Parker Progress Report: Butcher’s Moon (Parker #16, 1974) by Richard Stark; a review

And so we reach the final novel in the first phase of Donald “Richard Stark” Westlake’s Parker crime series, and indeed in the first phase of my reviewing trawl through the Parkers: Butcher’s Moon. I’ve actually got three posts planned on Butcher’s Moon: this first one, which is, obviously, a review; a […]

Review: Darwyn Cooke’s Parker–The Martini Edition

People are cynical about repackagings, and they should be. How many cuts of Blade Runner are there now? I think there’s a box set to collect them all. And I will fully acknowledge that when I first heard about this project, the song that popped into my head was “Paint a Vulgar Picture” by […]

News for week ending 2011-11-26

Peter Hanson at Every 70s movie reviews the 1973 Donald Westlake scripted Cops and Robbers: http://t.co/uCeQH7Lz # Donald Westlake's The Busy Body coming to audio book early next year. http://t.co/JjDNMmuy # Limited edition Parker prints autographed by Darwyn Cooke for sale to benefit the Hero Initiative: http://t.co/YAmIVqAz # […]

Limited edition Parker print by Darwyn Cooke

The Hero Initiative is the first-ever federally chartered not-for-profit corporation dedicated strictly to helping comic book creators in need. Hero creates a financial safety net for yesterdays’ creators who may need emergency medical aid, financial support for essentials of life, and an avenue back into paying work. It’s a chance for all […]

Donald Westlake’s official site relaunches

Donald Westlake’s official site has been dormant since his passing, and it didn’t see a whole lot of action before then.

Happily, Westlake’s son Paul has taken the reins, and a revamped donaldwestlake.com launched a couple of weeks ago. It features a blog and a Twitter feed, and new goodies are being added at […]

The Grofield Files: Lemons Never Lie (1971) by Richard Stark; a review

After a slightly-longer-than-intended gap following my re-posting on The Violent World of Parker the other week of my three previous reviews of Donald “Richard Stark” Westlake’s Parker spin-off Alan Grofield novels—The Damsel (1967), The Dame (1969) and The Blackbird (also 1969)—here, finally, are my thoughts on the fourth (and final) Grofield solo outing, Lemons […]

News for week ending 2011-11-19

Ed Gorman takes a look at The Jugger: http://t.co/0k0SVkhB # Seattle’s world-famous Scarecrow Video is featuring films based on Donald Westlake and Richard Stark books: http://t.co/0YzJpU6d # Four quick reviews of Richard Stark and one of Lawrence Block. I disagree with three out of the four. http://t.co/QBtmZAER # Typo troubles w/ U of C […]

The Grofield Files: The Blackbird (1969) by Richard Stark; a review

Let’s have the third of my reviews of Westlake’s Alan Grofield novels, which, as we’ve established, I’m re-posting from Existential Ennui ahead of a new review of the fourth and final book in the series, Lemons Never Lie. That review will be along next week (all being well), so for now, here’s what I […]

The Grofield Files: The Dame (1969) by Richard Stark; a review

Time for the second of my reviews of Donald “Richard Stark” Westlake’s Parker spin-off Alan Grofield novels, which I’m re-posting from Existential Ennui ahead of a new review of the final book in the quartet, Lemons Never Lie. As with the previous review—of 1967’s The Damsel—you can, of course, find an alternative view of […]

The Grofield Files: The Damsel (1967) by Richard Stark; a review

Over on Existential Ennui I’ve been making my way through Donald “Richard Stark” Westlake’s Parker novels for close to two years now, intermittently reviewing each one in turn. I followed my last review, of 1972’s Plunder Squad (Parker #15), with a review Joe Gores’s Parker-related 1972 crime novel Dead Skip, which I […]