• The Man Who Invented Florida

  • Doc Ford #3
  • By: Randy Wayne White
  • Narrated by: Dick Hill
  • Length: 12 hrs and 32 mins
  • 4.1 out of 5 stars (478 ratings)

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The Man Who Invented Florida  By  cover art

The Man Who Invented Florida

By: Randy Wayne White
Narrated by: Dick Hill
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Publisher's summary

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 craze, and Indian bones are buried, mysteries great and small have found the man to solve them.

©1993 Randy Wayne White (P)2010 Tantor

Critic reviews

"Like fellow Floridian Carl Hiaasen, White is adept at weaving ecological concerns into an oddball narrative with no loss of steam. The fate of the three missing men, even by bizarre Florida crime fiction standards, is inspired." ( Publishers Weekly)

What listeners say about The Man Who Invented Florida

Average customer ratings
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  • 4 out of 5 stars
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  • Overall
    5 out of 5 stars
  • Performance
    4 out of 5 stars
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    5 out of 5 stars

A real Florida girl loves a real Florida story

Great book. Well researched. Entertaining. Humorous without making us Florida Crackers look stupid. I just wish they had told the narrator the right way to pronounce the Tamiami Trail.

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7 people found this helpful

  • Overall
    3 out of 5 stars
  • Performance
    4 out of 5 stars
  • Story
    2 out of 5 stars

I am so glad I didn't start the series with this

Any additional comments?

This was a struggle for me. I absolutely hated the character representing Doc's uncle. This guy drove me crazy and reminded me of someone from my past. The story was a bit weak and predictable. At the bottom of the list of books I read this year.

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3 people found this helpful

  • Overall
    1 out of 5 stars
  • Performance
    3 out of 5 stars
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    1 out of 5 stars

The Man Who Invented Bordedom

We have enjoyed listening to and reading other Doc Ford novels. But this was just an incoherent mess in which Doc Ford was a complete afterthought. The characters were not compelling at all and White completely forgot about one main character about 2/3 of the way through.

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2 people found this helpful

  • Overall
    3 out of 5 stars
  • Performance
    4 out of 5 stars
  • Story
    2 out of 5 stars

Ramble on

I struggled with the plot. His other books are better. However, the characters are funny.

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2 people found this helpful

  • Overall
    1 out of 5 stars
  • Performance
    2 out of 5 stars
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    2 out of 5 stars

Slow moving with uninteresting central characters

I've read and enjoyed other books in the Doc Ford series but I found this one to be very tedious. The first part of the book meanders as slowly as an Everglades current and I kept losing interest as it plodded along.

The accents of the old men really annoyed me. They seemed almost cartoonish for some reason. Maybe my disinterest in the plot spilled over to the performance. Usually, Dick Hill is a wonderful narrator.

I wouldn't recommend this one unless you have a long boring drive to make and nothing else to do.

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  • Overall
    3 out of 5 stars
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    3 out of 5 stars
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    2 out of 5 stars

Hard to Get Through

I’m not sure if it was the story or the narrator or both but this one was painful. I really enjoyed the first two Dic Ford books. 4-5 stars all the way around. This one felt like a collection of disjointed stories that may have a common thread if you squint real hard. I’ll definitely do more Doc Ford/Randy White but I won’t soon recommend this one.

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1 person found this helpful

  • Overall
    5 out of 5 stars
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    5 out of 5 stars
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    5 out of 5 stars

Great read

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  • Overall
    1 out of 5 stars
  • Performance
    3 out of 5 stars
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    1 out of 5 stars

Nothing happens

I've enjoyed other books in this series, but this one is like a Seinfeld Episode, but not in a good way. It's a story about nothing.

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  • Overall
    3 out of 5 stars
  • Performance
    1 out of 5 stars
  • Story
    3 out of 5 stars

The reader's voice just about kills the book

The high pitched whiny drawl of the reader eventually stopped me in my tracks. I stopped listening with 12 hours to go. Like fingernails on a chalk board. Too bad because it's not a bad story.

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  • Overall
    3 out of 5 stars
  • Performance
    5 out of 5 stars
  • Story
    3 out of 5 stars

love doc!

I read the whole series in the eighties. This book was just not much about Ford and his skills mostly rambling about other people still not bad.

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