Donald E. Westlake (1933 - 2008)
(LIFE Magazine photo by Ted Thai.)
I’ve devotedly read enormous amounts of crime fiction for as long as I can remember. My discovery of Donald E. Westlake came rather late, sometime in my mid-twenties. He’s a bit of an acquired taste; there are no spectacles, no sentimental romances, and very little obviousness in his writing. He demanded that the reader peer a little closer at the page than most of his colleagues.
(His colleagues always appreciated him, though: Sarah Weinman has a superb collection of tributes.)
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Once I understood Westlake's music, I became a hard core addict. I have “collector” tendencies, which made him an especially wonderful find. Westlake was the most prolific author of high quality crime fiction in history, and collecting his vast output was a new reason to live. (My annotated bibliography below contains 88 items.)
Six outstanding traits in the writing of Donald E. Westlake:
1. An absolutely fluid prose style. There are no bad sentences in Westlake, ever, even in the early years.
2. A razor-sharp eye for detail. His books burst with page-long passages describing quotidian environments. They make no pretense of being “charismatic” or “exciting” descriptions: they are just life as is, in 100X magnification.
3. Dry wit. Half of his books are overtly funny, half are deadly serious. In both, careful reading shows a critical, humorous stance toward human behavior.
4. Emotional distance. Dashiell Hammett is usually considered the gold standard for the unsentimental approach; Peter Rabe took this attitude as well. Westlake always claimed Hammett and Rabe as his biggest influences, but Westlake actually went further than either when eliminating sentimentality from his books. He wanted the reader to participate in discovering the true emotion beneath the matter-of-factness. This is most obvious in the Parker series, but even, say, the comic love stories in Brothers Keepers or Trust Me on This are more matter-of-fact than impassioned. This clear-eyed attitude is refreshing and addictive, but also probably why Westlake never had a breakthrough bestseller; the average reader needs more obvious sentimental emotional engagement than Westlake was willing to provide.
5. Technical and historical command of all his material. This included anything connected with crime (guns, cars, banks, cops, hoods, gambling) but also legends, myths, countries, corporations, and anything else his current milieu required. Westlake’s one non-fiction book, Under an English Heaven, is a monument to dedicated research.
6. A fierce commitment to realism. He always preferred to tell the truth rather than hand the reader a fantasy. Of course, many of his comic novels have absurd passages, but the beating heart of any good Westlake book is a determination to have as naturalistic a narrative as possible. There are no Westlake books where a Hero Makes No Wrong Decisions and Gets Everything He Wants In the End; indeed, both his Parker and his Dortmunder books almost always end with a partial holocaust (in Parker) or tainted victory (in Dortmunder).
(When people told Westlake how realistic the Parker books were, he would joke that the Dortmunders were even more realistic, since Parker could always find a place to park his car and Dortmunder couldn’t.)
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I finished reading the complete Westlake canon in 2003. Sarah encouraged me to send him a fan letter, something I had never done before.
Huh. How do you send a fan letter to an established author? Well, I was a long term patron of Mysterious Bookshop in New York and knew that Westlake helped Otto Penzler build the bookshelves there. One day I walked in and told the clerk, “I have read every single Donald E. Westlake book and want to drop him a line and tell him so.” The clerk sized me up, said, “You didn’t get this from me,” and handed me a slip of paper with a Bleecker Street address. I wrote Westlake an emotionally reserved fan letter and enclosed a CD.
I was astounded to receive a pleasant email from Westlake about a month later. (Craftily, I had included email as my only contact. Hah! He was now in my clutches.)
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I met Don and his wife Abby at the Village Vanguard where I had invited them to see The Bad Plus. They were both very sweet and charming. Since that first meeting, Sarah and I socialized with Don and Abby on several occasions, always having a tremendous time. They both told incredible stories of their travels, children, gardening, the travails of country neighbors, the history of New York City, etc.
They also attended more TBP shows, once with Peter Straub and his wife, once with Lynne and Lawrence Block. I enjoyed the look on the other writers' faces when I told them I had read every single Westlake novel.
The last time we really hung out together was at their idyllic country home near Ancram, New York, where Sarah dug up some fabulous vegetables from Abby’s extensive garden. I asked Don if he had started writing books on the computer yet. He shook his head and said, “I need something that fights back. The computer is too easy.”
(The NY Times obit photo by David Jennings.)
Whenever I told Don I wanted to interview him about his complete canon, he just shrugged, not really interested. He always preferred to talk about anything else than his own work (at least with me; maybe with other professionals he talked shop). That last time, Sarah and I double-teamed him and got him talking a bit about our favorite book The Ax: he even briefly read aloud from it! Soon, though, he complained, “Enough about this boring topic.”
That same night we met some other friends of Don and Abby’s. For the first time I heard him describe me to somebody else: “Ethan travels all the time, and told me he needs at least three books with him under any circumstances.”
Later, I thought about the slightly curious way he said this and felt a chill, almost as if I was a moth pinned to a specimen board. The great Westlake had looked me over with his dispassionate all-seeing eye and had cataloged me for possible further use. Maybe some penny-ante crook in a future novel would carry three paperbacks with him at all times.
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I didn’t get to interview him, but there are 92 emails from Don saved on my hard drive. Looking at them now, I am astonished how much he shared with me in this format; perhaps I should have conducted my interview as a written questionnaire. 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.
This list hardly includes everything Westlake ever published, especially books published under names other than "Westlake." For example, I have never bothered with the boatload of youthful hackwork including softcore paperback porn and a biography of Elizabeth Taylor (and am confident Don didn't want me bothering with them, either). There are even a couple of "officially Westlake-authored" items that aren't on this list; specialty items and the like. (See Wikipedia for everything, although I would be astonished if that entry was really complete.)
However, my list does include all of Donald E. Westlake's major fiction. For fun, I have starred (****) my favorites.
I will begin with the 38 non-series books since the best of them are vastly underrated.
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The first five books are coiled and hard-boiled. They have shocking, experimental endings and high body counts. If Westlake had only produced these books, he would still be a cult figure among those who love this era's tough guy fiction.
The Mercenaries (1960) An admirable debut novel wherein a minor hood named Clay is forced to be a detective for his boss. Right from the beginning, Westlake explores 1960’s and 70’s New York City to the utmost: my five-borough geography is certainly better thanks to Westlake! Clay’s interrogation of Broadway mogul Cy Grildquist - both of them weirdly talking to an inoperative television set in Grildquist’s swank apartment - is a harbinger of Westlake's mature style.
Killing Time (1961) A portrait of a fully-corrupt small town. The ending is an absolute holocaust.
361 (1962) Recently reprinted by Hard Case Crime. From DW's email: “The very nice guy who runs our local liquor store had only read my lighter stuff, till a couple weeks ago, when he read 361. I walked into the place and he gave me a funny look.” Includes a detailed quote from Fredric Brown in the body of the text; Westlake studied all his predecessors seriously.
****Killy (1963) My favorite of the early novels: the unflinching tale of an idealistic union organizer turned bad by the system via murder and a femme fatale. The political aspect owes something to Hammett’s Red Harvest and The Glass Key.
Pity Him Afterwards (1964) A crazed-killer novel from years before they were de rigueur. This is the first time Westlake sets the action at a summer stock theater (soon to be a recurring theme).
Westlake surprised himself when his books took a comedic turn. With some notable exceptions, from here on his own byline would produce mostly humorous crime novels.
The Fugitive Pigeon (1965) There are too many gangster clichés in this one and The Busy Body, but they are still funny to read today --
The Busy Body (1966) -- Especially the long scene of Aloysius Engel and his worthless henchman digging up a coffin late at night.
The Spy in the Ointment (1966) A modicum of liberal politics and plenty of absurd send-ups of the James Bond/Man From UNCLE era.
****God Save the Mark (1967) Westlake’s
first comic masterpiece. It won an Edgar, too. The title is from
Shakespeare, and the last line is ideal. There are a limitless confidence tricks on display here, but we never lose confidence in the author.
Who Stole Sassi Manoon? (1968) Strange idea: three college kids kidnap an arrogant movie star and everybody ends up learning life lessons. Not so memorable, but Westlake fans will enjoy details like how Manoon’s dogs are named Kama and Sutra. In this book Westlake begins indulging in a love of exotic locales with exotic characters.
Up Your Banners (1969) Not a crime novel, but a ”comedy of controversy,” a topical exploration of interracial romance between teachers at a Brooklyn school.
****Somebody Owes Me Money (1969) Recently reprinted by Hard Case Crime. The hero Chester is a NYC cabby who is trying to collect on a bet. Classic first line: “I bet none of it would have happened if I wasn’t so eloquent.” Tightly plotted and hilarious.
Adios Scheherazade (1970) Not a crime novel, but a partly autobiographical exploration of how writing erotic novels for a living makes you go insane. Once in a while Westlake tries out an unusual structure: here there are 10 chapters of exactly 5000 words each, just like the sex novels the hapless narrator is supposed to be writing.
I Gave At the Office (1971) Despite
being a major TV network announcer, Jay Fisher is the height of unsavvy. This
text is a transcription of his testimony, a botched attempt to unravel how his “on the scene” documentation of
a CIA-esque takeover of a Caribbean dictatorship resulted in an international scandal.
Cops and Robbers (1972) Written expressly to be made into a movie. A strange temperature: not humorous, but not really hard-boiled either. The bad guys win in the end, which is nice.
Gangway (1973) (with Brian Garfield) Historical/Western/caper/comedy. Westlake, Garfield, Joe Gores, Lawrence Block, and some others were a tight-knit crew in this era. The back cover author photo hints at the perpetual poker game of these years. The story of these talented, prolific, poker-playing authors betting on a manuscript they all took turns writing while playing cards is true -- but apparently they didn’t get far enough for the book to be salable.
Help, I Am Being Held Prisoner (1974) Harry Künt - don’t forget the umlaut - is a determined practical joker and model prisoner, except that he and several other cons tunnel out to escape each night before returning by morning.
****Brother's
Keepers (1975) Not a crime novel. This magnificent book should have been a
mainstream bestseller. From DW's email: “ I have
to tell you a teeny thing about the genesis of BROTHERS KEEPERS. It
all began with a title; THE FELONIOUS MONKS. They would commit some
sort of robbery to save the monastery. So I started it and introduced
them and realized I liked them too much to lead them into a life of
crime. So, to begin with, there went the title. 'Okay,' I said, 'let's
see what a caper novel looks like without the caper.' Turned out to be
a love story; who knew.”
Two Much (1975) Probably the darkest of all the humorous crime novels, Two Much is the surreal story of a joke greeting card author/piker Don Juan character (already so strange) gradually becoming more and more nefarious. Another example of Westlake the crime novel historian: a chapter from John Dickson Carr’s The Hollow Man is bodily placed inside Two Much.
Dancing Aztecs (1976) One of Westlake’s most popular books, widely considered one of his most hilarious. Actually, this is a bit over the top for me; the patented Westlake “one step away from reality” touch is discarded here and I miss the subtlety.
****Enough (1977) Contains two wildly different novelletes, “A Travesty” and “Ordo.” “A Travesty” is simply a must-read for anyone who enjoys reading about a master sleuth’s powers of deduction. My lips are sealed - find out for yourself. “Ordo” is a wan little tale of marriage. There are no crimes here except that of Hollywood excess.
Castle in the Air (1980) The dedication reads, “And this one is for the guys and gals at the Internal Revenue Service.” It’s the weakest "over the top caper novel" - was it written desperately to pay a tax bill? Don’t let this be your introduction to Westlake.
Kahawa (1981) Westlake was very proud of this book, a serious caper novel set in Idi Amin’s domain. While Kahawa shows that Westlake easily could have been a Robert Ludlum “international espionage”-style writer, I admit that I’m glad that he didn’t pursue this direction further (although some scenes in Kahawa are stunningly memorable indeed).
****A Likely Story (1984) Not a crime novel, but the ultimate insider's skewering of the publishing industry as seen by a working joe writer. This must be fairly autobiographical (note the title). It’s possibly even a roman à clef. Contains capsule descriptions of Stephen King, Isaac Asimov, Norman Mailer, etc., that are just too good.
Levine (1984) Another structural experiment: interlinked short stories about a NYC cop with heart trouble. Only the last story is recent; the rest are from his earliest days flogging shorts to places like Alfred Hitchcock’s Mystery Magazine. Serious Westlake fans will require this book just for the long 12-page introduction which details his start as a writer.
High Adventure (1985) The title is a pun: there’s lots of marijuana in this book. Similar in feel to Dancing Aztecs. Again, not my favorite, but this book does have its followers.
****Trust Me On This (1988) A murder mystery perpetrated and solved by members of a National Enquirer-style tabloid. A recommended primer for those who don’t “get” the comic side of Westlake yet. Only the master could have written the introduction:
A Word in Your Ear
Although there is no newspaper anywhere in the United States like the Weekly Galaxy, as any alert reader will quickly realize, were there such a newspaper in actual real-life existence its activities would be stranger, harsher, and more outrageous than those described herein. The fictioneer labors under the constraint of plausibility; his inventions must stay within the capacity of the audience to accept and believe. God, of course, working with facts, faces no limitation. Were there a factual equivalent to the Weekly Galaxy, it would be much worse than the paper I have invented, its staff and ownership even more lost to all considerations of truth, taste, proportion, honor, morality or any shred of common humanity. Trust me.
Tomorrow’s Crimes (1989) This pairs with Levine, both being Mysterious Press reprints of mostly 1960’s work. Tomorrow’s Crimes features a few SF stories and the novelette “Anarchaos” originally published in 1967 under the name Curt Clark. “Anarchaos” is quite good and brutal, with a lead character exhibiting some very un-Westlakian fury. I nominate “In at the Death” as the best non-Dortmunder short story; it’s worthy of the best Fredric Brown.
****Sacred Monster (1989) A star was born in Jack Pine, the heartthrob of millions. But what price fame? This underrated book is a meditation on the craft and lifestyle of Hollywood actors. The crime element is present, but only as an afterthought. Amusingly, a Westlake nom de plume is killed off in passing: "This house, until recently owned by a television star named Holt who'd committed suicide when his series was canceled...."
Humans (1992) This intriguing book pairs with Smoke below as some sort of sci-fi or metaphysical exploration with a crime caper element. Impossible to market, Westlake clearly wrote these books for himself. In Humans, the angel Ananayel is God’s covert operative setting up a "deniable" end of the Earth.
Baby, Would I Lie? (1994) This fine sequel to Trust Me on This explores the world of country music.
Smoke (1995) A cigarette corporation wants to prove that melanoma isn’t so bad and finds the secret to invisibility in the process. A burglar (yes, it’s a Westlake book) accidentally becomes the test case.
****The Ax (1997) Burke Devore needs a job.
This is probably the greatest Westlake book. Westlake always said he never outlined or planned too much; he just invented characters and they showed him the way. For The Ax (he told me and Sarah) he wrote the first couple of paragraphs and took it to his agent, asking basically, "Do you want to read a book about this guy?" His agent said yes and Westlake wrote the whole book in about three weeks. I will never forget Don taking The Ax off his shelf and reading us what he showed his agent:
I've never actually killed anybody before, murdered another person, snuffed out another human being. In a way, oddly enough, I wish I could talk to my father about this, since he did have the experience, had what we in the corporate world call the background in that area of expertise, he having been an infantryman in the Second World War, having seen "action" in the final march across France into Germany in '44-'45, having shot at and certainly wounded and more than likely killed any number of men in dark gray wool, and having been quite calm about it all in retrospect. How do you know beforehand that you can do it? That's the question.
Well, of course, I couldn't ask my father that, discuss it with him, not even if he were still alive, which he isn't, the cigarettes and the lung cancer having caught up with him in his sixty-third year, putting him down as surely if not as efficiently as if he had been a distant enemy in dark gray wool.
The question, in any case, will answer itself, won't it? I mean, this is the sticking point. Either I can do it, or I can't. If I can't, then all the preparation, all the planning, the files I've maintained, the expense I've put myself to (when God knows I can't afford it), have been in vain, and I might as well throw it all away, run no more ads, do no more scheming, simply allow myself to fall back into the herd of steer mindlessly lurching toward the big dark barn where the mooing stops.
Today decides it. Three days ago, Monday, I told Marjorie I had another appointment, this one at a small plant in Harrisburg, Pennsylvania, that my appointment was for Friday morning, and that my plan was to drive to Albany Thursday, take a late afternoon flight to Harrisburg, stay over in a motel, taxi to the plant Friday morning, and then fly back to Albany Friday afternoon. Looking a bit worried, she said, "Would that mean we'd have to relocate? Move to Pennsylvania?"
"If that's the worst of our problems," I told her, "I'll be grateful."
After all this time, Marjorie still doesn't understand just how severe our problems are. Of course, I've done my best to hide the extent of the calamity from her, so I shouldn't blame Marjorie if I'm successful in keeping her more or less worry-free. Still, I do feel alone sometimes.
This has to work. I have to get out of this morass, and soon. Which means I'd better be capable of murder.
One time I emailed him: “I re-read The Ax last month, and noticed for the first time the superb names of some of the addresses on Burke's journey: Wildbury, Fall City, Nether St., Dyer's Eddy, Erebus....Obviously, Burke has to "Devore" (devour) all these addresses to get from Halycon to Arcadia."
His response:
"That's right. Usually I don't mess with meaningful names for things (except comic), but that time I wanted the atmosphere to be in every comma. Not that somebody reading it needs to catch all or any of it; you don't need to be aware of the smoke to feel a little antsy."
A Good Story and Other Stories (1999) Various crime shorts from all eras of his writing. Readable but Westlake himself didn’t consider himself a truly gifted story story writer (the Dortmunder collection is by far the best). From his email: “Short stories have always been a secondary thing for me, and now that Alice Turner is gone from Playboy I don't need to do them at all any more. A 70,000 word idea is much more fun than a 7,000 word idea.”
****The Hook (2000) A companion to The Ax which is almost as good. Like A Likely Story, this must be read by any working novelist. Westlake’s ability to make unbelievable scenarios believable is displayed here at the highest level. Maybe you, too, could kill a friend’s wife. A fun Westlake-as-crime-novel-historian moment:
"I think you gave up too quickly on the story about the guy who murdered the woman he didn't know. I mean, nobody knew he knew her."
Bryce cocked his head, gazing off. "You think so?"
In fact, Wayne did not. He thought the story was suited to a paperback original published around 1954, and the woman's brother would be a gangster, probably in a gambling racket somewhere. Kill Me Slowly, it would be called.
****Put a Lid on It (2002) The last three non-series novels are great comic reads but inevitably lack the tension of The Ax and The Hook. This “political fixer” novel is almost a Ross Thomas tribute, and funny as hell.
Money for Nothing (2003) This has the feel of something written for the movies, with an innocent man being drawn into an espionage net.
The Scared Stiff (2003) A surprise replay of the kind of “exotic locale” caper Westlake wrote time and again since Who Stole Sassi Manoon? It was first published under the pen name Judson Jack Carmichael.
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There are 24 Richard Stark books with Parker as the lead. Master thief Parker is probably the greatest antihero in all crime fiction. He is unquestionably the most matter-of-fact: If there are emotions in the books, we know about them only because Parker observes them. He doesn’t feel them himself. He just uses them or ignores them.
These books are an incalculably important influence on today's current scene: Here is Duane Swierczynski's tribute, with a list of other Stark-influenced work.
The Hunter (1962) All the early books start in motion, with the word “When.” (Here is a list.) In The Hunter, Parker is filled with a white-hot rage, destroying most of what he touches.
It is the only Westlake book that has produced a great movie, Point Blank. This was our email exchange:
EI: "I saw Point Blank on the big screen two weekends ago--Lee Marvin is great, the music is great, the sets are amazing, the babes are delicious, but your plot is nowhere to be found! Hard for me to think of another instance of such a good book making such a good movie--both really good--when the text of one is so misunderstood by the other.
"You must be kind of amazed at the Parker saga by now...40 years, right? First a pen name that no one knew was yours--cheap paperback originals--titles changed at the whim of whatever editor--Lee Marvin movies--French art movies--zillions of reprints and translations--cult classics--now new hardbound novels about the same character produced by a justly acclaimed master--"
DW: "I've always loved POINT BLANK sort of the way the Neanderthal mother loved that first hairless mutant: did that come from me? And I never get over being astonished at how far that original toss has sailed. In addition to the lowly origins you mentioned, there's also the fact that it was supposed to be a one-off, that I had Parker arrested by the cops at the end of THE HUNTER, which is part of why I didn't bother to give him a first name. A Pocket Books editor named Bucklyn Moon (honest: discovered Chester Himes) asked me if I could somehow arrange Parker's escape and bring him back. It's all careful planning, all careful planning."
Westlake also told me in person that Lee Marvin agreed to participate in the movie because Marvin “had never seen that character before, and wanted to play him.”
The Man With the Getaway Face (1963) There’s still some emotional rage from Parker in the second book. But when he brings home a man’s head in a box, it is because of business, not revenge. From here on out, Parker’s temperature is cool, unemotional, uncaring, and consummately professional.
****The Outfit (1963) The first of several Parkers that cram as many heists as possible into single book. For me, the series really begins here. Every sentence rides an express train from beginning to end.
The Mourner (1963) A riff on The Maltese Falcon. At one point, Parker tortures a woman at length to get information. The scene is not really described in detail at all; it's just part of Parker's job that day.
The Score (1964) Can Parker take down a full town? This also has the first appearance of Parker’s occasional sidekick Alan Grofeld, the summer stock theater-owning actor/heister.
The Jugger (1965) Parker buries his mailbox (an old buddy named Joe Sheer) and trouble ensues.
****The Seventh (1966) Possibly the toughest of a tough series. Westlake’s truth-telling never varies: here, Parker’s own stupid mistake with the cops kills off his whole crew. Parker doesn’t care, though. At the end he laughs (a real rarity) while clutching a fistful of bloody cash.
The Handle (1966) An exotic island run for gambling is Parker’s score this time.
The Rare Coin Score (1967) Introduces Parker’s love interest Claire.
The Green Eagle Score (1967) This was the first Parker I read. I could not understand how dry as dust, simple, and matter of fact it was. Weren’t crime novels supposed to have a suppressed current of sentimental emotion running through them? Maybe I had better read it again...
The Black Ice Score (1968) Probably the weakest Parker, with a crew of Africans that belong over in Westlake’s comedies.
****The Sour Lemon Score (1969) Nothing goes right in this one. It's just a blast to read.
Deadly Edge (1971) Claire gets in trouble with some psychos. Note to psychos: don’t go after Parker’s woman.
****Slayground (1971) A stone masterpiece. Here’s the thing about the Parker series: they are believable. In this case, Parker is trapped inside a large indoor amusement park in the Midwest while the local Mafia hunts for him. This is, of course, ludicrous. But Westlake never tips the action into parody. When Parker falls into an icy stream, he needs to sleep for 6 hours before he can fight again. When he realizes there are just too many hoods for him to take on alone, he leaves without triumph.
Plunder Squad (1972) Parker steals some art. Another one where absolutely nothing goes right from start to finish. One of Parker’s crew, fat Lou Sternberg, is reading Anthony Powell: indeed, Sternberg seems to be modeled on Widmerpool from A Dance to the Music of Time.
****Butcher's Moon (1974) The sequel to Slayground is last, longest, and bloodiest of the series’s first run. Another example of the maximum number of heists packed into one book. Stephen King always quotes this immortal passage:
“It was a stupid thing to kill Al Lonzini,” Shevelly said.
Parker frowned at him, looking at the coldly angry face. “Oh. They told you I did that, huh?”
Shevelly had nothing to say. Parker, studying him, saw there was no point arguing with him, and no longer possible to either trust him or make use of him. He gestured with the pistol toward Shevelly, saying, “Get out of the car.”
“What?”
“Just get out. Leave the door open, back away to the sidewalk, keep facing me.”
Shevelly frowned. “What for?”
“I take precautions. Do it.”
Puzzled, Shevelly opened the door and climbed out onto the thin grass next to the curb. He took a step to the sidewalk and turned around to face the car again.
Parker leaned far to the right, aiming the pistol out at arm’s length in front of him, the line of the barrel sighted on Shevelly’s head. Shevelly read his intention and suddenly thrust his hands out protectively in front of himself, shouting, “I’m only the messenger!”
“Now you’re the message,” Parker told him, and shot him.
****Comeback (1998) Parker’s return after 24 years is as good as any book in the series; as a bonus, it skewers evangelism, too. Comeback’s epigraph says it all about Parker’s attitude:
“The outcome you have been waiting for is assured. Continue to persevere.”—Chinese Fortune Cookie
Backflash (1999) Wow, two fully successful heists in a row: Parker is doing well since he’s back. This time he takes the money off a gambling boat.
****Flashfire (2000) Another example of the maximum number of heists stuffed into one book. The concluding chapter of Parker-cop repartee is priceless.
****Firebreak (2001) Parker unhesitatingly trains young psychopath Larry Lloyd in the finer points of murder, arson, and getting out with something from the remains of a heist gone sour.
****Breakout (2002) Parker escapes from prison. I mean, do you really need more inducement to read this book?
****Nobody Runs Forever (2004) The final three books evolved into an interconnected trilogy. Westlake must have done an amazing amount of research to keep Parker's work environment up to date over the years. In fact, the arc of crime enforcement can be traced by how hard it is for Parker to pull a heist: in The Hunter from 1962, Parker runs several small scams at New York City banks without any photo I.D., and the final trilogy mostly deals with the tremendous access of information law agencies have had since 9/11.
Of course, there is a strong through-line too. The first scene in Nobody Runs Forever, where Parker puts down his poker cards in order to strangle a fellow thief who is wearing a wire, could have been included in any one of the books from 40 years earlier.
****Ask the Parrot (2006) Westlake described this to me as “Parker among the straights.” There are a couple of amusing goofy edges as Parker deals with amateurs. The parrot even has a scene of internal dialogue, a successful experiment.
****Dirty Money (2008) Ah Christ, is it really the last one? Well, at least we had 24 of them. How does an author know when a book is done? Westlake told me that a book should end when the reader could easily write the next chapter. At the very end of Dirty Money, Parker leaves a trussed-up enemy in the hands of a recovering associate:
“If you leave me here,” the guy on the floor said, “He’ll kill me in the morning.”
Parker looked at him. “So you still have tonight.”
(end)
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The 4 Richard Stark novels with Alan Grofeld as the lead include The Damsel (1967), The Dame (1968), The Blackbird (1971), and Lemons Never Lie (1971). I’m not sure the first three work so well, since they try to inject some of the globe-trotting humor of Westlake into the heister ethos of Stark. (The best part of these books are when Grofeld commits heinous acts of murderous violence in the context of something that is reading as a light comedy.) However, the brilliant Lemons Never Lie is as tough as a Parker book. In conjunction with this book’s reissue by Hard Case Crime, Westlake wrote on his website:
What pleases me most about LEMONS NEVER LIE is that it was the only time I can think of where I invented a plot structure. That structure, which is not an arc but three bounces, each one higher, was new, I believe.
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I suspect that the 15 Donald E. Westlake novels with John Dortmunder in the lead are the ones that Don's close companions and Don himself related to the most. They document elaborate heists performed by a talented but slightly bumbling everyman. Don wasn't bumbling - not in the slightest - but after meeting him I decided he was clearly more Dortmunder than any other Westlake character.
The Hot Rock (1970) How many times do you need to steal an emerald? Westlake had originally planned on giving Parker this assignment, but realized Parker would cut his losses and quit mid-book. He needed a thief who was fatalistic. It’s not a bad movie, but honestly Robert Redford was miscast. Westlake told me he had imagined Harry Dean Stanton as Dortmunder.
Bank Shot (1972) I like the first two Dortmunders, but they are still revving up.
****Jimmy the Kid (1974) Here we go! A masterpiece of meta. Anthony Boucher outed Richard Stark as Westlake in the New York Times, so the author responded by (sort of) combining both worlds. At one point, Dortmunder’s crew has a stroke of good luck. Dortmunder’s response? “We’ll pay for this.”
Nobody's Perfect (1977) Stealing one painting takes a lot out of you. Structured as “The Verse,” “The First Chorus,” “The Second Chorus,” “The Bridge,” and “The Final Chorus.” The Christmas party in Dortmunder’s home is a vast celebratory canvas that carefully leads up an all-time great punch line; the first time I read it I couldn’t move for several minutes.
****Why Me? (1983) The franchise really starts to settle down here. Previously, sidekick Andy Kelp was a dim-witted thorn in Dortmunder’s side, but from here on out, Kelp and the rest of the team consistently act like experienced pros. I think Westlake was too much of a professional himself to put up with the initial amateurism of the team any longer. Of course, just because they are pros, that doesn’t mean that they win.
Classic line: Chief Inspector Francis Mologna refuses a $60,000 bribe from extremists. Afterwards, he thinks, "You don’t get to be the top cop in the great city of New York by takin bribes from strangers."
****Good Behaviour (1987) Oh dear, a sisterhood of Nuns who have taken a vow of silence need Dortmunder’s help rescuing one of their own. Structured as “Genesis,” “Numbers,” “Lamentations," and “Exodus.” One of the funniest books ever written.
****Drowned Hopes (1990) Possibly the best of the Dortmunders, and possibly the longest Westlake novel. The comic caper novel is now symphonic. Structured as “First Down,” “Second Down,” “Third Down,” and “Fourth Down.” By this point, not just Dortmunder is the star: Kelp, May, Stan Murch, Murch’s Mom, and Tiny Bulcher all have well developed characters and deliver side-splitting lines. Famously, a Jim Thompson-style character, Tom Jimson, shows up and puts the fear of God into everybody. More than Jimson, though, what Dortmunder ends up truly fearing is the Vilburgtown reservoir, which Dortmunder keeps intentionally and unintentionally exploring in great depth.
Don't Ask (1993) This time a bone is the object. Yes, that’s right, Dortmunder is stealing a bone. Don’t ask.
****What's the Worst That Could Happen? (1996) Dortmunder tangles with a Donald Trump-type figure. This joyous book’s victories seem to redeem the manifold losses of the past.
Bad News (2001) The tales of Dortmunder’s final decade are smooth-running machines. The crew almost never puts a foot wrong; instead, they are just constantly visited by poor luck. To get the most out of the late Dortmunders, you must have read at least some of the previous adventures. In Bad News the contest between lawyers in a hick courtroom is the highlight.
The Road to Ruin (2004) I didn’t like The Road to Ruin the first time through because it was so diffuse. But upon rereading, I thought it was great and certainly much more surreal than I understood at first. From our email exchange:
EI: "The crimes are no longer the center of the books: Reporting on life is the center instead. I now adore THE ROAD TO RUIN, which features a kind of daemonic journalism which is perhaps unprecedented. I mean, what are those scenes?!? Chester driving the drunk salesman around? The Harvards vs. the labor schmos? Who else but you would dare to be so underdone in a caper novel?"
DW: "Lemme think about this." [Later] "I like what you are saying...In all the arts, first you try to please the audience and eventually who you're trying to please is yourself."
Thieves' Dozen (2004) “Too Many Crooks” is the standout of this hilarious collection of Dortmunder shorts. (Yes, there are eleven of them.)
Watch Your Back! (2005) Dortmunder meets a Tony Soprano-like character. Memorably, Murch gets to steal a semi on the fly.
The novellete "Walking Around Money" is included in the Evan Hunter/Ed McBain anthology Transgressions (2005). From DW's email: "WALKING AROUND MONEY is an oddity, isn't it? The whole book was Evan's idea, and he was just determined to make it happen. Twenty thousand word novelettes from 10 writers. We all knew, if he didn't sell the book, there was nowhere else on earth to sell a twenty thousand word story, but we all went ahead and wrote them anyway; Evan could do that to you. When he first asked me to contribute, I said, 'Westlake or Stark,' and he said, 'Dortmunder,' so there we are. I'd had the real/fake money idea for 30 years without being able to figure out how to do it. Oh, a novelette."
When Hunter died I send Don a condolence. He wrote back: "Evan began as a serious novelist, but that world had ended. He wrote several first-rate novels, completely forgotten. It griped him sometimes, but he was mostly sunny, and if the world wanted him to be Ed McBain, fine. I liked and admired him a lot."
****What's So Funny? (2007) I just love the lead attorney/heir/modern NYC woman's story in What's So Funny? Hard to believe a 73-year old writer had his finger on the pulse so accurately.
I got to peek inside Westlake’s head a little bit for this one. When in the process of writing this volume, he told me that Stan Murch was proud to bring a caper to the table for once: there was a huge dome of gold by the expressway that he thought the gang should steal. Don didn’t know how he was going to work it yet...
But when What’s So Funny? was published, Stan and the dome were there, but not as the main caper, just as a humorous sidebar. I emailed him:
EI: "I have just finished your latest Dortmunder, and thought it was really wonderful. The burglary of the chess set was priceless. Now, I hope they go get that gold dome in the next volume! I think the crew is averaging about 10 G's per man for a two-month caper these days, huh? Perhaps the moral of the Dortmunder books has turned out to be: Crime pays a moderate wage."
DW: "I think the purpose of the golden dome was to show the difference between what they do do and total absurdity."
So there you go: Westlake started to write the golden dome caper, realized that it couldn’t work and still be believable, but kept it in since Stan's character had said it already.
Get Real (2009) This will be hitting the streets soon. I suspect Dortmunder and team will be
semi-triumphant/semi-defeated once again.
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The 5 Tucker Coe novels featuring retired policeman Mitch Tobin
Kinds of Love, Kinds of Death (1966)
Murder Among Children (1967)
Wax Apple (1970)
A Jade in Aries (1970)
Don't Lie to Me (1972)
and the 4 Sam Holt novels featuring ex-TV Star/amateur detective Sam Holt
One of Us is Wrong (1986)
I Know a Trick Worth Two of That (1986)
What I Tell You Three Times is False (1987)
The Fourth Dimension is Death (1989)
are the only conventional private eye murder mysteries in the Westlake canon. It’s not surprising they are under pen names; Westlake was suspicious of the form. His long, detailed, well-researched history “The Hardboiled Dicks” (The Armchair Detective, Winter 1984) is easily the best crime novel criticism I have ever read. It also concludes with an indictment against writing private eye novels today!
The Coes and Holts are probably really only for Westlake completists, but they will make good reading for anyone who likes to try to “beat the detective” and solve the murder mystery before the hero does. The always-honest Westlake leaves the clues in plain sight; rather to my surprise, without trying, I solved a few of them myself. The most charismatic of the bunch is surely What I Tell You Three Times is False, in which we meet not just the TV actor “Packard,” (Sam Holt, a Jim Rockford/James Garner figure) but also the actors famous for playing Miss Marple, Sherlock Homes, and Charlie Chan on TV.
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Other choice bits from our correspondence:
DW: "Originally I was supposed to be in DC for Laura Bush's National Book Festival, a thing we did the first time she ran it, the weekend before 9/11, the only time we've ever been in the White House. But I just couldn't do it, and begged off. I'm not going to go public and rant and rave about that bunch, but I can't be complicit."
On what dietary restrictions he and Abby had when coming for dinner:
DW: "None. If it moves slowly enough, we'll eat anything."
On John D. Macdonald, after I sent him a long quote from Soft Touch (found towards the end of this post):
DW: "John D. was a born writer, which is the same I guess as a born poet. He would drop into these riffs every once in a while, and they were wonderful. I remember one where a guy on death row suddenly starts feeling what he calls nostalgia for all the things that won't be; the wife, the kids, the experiences. 'I won't be coming down the track of time to you.'
None of those riffs are necessary, but life wouldn't be the same without them."
On Charles Willeford, after (amazingly!) he sent me a copy of Willeford's own typed manuscript Grimhaven, which has never been published. (This is the one where Hoke Mosely kills his own daughters. At the pained request of his agent and publisher - the Hoke Mosely series was looking like it was actually going to be successful - Willeford cannibalized Grimhaven and made it New Hope for the Dead without any dead daughters.) I sent him a thank you note and called Grimhaven "exceptional," which it surely is.
DW: "It is not just an exception in his oeuvre, but in the world. Those who will be knocked out by it should see it."
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Don, thanks for a memorable chapter in my life; I'll never forget meeting and getting to know a literary hero.
But really, thanks for all the goddamn great books. In way, I can't even be that sad you have passed on: you did here exactly what you were supposed to do.
