Search Results for 'westlake'


University of Chicago Press is reprinting Donald E. Westlake’s Parker novels, originally published under the pseudonym Richard Stark. So far they include:

* Handle: A Parker Novel
* Hunter: A Parker Novel
* Jugger: A Parker Novel
* Man with the Getaway Face: A Parker Novel
* Mourner: A Parker Novel
* Outfit: A Parker Novel
* Rare Coin Score: A Parker Novel
* Score: A Parker Novel
* Seventh: A Parker Novel

The last three in this list have just been released, with more to follow.

The books here are those Westlake published under his own name. I have separate posts for books published under the pseudonyms “Richard Stark” and “Tucker Coe.”

There are multiple categories of novels written by Westlake under his own name. Comic crime capers involving John Dortmunder, non-Dortmunder comic crime capers, stories which I will call “non-crime” even though many of them do involve some kind of crime, and crime adventures.

Author Rating: A+

* * *

Westlake’s Dortmunder is a small-time burglar for whom life presents a series of opportunities which rarely work out. The Dortmunder stories are wonderfully complex comic crime capers that will keep you laughing and gasping and turning the page.

The Hot Rock (read 7/07)

Westlake’s first crime caper starring John Dortmunder. Originally conceived as a Parker novel (see Richard Stark), the plot involves stealing the same object — an emerald — over and over and over. Wonderful hard-boiled style.

Don’t Ask (read 9/11/07)

Similar to The Hot Rock in being an “international” heist but a little more sophisticated. The ending is timed perfectly.

Good Behavior (read 11/15/07)

Dortmunder and his crew have to rescue a num from the tower where her father is keeping her prisoner, pull off a heist of multiple jewelers at once, fight off unexpected armed mercenaries. It’s a good thing the Silent Sisters of Saint Filumena are there to help!

What’s the Worst That Could Happen? (read 11/19/07)

Dortmunder’s ring is boosted by a corporate baron, Max Fairbanks, who busts him robbing his Long Island mansion and Dortmunder has to get it back. This delightful romp goes from Long Island to Manhattan to Washington DC. Fairbanks lives to regret his humiliation of John Dortmunder, the ring is recovered. A rare success story involving Dortmunder.

Bad News (read 11/21/08)

Andy Kelp gets a gig digging up a body and reburying it in an occupied plot in a NY cemetery and asks his friend Dortmunder to assist with the reburying and disposal of the plot’s occupant. The group who hired Kelp are trying to pull a fast one and have “Little Feather” declared the last remaining member of a NY Indian tribe to claim a one-third share in a reservation casino. Things work out — sort of.

Why Me? (read 3/25/08)

In The Hot Rock, Dortmunder couldn’t get hold of a valuable jewel no matter how ingenious the plan. In Why Me?, Dortmunder has to figure out how to get rid of a similarly valuable jewel.

While burgling a small jewelry store, Dortmunder accidentally steals a valuable ruby and sapphire ring that had been stolen before it could be returned to Turkey. There is a shake down of every known criminal in New York as a result of the ring’s original theft and Dortmunder has not only the NYPD and the FBI after him but every known criminal in New York is mad at him too. Dortmunder has to evade the police, the Feds, some terrorists and the entire criminal element of New York while figuring out how to get rid of the ring.

Watch Your Back! (read 4/14/08)

Only Westlake can repeat a premise like robbing a Manhattan penthouse multiple times and keep each one fresh and breezy as a spring morning. While Dortmunder and his gang are organizing and executing a heist, the son of a New Jersey mob boss is screwing with OJ’s Bar and Grill, the gang’s favorite meeting place. The gang lose the battle (the loot) but win the war (the loot-laden mobsters are picked up by police).

Drowned Hopes (read 6/8/08)

An old pal of Dortmunder’s comes to him with a request to help him recover $700,000 hidden decades earlier after a bank heist. The problem is the location where the money was hidden is now underwater in an upper New York state reservoir.

Published in 1990.

What’s So Funny? (read 9/12/08)

Dortmunder and the gang are pressed into hijacking a solid gold chess set. Unfortunately, just as they’re about to get paid the chess set is stolen and once again the hard-luck gang is out of luck.

Jimmy The Kid (read 12/20/08)

Using one of Westlake’s Parker novels as a template for their plan, Dortmunder and the gang go into kidnapping for ransom with hilarious results.

Bank Shot (read 2/09)

Dortmunder and crew don’t just rob the bank, they steal the whole bank.

Nobody’s Perfect (read 4/19/09)

First published in 1977, this misadventure begins when Dortmunder is railroaded into stealing a painting so the owner can collect the insurance but it gets lost. Unfortunately for Dortmunder, the painting winds up in Scotland, so this is now an international misadventure. Great stuff.

Thieves Dozen (read 4/21/10)

Twelve short stories featuring everybody’s favorite criminal — John Dortmunder. These are truly some of the most delightful short stories you’ll find anywhere. A must read.

* * *

The following are non-Dortmunder comic crime capers

Trust Me On This (read 11/23/07)

A wonderful murder mystery romp set in the underworld of tabloid journalism. In his forward to this novel, Westlake disclaims the existence of an actual paper like the Weekly Galaxy and suggests that should such a paper actually exist it would involve people “even more lost to all considerations of truth, taste . . . or any shred of common humanity.”

Baby, Would I Lie? (read 8/11/07)

Westlake and his readers Trust Me On This so much, he takes us on a second trip with the folks from the Weekly Galaxy, this one set in Branson, Missouri. Hilarious, fast-paced satire involving country western stars and their fans.

The Busy Body (read 7/26/08)

A romp in the underworld. Aloysius Engel becomes righthand man to the local chief, Nick Rovito, and tasked with recovering a suit lined with uncut heroin in which Charle Brody was buried. But Charlie’s body is not in the grave and Engle has to find the suit.

Wonderful pacing, masterful use of language puts you right in the middle of it. Published in 1966.

Money For Nothing (read 2/11/08)

This one has spies. Josh Redmont received $1000 monthly for seven years. He didn’t know where the money was coming from but he wasn’t about to ask questions until one day he finds himself in the middle of — and the potential fall guy for — a political murder.

Great characters, great pacing, with Westlake’s first-class comic flare.

Help I’m Being Held Prisoner (read 8/24/07)

Harry Kunt (pronounced “Koont”), as a defense against a world in which his very name is a practical joke, is a lifetime practical joker, but when one of his better jokes misfires, he ends him up in a maximum security prison. He stumbles across a group of fellow prisoners who have worked out a way to continue life on the outside while serving their sentences and invite him to join them. Things would be great but someone is hiding messages in stuff leaving the prison which say “Help, I’m being held prisoner,” and the warden blames Kunt for the trouble this is causing him.

Put A Lid On It (read 10/21/07)

Sitting in jail in the Manhattan Correctional Center, denied parole and stoically awaiting sentencing, Meehan (a one-name kind of guy) is surprised with a chance to escape his fate with an offer from a clandestinely dispatched representative of the president’s reelection campaign. Meehan just has to steal an incriminating videotape from the upstate-New York estate of a wacko millionaire before time runs out.

God Save The Mark (read 9/10/08)

From a review at Amazon:

* mark n. An easy victim; a ready subject for the practices of a confidence man, thief, beggar, etc.; a sucker.-Dictionary of American Slang, Thomas Y. Crowell Co., 1960

That’s the long definition of a mark. But there’s a shorter one. It goes:

* mark n. Fred Fitch

What, you ask, is a Fred Fitch? Well, for one thing, Fred Fitch is the man with the most extensive collection of fake receipts, phony bills of sale, and counterfeit sweepstakes tickets in the Western Hemisphere, and possibly in the entire world. For another thing, Fred Fitch may be the only New York City resident in the twentieth century to buy a money machine. When Barnum said, “There’s one born every minute, and two to take him,” he didn’t know about Fred Fitch; when Fred Fitch was born, there were two million to take him.

Every itinerant grifter, hypester, bunk artist, short-conner, amuser, shearer, short-changer, green-goods worker, pennyweighter, ring dropper, and yentzer to hit New York City considers his trip incomplete until he’s also hit Fred Fitch. He’s sort of the con-man’s version of Go: Pass Fred Fitch, collect two hundred dollars, and move on.

What happens to Fred Fitch when his long-lost Uncle Matt dies and leaves Fred three hundred thousand dollars shouldn’t happen to the ball in a pinball machine. Fred Fitch with three hundred thousand dollars is like a mouse with a sack of catnip: He’s likely to attract the wrong kind of attention.

Add to this the fact that Uncle Matt was murdered, by person or persons unknown, and that someone now seems determined to murder Fred as well, mix in two daffily charming beauties of totally different types, and you have a perfect setup for the busiest fictional hero since the well-known one-armed paperhanger. As Fred Fitch careers across the New York City landscape-and sometimes skyline-in his meetings with cops, con men, beautiful girls, and (maybe) murderers, he takes on some of the loonier aspects of a Dante without a Virgil. Take one part comedy and one part suspense and shake well-mostly with laughter.

Somebody Owes Me Money (read 1/09)

Published in 1969, Westlake proves again that he is a writer for the ages. There is nothing dated about either the story or the writing. Chet Conway, a New York City cabbie, gets a tip on a horse, but when he goes to collect on the long-shot, he finds his bookie has been killed with a bullet, and too many people think Chet pulled the trigger. Chet just wants his money! Another delightful Westlake romp.

The Fugitive Pigeon (read 2/09)

Click the link to read my stand-alone review of this hilarious crime caper published in 1965.

* * *

From here down is still a work in progress in terms of organizing.

Adios Scheherezade (a writer’s nervous breakdown)

The Ax (dark crime – midlife crisis gone wrong)

Up Your Banners (1960s)

Anarchaos (sci-fi)

The Hook (dark crime — another writer’s breakdown)

Killy is a story about union busting and has a similar flavor to Dashiell Hammett’s Red Harvest. (Read 5/09)

Kahawa (crime adventure)

Humans (adventure/mystery)

High Adventure (crime adventure)

361 (hard crime)

Sacred Monster (Hollywood crime)

Published in 1989, this is the least believable and most dated of Westlakes’ books. I would recommend this only to real fans of Westlake. He had a difficult relationship with Hollywood during various attempts to bring his novels to the big screen, and this seems more like demon exorcism than anything else. The central character is a Hollywood star with a dark past that finally catches up with him. More psychological than action.

A Likely Story (read 5/12/09)

First published in 1984, this is not a crime story, unless you consider philandering to be criminal activity. Thomas Diskant is a writer with a complicated personal life, including a wife from whom he is separated, a girlfriend with whom he lives and an editor with whom he begins an affair in order to get a book through publication in order to keep things afloat. The first third of the book felt stilted, dated and somewhat meandering, but by the time I got to the halfway point the story proved to have legs. It’s a story about coming to terms with life.

Two Much (read 6/12/09)

This book is really incredible. Two Much, published in 1975, is about man’s drive to come out on top. Art Dodge, owner of a very small greeting card company in New York City, is a funny guy who loves to fool around and will do or say just about anything to get a woman in bed. When he meets Liz Kerner and she tells him she has a twin, he unthinkingly pipes up, “I do too!” It turns out that Liz and Betty are not only good looking young women, they are very wealthy recent orphans.

Unable to tell Liz that he was lying about having a twin, Art is forced to produce “Bart” who begins dating Betty. The charade becomes more and more complicated as the relationships between Art and Liz, “Bart” and Betty progress.

What ultimately happens is shocking. This is Westlake at his best.

Two Much (read October 2009)

A collection of 18 short stories that Westlake selected as his best non-series short fiction written between 1958 and 1997. One gem after another.

The Comedy Is Finished (read 8/25/2017)

Westlake’s final lost novel (that we know of, after Memory, published in 2010), written in the late ’70s/early ’80s, according to the Publisher’s Note, was set aside and never submitted for publication “in part because Martin Scorsese had just released the movie The King of Comedy and Don thought some readers might find the movie’s premise and the book’s were too similar.” I’ve never seen the movie, so I can’t speak to that, but this novel is the best of Westlake. Set in 1977, it’s a story very much set in that time but speaks to the delusion that has captured many today – that our societal and political problems can be fixed through violence. Donald E. Westlake is a true gift.

Donald Westlake, master of the comic crime caper and so much more, has left this mortal coil at the age of 75 after an apparent heart attack while vacationing in Mexico.

Condolences to his family and friends and all those who have come to love this wonderful author.

Sarah Weinman has a long list of excellent links to all things Westlake.

How come WordPress doesn’t have funeral bunting?

Go read this:

Here (possibly for the first time?) is an annotated critical list of the 88 canonical Westlake novels and short-story collections, occasionally amplified by his own comments from our correspondence.

Author Rating: C

Too High (read 7/14/11) Meh

I picked this up in the library because of the cover and checked it out because the back cover blurb compared Hirschfeld favorably to Carl Hiaasen and Donald E. Westlake, the latter being one of my favorite authors. Unfortunately, Hirschfeld fails to live up to that praise. While the novel is competent to a degree, there were too many threads that can’t bear up under the weight of reality.

Author Rating: A

Plugged (read 7/27/12) Highly recommended

OMG! OMG! The jacket blurb compares Colfer favorably to Donald E. Westlake, something which generates negative alarm bells with me because so many make that claim and so few ever live up to it, but — holy cow — Colfer is brilliant!

On New York’s 8th Avenue you know exactly what kind of street you’re walking. The flashing billboards and windows stacked high with lingerie-clothed mannequins never let you forget it. The smell of lust rises from the pavement and the door handles are coated with grease and guilt.

And Another Thing… (read 8/12/12) Recommended

Through happenstance, I discovered that in 2009 an author who is not the deceased Douglas Adams had published this sixth novel in Douglas Adams’ Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxytrilogy in five parts.”  I was a little disappointed because I didn’t find it nearly as entertaining as Plugged, but I’m glad I read it if only for historical interest.   If you haven’t read the Hitchhiker’s Guide you are less likely to enjoy this, but if you have it’s not a bad bit of light entertainment.

Colfer is also author of the eight-book Artemis Fowl science fantasy series, “starring teenage criminal mastermind Artemis Fowl II.”

Artemis Fowl (read 8/15/12) Recommended

Yes, well, it is perhaps more entertaining if you’re a Young Reader age 9 to 12, but also I’m not so keen on the inherent unpleasantness of the main character for whom the first book and series is named.  I’m still recommending it though because it’s not actually terrible and I wouldn’t want to discourage others from giving it a go.  I probably will not continue with the series myself, however.

Author Rating: A

The Grifters (read 12/24/11) Highly recommended

J. Kingston Pierce at The Rap Sheet explains why The Grifters is one not to be missed:

I know Jim Thompson is a crime writer, though after re-reading one of his books, you wonder. Most of the requisite ingredients are there–guns and blood, cops and criminals, explications on the social habits of the wicked and dispossessed. But you can’t help thinking that Thompson only picked the genre as the most expedient route to his actual goal, which was to delve unblinkingly into the casual depravity of your everyday sociopath.

Of course, The Grifters (originally published in 1963) is first-rate noir, which is where it clearly fits within the contemporary taxonomy of crime fiction. Darkly engrossing and fast-moving, with writing that lacerates when it isn’t being lyrical. It’s a brief trip into the netherworld of the professional con, where fleecing suckers is less an adventure than a routine occupation, complete with its own operating manual–unwritten–and its own lexicon.

The screenplay for the 1990 movie adaptation, which received four Academy Award nominations and was named best picture of the year by, among others, the Los Angeles Times, was written by Donald E. Westlake.

It really is a terrific read.

Author Rating: A+

Hard crime thrillers written by Donald E. Westlake under the pseudonym (Richard Stark.” All are recommended. Those I have read are so indicated.

* The Hunter (read 7/10/09)

Holy smokes! The Hunter (1962) was Westlake’s first hard crime novel published under the pseudonym Richard Stark and is the first of many featuring thief and all-around tough guy Parker. It was made into a movie in 1967 titled Point Blank, directed by John Boorman and starring Lee Marvin, Angie Dickinson and Keenan Wynn which I haven’t yet watched, but the book is brilliantly done, full of action and suspense. The Parker novels written in the ’90s are not nearly as violent and corpse-strewn as the early ones from the ’60s.

Mal Resnick, one of the guys working a heist with Parker, pulls a double-cross and steals Parker’s woman, leaving him for dead, so Parker has to make things right.

* The Man With the Getaway Face (read 7/12/09)

Picks up where The Hunter left off. Parker has had plastic surgery to make him unrecognizable but the Mob — calling themselves “The Outfit,” have tracked him down and set a hitman on him. Having earlier lost the recovered $45,000 stolen by Resnick in The Hunter, Parker agrees to take part in an armored-car heist. While setting up and executing the heist, Parker has to deal with Stubbs, the former chauffeur of the doctor who gave Parker a new face, who is looking for which of the doctor’s last four patients killed him, as well as work around another double-cross by one of his companions.

* The Outfit (read 7/14/09)

The third Parker novel, published in 1963, picks up where we left off in The Man With The Getaway Face. The heist a success and the doctor’s murderer found and dealt with, Parker turns his sights back to The Outfit. Parker is David to The Outfit’s Goliath and pulls out all the stops to force them to lay off him. Parker is implacable and inexorable.

* The Mourner

* The Score (Parker and Grofield) (read 8/09)

* The Jugger (read 8/09)

* The Seventh

* The Handle (Parker and Grofield)

* The Damsel (Grofield)

* The Rare Coin Score

* The Green Eagle Score (read 8/09)

* The Dame (Grofield) (read 8/09)

* The Black Ice Score (read 8/09)

* The Sour Lemon Score

* Deadly Edge

* The Blackbird (Grofield)

* Slayground (read 8/09)

Parker and some of his pals, including Grofield, heist an armored car but run into some trouble as they’re getting away. Parker winds up in a closed amusement park with the bag of money and a bunch of mobsters and cops who want him dead. After leading his pursuers on a chase through the park, he gets away but has to leave the money hidden in a fun house.

* Lemons Never Lie (Grofield) (read 8/08)

* Plunder Squad

* Butcher’s Moon (Parker and Grofield) (read 11/8/09)

This is the last Parker novel (published in 1974) until 1997 when Westlake revived Richard Stark for another run, and it is phenomenal!

You don’t want to piss off Parker, or steal from him. Parker goes back to the amusement park where he left the loot in Slayground but it’s not there, so he pays a visit to the top mobster in town and tells him to give it back. Lozini says he doesn’t have it but Parker knows someone in the organization took it and uncovers a scheme to unseat Lozini which has been partly funded with Parker’s loot. When the mobsters refuse to give him his money and shoot Grofield in a double-cross, Parker calls in some of his pals for a night of mayhem in which five or six mob businesses are robbed. The $250,000 take is the payoff for the gang assisting Parker in rescuing the badly injured Grofield who is being kept alive as a bargaining chip and teaching the mobsters a lesson they will never forget.

This is Westlake at his best.

* Comeback (read 8/08)

* Backflash (read 8/08)

* Flashfire (read 8/08)

* Firebreak (read 8/08)

* Breakout

* Nobody Runs Forever (read 8/08)

* Ask The Parrot

* Dirty Money (read 5/5/09)

The money has already been stolen (Nobody Runs Forever) but it’s very hot and Parker and his crew have to retrieve it from the location where it was hidden and try to unload it. This is the last Parker novel as Donald E. Westlake died December 31, 2008.

For excellent coverage of the novels of Richard Stark, be sure to visit The Violent World of Parker.

Author Rating: A+

Crime thrillers written by Donald E. Westlake under the pseudonym “Tucker Coe.”

Kinds of Love, Kinds of Death (Read 3/26/08)

Published in 1966, a 2000 paperback re-release includes a terrific introduction by Donald E. Westlake wherein he provides background on what he was up to with his use of pseudonyms and his explorations and influences. Essentially, he was writing at such a volume that it was necessary to publish under different names in order to not over-saturate the market.

That said, this crime novel is another example of Westlake’s excellent control of pacing, description and story line. He is spare but rich and maintains strong coherence and plausibility.

Kinds of Love, Kinds of Death is the first of five involving the protagonist Mitchell Tobin, a former NY cop busted from the force when his partner was killed while Tobin was dallying during working hours and extra-maritally with the girlfriend of a criminal he helped arrest and put away for an extended prison stay. Tobin is hired by a mob guy to find out who killed his mistress.

As Westlake points out in his introduction, this was somewhat of a departure in that it is more in the nature of a mystery rather than a crime novel.

Author Rating: B

Richard Hawke is a pseudonym of Tim Cockey who writes humorous mystery fiction set in Baltimore, Maryland under his own name, reserving Richard Hawke for noir-ish detective fiction.

Speak of the Devil (read 5/28/09) recommended

Set in New York City, the protagonist, Fritz Malone, a private detective, is out buying bagels to take over to his girlfriend’s apartment but takes a small detour to view part of the Macy’s Thanksgiving Day parade. He spots a gunman but is unable to get to him fast enough to prevent seven people being shot and killed.

It’s a pretty good, fairly well paced story involving an apparent mastermind who is holding the city hostage through a series of bizarre and escalating events.

I was disappointed by the resolution at the end. It seemed overly simplistic given the build up. Although there were many sections of the book which were excellently done, there were other sections which were disappointingly weak. I blame his editor who probably thought it “good enough” for a B genre. Westlake proved that crime fiction can be so much more, and Cockey/Hawke has potential. I’m just not sure that we will see it from him.

Author Rating: C

Splitting Heirs (read 3/16/08) Recommended

Jacket blurb equates Hanson with Hiaasen. Certainly they are similar in their humorous, light-hearted romp style, but where Hiaasen (and Westlake) are masters, Hanson is missing that ineffable something that would make him more than middling. The ending was particularly disappointing and had the flavor of an afterthought.

That being said, I would not be averse to reading another book by Hanson.