Books Read in 2018

Another year winds down. I have no prophetic words, no great wisdom to part, no thoughts about one year ending and another beginning. As always, I try to move forward, look to each day not as a burden, but something to be happy for. I don’t always succeed in that and most days blend together.

Books have been my one constant in my life and remain, in some ways, my best friend. They are always nearby, always waiting, never complaining. They teach me new words, make me laugh, make me cry, and fill me with wonder. They are fantasy, a universe to escape to when the real world is pounding on my door, trying to break down the walls.

I live for them. And will continue into a new year…

 

Books read in 2018:

01. Persepolis Rising by James S.A. Corey

02. Origin by Dan Brown

03. The Job of the Wasp by Colin Winnette

04. The Wrong Stars by Tim Pratt

05. Altered Carbon by Richard K. Morgan

06. The Cheese Monkeys by Chip Kidd

07. The Learners by Chip Kidd

08. The Case of the Missing Books by Ian Sansom

09. Mr. Dixon Disappears by Ian Sansom

10. Crazy Rich Asians by Kevin Kwan

11. Star Wars: The Last Jedi by Jason Fry

12. The Unhappy Medium by T.J. Brown

13. Contact By Carl Sagan

14. Noir By Christopher Moore

15. Less by Andrew Sean Greer

16. Off To Be The Wizard By Scott Meyer

17. Surrender the Pink By Carrie Fisher

18. The Outsider By Stephen King

19. Expecting Someone Taller By Tom Holt

20. Meddling Kids By Edgar Cantero

21. Spell or High Water by Scott Meyer

22. The Secret Diary of Adrian Mole, Aged 13¾ by Sue Townsend

23. The Growing Pains of Adrian Mole by Sue Townsend

24. Bazaar of Bad Dreams by Stephen King

25. Lovecraft Country by Matt Ruff

26. Doctor Who: Fear of the Dark by Trevor Baxendale

27. Doctor Who: The Romance of Crime by Gareth Roberts

28. The Cabin at the End of the World by Paul Tremblay

29. Star Wars: Thrawn By Timothy Zahn

30. Doctor Who: The English Way of Death By Gareth Roberts

31. Feeder By Patrick Weekes

32. Star Wars: Thrawn: Alliances by Timothy Zahn

33. We The Animals By Justin Torres

34. How To Stop Time By Matt Haig

35. Booked to Die By John Dunning

36. Storm Front By Jim Butcher

37. Shadow Man By Margaret Kirk

38. The Dreaming Stars By Tim Pratt

39. Small Spaces by Katherine Arden

40. A Map of Days By Ransom Riggs

41. Magnus Chase and the Gods of Asgard: The Sword of Summer by Rick Riordan

42. Groucho Marx, Master Detective By Ron Goulart

43. Elevation By Stephen King

44. Labyrinth of the Spirits by Carlos Ruiz Zafon

45. Douglas Adams’s Starship Titanic by Terry Jones

46. Somebody Owes Me Money By Donald E. Westlake

47. Help I Am Being Held Prisoner by Donald E. Westlake

48 The Hot Rock by Donald E. Westlake 

49. Bank Shot by Donald E. Westlake

Books: Bank Shot By Donald E. Westlake (1972)

"Encyclopedias are heavy, and John Dortmunder is sick of carrying them. While in between jobs, the persistent heist-planner is working an encyclopedia-selling scam that’s about to blow up in his face. The cops are on their way when his friend Kelp pulls up in a stolen Oldsmobile, offering a quick escape from the law and a job that’s too insane to turn down. Kelp’s nephew is an FBI washout who’s addicted to old-time pulp novels and adventure stories. He tried being a cop, and now he wants to be a robber. His target: a Main Street bank that has temporarily relocated to a large mobile home. Breaking in is impossible—there are seven guards and a police station down the street—but mobile homes were meant to be driven. Dortmunder just has to drive the bank away."

Whatever can go wrong in Dortmunder’s elaborate attempts at larceny invariably does, and in the most amusing and unexpected ways possible. Bank Shot is more nutty and much better than The Hot Rock –which is pretty witty in it of itself. The best part of the book is once his gang steals the trailer, they have to hide it from the police (which involve stealing a few cars and trucks, along with a hitch and some water-based paint), whom are –thankfully- comically too inept to see the bumbling criminals are within their grasp.

The ending, as well, is perhaps one the most vivid and memorable parts of the book –a purely absurd and hilarious string of set pieces.

There was a 1974 film based on this 1972 novel, but for whatever reasons, the film version is only loosely based on Westlake’s book. It would be interesting to see a faithful adaptation of the book, but it would have to be a “period” comedy, as there is no way this plot would work in modern times, not with the GPS technology and all the CCTV that is around.

Still, it’s a very funny book and a quick read. More Donald E. Westlake is in my future for 2019, so watch out!

Books: The Hot Rock By Donald E. Westlake (1972/2012)

Supposedly The Hot Rock, began as another Parker novel (to be released under the pen name Donald E. Westlake often used, Richard Stark), with the idea of a thief having to steal the same thing over and over. Alas, it kept coming out funny, something apparently that is not to be associated with the hard boiled, grim, no-nonsense Parker novels, and so a new hero was born.

"John Archibald Dortmunder is the thief and after being released from his latest stint in prison he is quickly drawn into a caper by his friend Kelp; it’s a plot to steal the $500,000 Balaboma Emerald. The Akinzi have the stone, the Talabwo want it back, and their UN rep will pay for retrieval. The stone - of at least as much symbolic importance as monetary value – is currently in the U.S. on a museum tour. With Dortmunder’s brilliant plan set, the team successfully steals the emerald. But circumstances prevent them from holding onto it, leading to a number of more complicated and more elaborate capers."

What Donald E. Westlake created here –by accident at first- is a wonderful mixture of plot and gimmicks, with some lively, hilarious dialogue and well rounded, believable (but amoral) anti-heroes. It’s obvious that Dortmunder is a criminal genius here, who seems to have the worst bit of luck. I kind of felt sorry for him as the novel progressed –he seemed to think of every detail to plans, but something seemed to go wrong each time. While the plot is pretty funny, a lot of the laugh out loud stuff comes from the mutual misunderstandings between the characters, as well as getting on each others' nerves.

A very funny, very cheeky novel with eccentric New Yorkers, most who are not the brightest bulb on the Christmas Tree.  

Books: Help I Am Being Held Prisoner by Donald E. Westlake (1974/2018)

“An ingrained practical joker, sentenced to prison after one of his jokes got out of hand, is inadvertently dumped into a gang of prison trusties who are able to periodically sneak out of prison to commit robberies for which they have the perfect alibi: they're in jail. Harry Künt (pronounced Koont,  but you get the picture here; it’s a crude pun used mostly –I think- to piss off the more conservative reader) is not really a criminal by nature, and is terrified but must hide his fear from the gang, who are tough enough that they might kill him if he chickens out (or so he believes). So he uses his skill at practical joker to surreptitiously disrupt their plans, all while hoping his co-conspirators don’t catch on.”

Doing some research on Westlake, I discovered that Help I Am Being Held Prisoner, and the previous book I read by the writer, are called a “nephew” capers. As described, “the essence of the (Westlake's) ‘nephew’ plot is that the hero is accused of doing something bad that he didn't do. He has trouble finding out what that something is because the people who can tell him refuse to believe he didn't do it.” Still, most of the characters here are sort of cheerfully amoral, with an unspoken honor among them. The prisoners Harry hangs out with are not killers, just your everyday misfits, robbers and lower level mobsters (and very white, which seems odd even for the 1970s when this book was written). And what drives this humorous tale is what happens when the best laid plans go afoul, mostly due bumbling of the caper crew. I will also note that the title of the book is a bit misleading. It ties into the story in a clever way, but seems more of a McGuffin.

This a truly a marvelously funny book, though, and while I did not believe anyone within the prison administration system would not be able to figure out that some of the inmates where “escaping” only to return before headcount, I still sort of accepted this Hogan’s Heroes/Great Escape idea (though apparently, there is some truth to part of Westlake’s plot, insomuch that some prisoners did try to dig themselves out but only to get caught). But that's what good writing does, it takes the most outlandish idea and makes you forget how unbelievable it is because the rest of structure, the characters and sheer audacity of it in the first place.

Books: Somebody Owes Me Money By Donald E. Westlake (1969, 2008)

Writer Stephen King has always loved Donald E. Westlake. He liked the author when he wrote his comic mysteries, and loved him more when Westlake wrote under the pen name (one of a few) of Richard Stark, using the criminal anti-hero, hard-boiled, and relentless Parker as main protagonist. And its because of King’s love for this writer (who he paid homage to in the 1989 novel The Dark Half), that I have decided to read some of his books.

Westlake was prolific writer, penning 28 novels under the Stark name alone (24 featuring Parker), and 14 (along will 11 short stories) featuring his comic protagonist John Dortmunder. This character, by the way, was accidently born when Westlake was writing the 1970 novel The Hot Rock, which was to feature Parker and go out under the Stark name. That plot, however, involved a precious gem that is stolen, lost, reacquired, stolen again, lost again (and so forth), which seemed too comic a situation for a hard-boiled creation like Parker. Westlake therefore rewrote the novel with a more bumbling and likable cast of characters, led by a pessimistic, hard-luck professional thief. I’m going to read a few of those in the coming weeks.

Westlake also published books under multiple pseudonyms. Beyond the Stark name, he used up to 17 different authors’ names, publishing in a variety genres (Westlake acknowledged writing as many as 28 paperback soft-porn titles from 1959–64 under the name of Alan Marshall, along with veteran mystery writer Lawrence Block).

In between writing Parker and Dortmunder novels, Westlake also wrote a bunch of stand alone comic mysteries, and 1969’s Somebody Owes Me Money is my first Donald E. Westlake novel:

“Cab driver Chet Conway was hoping for a good tip from his latest fare, the sort he could spend. But what he got was a tip on a horse race. Which might have turned out okay, except that when he went to collect his winnings, Chet found his bookie lying dead on the living room floor. Chet knows he had nothing to do with it-but just try explaining that to the cops, to the two rival criminal gangs who each think Chet's working for the other, and to the dead man's beautiful sister, who has flown in from Las Vegas to avenge her brother's murder.”

This is a fun page-turner with some brilliant dialogue along with your basic mistaken identity plot. What works here is that Westlake creates a plausible plot (and even though published 50 years ago, nothing seems outdated), great conflicts and believable characters. It’s a light, almost wacky caper with an uncomplicated plot, which is great if you’re tired of real life. The book does have a sort of metafictional ending that does seem out of place, and I’m curious if this was the books original ending or was it changed years later for the Hard Case imprint line? When Chet figures out whodunnit  (and one I did not suspect), Abbie blurts out, "You wouldn't get away with that in a mystery story."

It was a surprise -in both who killed Tommy and Abbie uttering those words, and I felt taken a bit, but all in all, a very enjoyable romp.