthy of the title 'writer.'" --Fort Worth Star-Telegram

*NATIONAL BESTSELLER*From New York Times bestselling author Randy Wayne White, after the deadliest hurricane to hit Florida's Gulf Coast in a century, Doc Ford must stop a gang of thieves--and worse--during the twelve hours of chaos that follow the passing of a storm's eye.A Russian diplomat disappears while Doc is tagging great white sharks in South Africa, and members of a criminal brotherhood, Bratva, don't think it's a coincidence. They track the biologist to Dinkin's Bay Marina on the west coast of Florida, where Brotherhood mercenaries have already deployed, prepared to pillage and kill in the wake of an approaching hurricane.No one, however, is prepared for a cataclysmic event that will forever change the island and leaves Doc to deal with escapees from Russia's most dangerous prison, including a serial killer--the Vulture Monk--who has a taste for blood. His only ally is an enigmatic British inventor whose decision to ride out the storm might have more to do with revenge than protecting a priceless art collection.Doc has a lot at stake--the lives of his fianc e, Hannah Smith, and their son, plus the fate of his hipster pal, Tomlinson, whose sailboat has disappeared in the Gulf of Mexico. The greatest threat of all, though, is a force that cannot be escaped--a Category Five hurricane that, minute by minute, melds sins of the past with Florida's precarious future.

The Professional Tarpon Rodeo is back on Sanibel Island, offering any celebrity contestant who lands a rare piebald tarpon a one-million-dollar prize. But marine biologist Doc Ford is certain that people are cheating to win. When an angler team illegally catches a tarpon to feed it to sharks for attention, Doc enlists the kids of Sharks Inc. - Luke, Maribel, and Sabina - to uncover their scheme. Would introverted Luke rather be trapped between a hammerhead shark and an injured tarpon - or trapped in the spotlight of internet adoration? With the help of an unlikely new friend, the intrepid Sharks Inc. trio will unmask a band of zombies, outwit a devious celebrity manager, and rescue one elusive tarpon.

From Randy Wayne White, the New York Times bestselling author of the Doc Ford series for adults, comes Fins, a high-stakes, masterfully plotted story of courage, friendship...and sharks The world's shark population is in trouble for a sad, simple reason: shark fin soup. And although it's illegal, poachers have been targeting Florida's biannual migration of blacktip sharks. Marine biologist Doc Ford needs some assistance protecting the sharks and enlists the help of three kids--Luke, Maribel and Sabina. Luke is brand-new to Florida from the Midwest; sisters Maribel and Sabina have only recently arrived from Cuba--and all three feel like fish out of water. It's going to take some convincing for them to work as a team and to recognize in themselves the courage, wisdom and tenacity that Doc sees in them. Together they form Sharks, Inc. and are given an important assignment: to set out each day on their small fishing boat in hopes of tagging sharks for Doc's research--and to stay away--far away--from any possible poachers in the area. The trio certainly isn't looking for trouble, but when they come face to face with danger, survival requires them to rely on each of their own unique gifts, and especially on one another.

The trio of brave friends who make up Shark, Inc--Luke, Maribel and Sabina--dive back into adventure in Stingers, the follow-up to bestselling author Randy Wayne White's Fins.Marine biologist Doc Ford invites Maribel, Luke, and Sabina to a remote island in the Bahamas where lionfish, a beautiful and venomous inhabitant of the South Pacific that has invaded Florida and the Caribbean, are not just upsetting the balance of nature by damaging the coral reefs--their sting has put several people in the hospital. What Doc and Captain Hannah Smith don't mention is that the island is riddled with limestone caves, once home to a band of pirates, and stories of Spanish gold have lured outlaw treasure hunters to the area. When the trio finds precious artifacts, they agree to guard the secret until they've thoroughly explored the spot. Soon, outlaws search for the trio, hoping they will lead them to riches.

The sins of the past come back to haunt Doc Ford and his old friend Tomlinson in this thrilling novel from New York Times-bestselling author Randy Wayne White, now in paperback. Marine biologist and former government agent Doc Ford is sure he's beyond the point of being surprised by his longtime pal Tomlinson's madcap tales of his misspent youth. But he's stunned anew when avowed bachelor Tomlinson reveals that as a younger man strapped for cash, he'd unwittingly fathered multiple children via for-profit sperm bank donations. Thanks to genealogy websites, Tomlinson's now-grown offspring have tracked him down, seeking answers about their roots. . . but Doc quickly grows suspicious that one of them might be planning something far more nefarious than a family reunion. With recent history on his mind, Doc is unsurprised when his own dicey past is called into question. Months ago, he'd quietly "liberated" a cache of precious Spanish coins from a felonious treasure hunter, and now a number of unsavory individuals, including a disgraced IRS investigator and a corrupt Bahamian customs agent, are after their cut. Caught between watching his own back and Tomlinson's, Doc has no choice but to get creative--before rash past decisions escalate to deadly present-day dangers.

A scintillating new collection from one of America's premier travel writers.

Whether he's engaging in mock aerial combat or riding an Iditarod sled, Randy Wayne White is one of America's most adventurous travelers. In this collection he studies anti-terrorist driving techniques, dives for golf balls in an alligator-infested pond, hunts his fellow man with a paint gun, ice-fishes for walleye with X-ray-stunned night-crawlers, and goes pig-shooting with Dr. Pavlov. With self-effacing optimism, White captures joys and fears of wandering the earth's surface with an eclectic cast of fellow travelers: a frog that won't jump, a group of expatriate Brits who developed an interesting cure for "road jaundice," and even a mad Australian scientist. Though he rarely finds what he's looking for--like the legendary landlocked bull sharks of Lake Nicaragua--he develops a Zen-like "passion for the means," and a rare ability to revel in the rib-aching humor of each exotic trip.

Readers familiar with Randy Wayne White's "Out There" column in Outside magazine will relish this first collection of his best work; those new to White's delectable blend of adventure, hilarity, and spirit can only be envied for the satisfaction of that first encounter. Whether it’s `This Dog Is Legend,” in which he tells of his cinder-block-retrieving Chesapeake Bay retriever named Gator, or “Coming To America,” about the stirring—and sometimes terrifying—Mariel boat lift, White never fails to engross us in a life of sun, boats, work, and sport.

"A highly-spirited adventure...Loopy and lovable characters."--The New York Times Book Review Nobody knows the dark side of the Sunshine State like Doc Ford in the bestselling The Man Who Invented Florida by Randy Wayne White. When solitary marine biologist Doc Ford focused his telescope on the woman in the white boat, he didn't know his life was about to be capsized: that his conniving uncle Tucker Gatrell would discover the Fountain of Youth, that The National Enquirer would write about it, and that the law would beat down his door in search of three missing men. But Doc Ford is about to find these things out--the hard way. Because in the shadowy world of Southwest Florida, where gators yawn, cattle graze, and Indian bones are buried, mysteries great and small have found the man to solve them... "Wildly inventive."--San Diego Union-Tribune This edition of the book is the deluxe, tall rack mass market paperback.

Murder, sunken treasure, and pirates both ancient and modern send Doc Ford on a nightmare quest in this thrilling novel in the New York Times-bestselling series, now in paperback for the first time Marine biologist Doc Ford has been known to help his friends out of jams occasionally, but he's never faced a situation like this. His old pal Carl Fitzpatrick has been chasing sunken wrecks most of his life, but now he's run afoul of the Florida Division of Historical Resources. Its director, Leonard Nickelby, despises amateur archaeologists, which is bad enough, but now he and his young "assistant" have disappeared--along with Fitzpatrick's impounded cache of rare Spanish coins and the list of uncharted wreck sites Fitz spent decades putting together. Some of Fitz's own explorations have been a little...dicey, so he can't go to the authorities. Doc is his only hope. But greed makes people do terrible things: rob, cheat, even kill. With stakes this high, there's no way the thieves will go quietly--and Doc's just put himself in their crosshairs.

The ghosts of a 1925 multiple murder stalk Doc Ford in this electrifying novel in the New York Times-bestselling series. Doc Ford has been involved in many strange cases. This may be one of the strangest. A legendary charter captain and guide named Tootsie Barlow has come to him, muttering about a curse. The members of his extended family have suffered a bizarre series of attacks, and Barlow is convinced it has something to do with a multiple murder in 1925, in which his family had a shameful part. Ford doesn't believe in curses, but as he and his friend Tomlinson begin to investigate, following the trail of the attacks from Key Largo to Tallahassee, they, too, suffer a series of near-fatal mishaps. Is it really a curse? Or just a crime spree? The answer lies in solving a near-hundred-year-old murder...and probing the mind of a madman.

In Randy Wayne White's The Heat Islands, marine biologist and former secret operative Doc Ford is lazily poling his skiff along Southwest Florida's flat copper sea in search of sea anemones, when he runs into the body of the most hated man on Sanibel Island - Marvin Rios. And when the Island's simplest and sweetest resident is arrested for the murder, Doc heads straight into the heart of the sunshine state's dark side - to save his friend from being framed, and to save Sanibel Island from a rising tide of land-grab schemes, blood money, and violence.

A five-hundred-year-old mystery and a twenty-year-old murder haunt Hannah Smith in a stunning adventure by the author of the New York Times-bestselling Doc Ford novels. A fishing guide and part-time investigator, Hannah Smith is a tall, strong Florida woman descended from many generations of tall, strong Florida women. But the problem before her now is much older even than that. And its consequences are lethal. Five hundred years ago, Spanish conquistadors planted the first orange seeds in Florida, but now the billion-dollar industry is in trouble. The trees are dying, weakened by infestation and genetic manipulation, and the only solution might be somehow, somewhere to find sample of the original root stock. No one is better equipped to traverse the swamps and murky backcountry of Florida than Hannah, but once word leaks out of her quest, the trouble begins. "There are people who will kill to find a direct descendant of those first seeds," she is warned--and it looks like those words may be all too prophetic. That is, if the secrets she discovers in the Florida wild about a twenty-year-old murder don't kill her first. Or the fifteen-foot-long Burmese python.