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Donald Westlake?

Discussion in 'Booktalk' started by Old Raven, Oct 18, 2006.

  1. Old Raven Gems: 2/31
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    I had never heard of him intil recently, but he is supposedly quite well known. Maybe it's because I don't live in the U.S that I hadn't heard of him before. So, have you heard of him/read any of his books? Would you recommend them?
     
    Old Raven, Oct 18, 2006
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  2. jaded empath Gems: 20/31
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    Ohhhh, my friend...

    "...I think this is the beginning of a beautiful friendship." :D

    Donald E. Westlake has been writing a TON of books in a variety of genres, usually relating to crime, often enough.

    A lot of his stuff ends up like a farcial version of Elmore Leonard's crime novels, really.

    There's the long continuing 'Dortmunder' series, about the misadventures of a New York career burglar.

    Apart from this big chunk o' text, and sundry 'comic crime' novels, he's also written some serious crime stuff, that can get pretty dark.

    A bunch of his books have been turned into movies - maybe remember Mel Gibson in "Payback"? Or for oldies, there's the Lee Marvin film "Point Blank"

    He also writes under a variety of pseudonyms, one of which is good old Richard Stark - penname for the equally impressive (serious) crime fiction series following 'Parker' around.

    Here's an apt little snippet from the Wiki page on him:

    Try him, he's one of my favourite authors. If you like humor, start with something about poor old Dortmunder. If you're more drawn to serious stuff, try one of the Parker novels by 'Richard Stark'. :)

    (And *I'm* a Canuck, as well - so don't use non-Americanism as an excuse! ;) )
     
    jaded empath, Dec 5, 2006
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  3. Old Raven Gems: 2/31
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    First of all, Scandinavia is a bit farther away from the US than Canada is, so I think I deserve some justification for not having heard of him :p

    The reason I got curious about Westlake is because I read in Robert Jordan's blogg that he was "the funniest man currently writing in the english language (with appologies to Terry Pratchett)" (well, I think that's about what he wrote). So I guess I'll start with the humorous books, since that is what sparked my interest.

    I looked up the wiki site as soon as I read that blogg (well, actually, quite a few weeks later, since I couldn't remember his name, but it sound a lot better with "as soon as", don't you think? :p ). So I've already seen that, but I wanted the opinion of a "real" person as well, and I am glad I got such an enthusiatic answer! :D
     
    Old Raven, Dec 13, 2006
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