Parker (Stark)

Between Parker's 1961 debut and his return in the late 1990s, the whole world of crime changed. Now fake IDs and credit cards had to be purchased from specialists; increasingly sophisticated policing made escape and evasion tougher; and, worst of all, money had gone digital-the days of cash-stuffed payroll trucks were long gone.   But cash isn't everything: Flashfire and Firebreak find Parker going after, respectively, a fortune in jewels and a collection of priceless paintings. In Flashfire, Parker's in West Palm Beach, competing with a crew that has an unhealthy love of explosions. When things go sour, Parker finds himself shot and trapped-and forced to rely on a civilian to survive. Firebreak takes Parker to a palatial Montana "hunting lodge" where a dot-com millionaire hides a gallery of stolen old masters-which will fetch Parker a pretty penny if his team can just get it past the mansion's tight security. The forests of Montana are an inhospitable place for a heister when well-laid plans fall apart, but no matter how untamed the wilderness, Parker's guaranteed to be the most dangerous predator around.

The long-awaited return of the legendary thief created by Richard Stark (aka Donald Westlake) in "a riveting tale of betrayal and escape" (Chicago Tribune).   Foreword by Lawrence Block   After the bloodbath of Butcher's Moon, the action-filled blowout Parker adventure, Donald Westlake said, "Richard Stark proved to me that he had a life of his own by simply disappearing. He was gone." And for nearly twenty-five years, he stayed away, while readers waited. But nothing bad is truly gone forever, and Parker's as bad as they come. According to Westlake, one day in 1997, "suddenly, he came back from the dead, with a chalky prison pallor"-and the resulting novel, Comeback, showed that neither Stark nor Parker had lost a single step. Knocking over a highly lucrative religious revival show, Parker reminds us that not all criminals don ski masks-some prefer to hide behind the wings of fallen angels.   "Parker has not lost his touch-or his nerve . . . In a world of warped values, an honest crook like Parker is a true treasure." -Marilyn Stasio, The New York Times Book Review   "Comeback is brisker, faster, and funnier than the earlier novels . . . Elmore Leonard wouldn't write what he does if Stark hadn't been there before. And Quentin Tarantino wouldn't write what he does without Leonard . . . Old master that he is, Stark does all of them one better." -Los Angeles Times   "Energy and imagination light up virtually every page, as does some of the best hard-boiled prose ever to grace the noir genre." -Publishers Weekly

A master thief must build a team to escape a correctional center in this fast-paced, hard-boiled crime novel by the author of Firebreak. With Parker locked up and about to be unmasked, Breakout follows his Houdini-like escape from prison with a team of convicts. But when a new heist and new dangers-con artists, snitches, busybodies, eccentrics, and cops-loom among the dark alleys and old stone buildings of the big city to which they've fled, Parker soon learns that not all prisons have bars. Praise for Breakout "Fiercely distracting. . . . Westlake is an expert plotter; and while Parker is a blunt instrument of a human being depicted in rudimentary short grunts of sentences, his take on other characters reveals a writer of great humor and human understanding." -John Hodgman "Stark . . . applies his great wit and dexterous mental skills to a series of . . . ingenious exits and entrances in (what else?) Breakout. . . . Jampacked. . . . He writes with ruthless efficiency." -Marilyn Stasio, New York Times "Stark invites readers to project themselves onto the always-assured Parker, making him a frighteningly easy sociopath to root for. And watching knowledgeable bad guys ply their shadowy trade under pressure is always fun. An immensely pleasurable entry in the Parker series. . . . Simply put, Breakout is great escapist fiction." -Booklist,starred review

A master thief wraps up some unfinished business in this fast-paced, hard-boiled crime novel by the author of Nobody Runs Forever. Parker's got a new fence and a new plan to get the loot back from a botched job. But a bounty hunter, the FBI, and the local cops are on his tail. Only his brains, his cool, and the help of his lone longtime dame, Claire, can keep him one step ahead of the cars and the guns in this final Parker thriller. Praise for Dirty Money "Entertaining. . . . Stark handles the criminal aspects of his tale with his usual panache." -Publishers Weekly "Stark, Donald E. Westlake's more bad-tempered alter ego, breaks his usual rule and gives women-ballsy Sandra and dispassionate Claire-major roles. Not that Parker takes a back seat for a minute. The man is fiercely conceived, one mean piece of work." -Kirkus Reviews "The hard-edged Parker is as resolute and dangerous as ever, and the faithful will stand beside him through every step of this typically involved and entertaining novel." -Booklist

The coldblooded criminal known as Parker tries, and fails, to stay under the radar in rural New England: "Nobody does the noir thriller better than Stark." -San Diego Union-Tribune In Ask the Parrot, the followup to Nobody Runs Forever, ruthless thief Parker is back on the run, dodging dogs, cops, and even a helicopter. His escape brings him to rural Massachusetts, where he is forced to work with a small-town recluse nursing a grudge against the racetrack that fired him. Even in hiding, Parker manages to get up to no good. It'll be a deadly day at the races . . . "Richard Stark's Parker crime novels are the ultimate page-turners." -Jonathan Ames, The Boston Globe "Parker is a blunt instrument of a human being." -John Hodgman, Parade "Often funny, laced with Stark's brutally morbid humor . . . fast-moving, tense scenes that drip with potential violence before, inevitably, exploding into actual violence." -Christopher Bahn, AV Club

"Lots of bleak fun . . . This stellar series just gets better and better." -Publishers Weekly (starred review) The saga begins with a poker game gone lethally awry. When Parker goes in on a messy scam-stealing an armored car-with someone he barely knows, as usual the amateurs get in the way of the job. From a nervous ex-con and his well-intentioned sister to a bank manager's two-timing wife and a beautiful, relentless cop, too many people have their hands too close to Parker's pie. Even when he sees the job turning bad, he can't let go of the score-and there just might be nowhere left to run . . . "Another thrill ride worth staying up all night and calling in sick tomorrow morning for." ?Austin Chronicle "The shrewdest sociopath this side of Tom Ripley . . . a great hard-boiled series." -Booklist

"Hearing the click behind him, Parker threw his glass straight back over his right shoulder, and dove off his chair to the left." When a job looks like amateur hour, Parker walks away. But even a squad of seasoned professionals can't guarantee against human error in a high-risk scam. Can an art dealer with issues unload a truck of paintings with Parker's aid? Or will the heist end up too much of a human interest story, as luck runs out before Parker can get in on the score?

The hunter becomes prey, as a heist goes sour and Parker finds himself trapped in a shuttered amusement park, besieged by a bevy of local mobsters, in Slayground. There are no exits from Fun Island. Outnumbered and outgunned, Parker can't afford a single miscalculation. He's low on bullets and making it out alive is a long shot-but, as anyone who's crossed his path knows, no one is better at playing higher stakes with shorter odds.

Deadly Edge bids a brutal adieu to the 1960s as Parker robs a rock concert, and the heist goes south. Soon Parker finds himself-and his woman, Claire-menaced by a pair of sadistic, strung-out killers who want anything but a Summer of Love. Parker has a score to settle while Claire's armed with her first rifle-and they're both ready to usher in the end of the Age of Aquarius.

Parker's got a couple of rules that have helped keep him alive throughout his long career. One of those is never to work on a boat. But with a gambling boat cruising down the Hudson, stuffed to the gunwales with cash, Parker's got a plan, a team, and a new rule: a shot at a big enough score makes any rule worth breaking. Parker and his crew hit the boat, hard, but as always, there are a lot of complications-and a lot of bodies-before this one's in the bag.

The sixteenth Parker novel, Butcher's Moon is more than twice as long as most of the master heister's adventures, and absolutely jammed with the action, violence, and nerve-jangling tension readers have come to expect. Back in the corrupt town where he lost his money, and nearly his life, in Slayground, Parker assembles a stunning cast of characters from throughout his career for one gigantic, blowout job: starting-and finishing-a gang war. It feels like the Parker novel to end all Parker novels, and for nearly twenty-five years that's what it was. After its publication in 1974, Donald Westlake said, "Richard Stark proved to me that he had a life of his own by simply disappearing. He was gone."   Featuring a new introduction by Westlake's close friend and writing partner, Lawrence Block, this classic Parker adventure deserves a place of honor on any crime fan's bookshelf. More than thirty-five years later, Butcher's Moon still packs a punch: keep your calendar clear when you pick it up, because once you open it you won't want to do anything but read until the last shot is fired.