I obviously read an earlier edition, so the book was written in the 1950's. Our point of view character is arriving at the company sales convention. No one will be shot, several careers get destroyed and several marriages will also end. Though there are no shootings, there is a lot of destruction breaking out. ( )

Amongst the many MacDonald books I have read, this is the most unsatisfying. Unlikable characters, no humour and an ending that leaves all unsatisfied. Not recommended.

Floyd Hubbard is of to a convention where his firm has a section. His job is to fire one of the salesman who has been under preforming. That salesman plans to set up and embarrass Hubbard with a call girl and have him back off. Too many other men at the convention have plans to satisfied their own desires which mostly involve women to make the planning go well. This is a dismal description of business ethics in the 1960's. ( )

The story is almost a convenient scaffold used to draw a picture of business life and conventions of the sixties. The storyteller kills off a couple of characters, perhaps because that is the neatest way to tie up loose ends.
The image painted of women and their role in the world is quite foreign by contemporary standards. I suppose there will anyways be intergender tensions, but acceptable rules and treatment has clearly changed a lot. Guessing how they will be managed twenty years from now is clearly a guess. The continuation of they historical tend of equal rights seems most likely. People will always try to be manipulative and neither gender has a monopoly on that.
Part of what it means to be human is the continuous exploration of gender roles and ongoing effort to understand the motivation of others. ( )

After reading a thoroughly depressing Travis McGee novel (A Tan and Sandy Silence), I decided to turn to one of MacDonald's non-McGee books, which in my considerable experience, tend to be better. Not that there aren't some good books in the McGee series; there are. But there are also a few that seem to be made up on the fly. With very little plot in the mix.

A Key to the Suite doesn't have all that much plot either. It is basically a character study that takes place at a convention of salesmen from companies in some sort of machine industry. All the attendees are men--this is around 1960 after all, though a couple do bring their wives. The story is focused on a new hotshot administrator, a former engineer, who is at the convention to make the final evaluation on whether to let go a long term salesman who isn't capable of doing things the new way. The salesman and one of his employees have a trick up their sleeves, however. They are going to set the manager up for an embarrassment that will prevent him from carrying out his assignment. Let's just say things don't go according to plan. As the story proceeds, it's clear that it is really the story of the manager and his own internal struggle. Though he was content as a metallurgist and college teacher, he is becoming seduced by the power of his new position.

Reading this book makes me glad that MacDonald, a Wharton MBA, never went into business himself. Especially with women. Once again in this book, it is the women characters who he spends the most time developing--and no matter that he throws in a good, strong one now and again, the things he does to the other ones are getting to be pretty indefensible. MacDonald's books remain fascinating due to his know-it-all manner--but it is that same manner that also makes them so annoying at times. This book straddles the line. Though depressing, it does succeed as a cautionary tale for anyone looking to climb the ladder of success in the business world. And as always, the setting is excellent, although in this case the whole book takes place in a huge resort hotel. ( )

Stark realism distances the reader from the emotional texture of this report of the weekend of a busiess convention. Third person narration emphasises the separation of the reader from the characters while the multiple narrators suggest accurate reportage. The weekend brings together a corporate analyst, salesmen, their managers, promotional models, and prostitutes dissolved in a profusion of libidinous alcohol. When catastrophe strikes the hoteliers and local police implement a polished cover up that is as brutal as any violence. All this is very much of its time (the early 1960s) but I found it more admirable than enjoyable. ( )

JDM is excellent with fallen women, cops, and hotels. In this detailed profile of a hotel's operation, we learn everything we never wanted to now about how a murder is covered up. It's a fast-paced mystery and one of his best. ( )