FOOL’S PARADISE
Book one of the (McAllister Trilogy)
A Novel by Bobby Ferguson
© Copyright 2010
(Summary/Outline)
HISTORICAL FACT – [COVERED IN PROLOGUE]
In 1733, King George II of England sent a newly commissioned, twenty-seven year old Admiral on a mission to the New World. Admiral James Ingrams, in command of the H.M.S.Looe, was assigned to privateer a mystery ship that was reputed to have been a floating storage depot for millions of dollars of Spanish gold and other New World riches looted from years of piracy and illegal salvage.
Admiral Ingrams was successful in locating the almost mythical ship and, after wresting control from a skeleton crew left to guard her, took the ship, monikered The Prize, under tow and started to sail for England. His luck ran out, however, when a small but powerful hurricane dashed the Looe against a reef and the untended mystery ship broke free and disappeared.
Although the remains of the Looe have long been located and are now a part of an underwater, federally protected, National Park off the coast of present day – Looe Key, Florida, the remains and the treasure of the legendary Prize has never been found.
THE BOOK
In present day Savannah, Georgia, Bobby McAllister has made a name for himself as a treasure hunter. A semi-recluse because of his wealth and the enemies he made during his lifetime, lives comfortable in his hometown, but longs for the life of a modern day pirate and yearns for the fulfillment of a life-long dream.
McAllister hires moderately successful fiction author Granger Lawton to write his biography, a book of which Lawton’s publisher has been actively seeking publication rights. Lawton reluctantly accepts the assignment and travels from his home town Payson, Arizona to Georgia to interview the eccentric seeker of sunken fortune.
In a variety of strange and sometimes exotic locations, chosen by McAllister to better illustrate his adventures, Lawton listens to McAlister’s life long story with a combination of caution and skepticism. McAllister is not only unconventional in some of his beliefs, his account of his life experiences sometimes border on the bizarre and tax the imagination.