Cape Cod League top 30 prospects: 30-16 and 15-1. I’ll be on ESPN 1000 Chicago’s 9-11 pm program, but we’re taping it beforehand so I don’t know exactly when I’ll be on.
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Richard Stark’s The Hunter
The story starts with Parker catching up with the woman, then jumps back to tell us about the score gone wrong, then shifts focus to Parker’s other prey, the onetime partner who masterminded the betrayal but realizes that Parker isn’t dead. Where Sam Spade or Philip Marlowe would knock a guy cold, Parker kills him – he kills for revenge, he kills for leverage, he kills to send messages. He shows remorse for one death he didn’t plan, but otherwise reasons away every kill (when he reasons them at all) as justified. Stark’s style is dry and efficient, short sentences, minimal details. It moves, and I found myself pulling for Parker despite the fact that he’s a nasty piece of work.
The Hunter was a ripping read until the last five pages, when Stark (actually a pseudonym for the prolific Donald Westlake) has Parker, normally a meticulous planner, make an uncharacteristically sloppy mistake, perhaps just for the purpose of sending him on one last major score in the final few paragraphs of the book. It seemed out of character and forced for a story that was an effortless work up until that point. It’s absolutely worth the read, but I found that ending to be a letdown after 98% of the book was so strong.
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I don’t devote much time to P.G. Wodehouse books for two reasons. One, I’ve flogged his stuff relentlessly enough that if you were ever going to try him, you probably already have. Two, his books more or less share the same plot but with different gags and twists to get to the same ending. Heavy Weather, part of the Blandings Castle series and a direct sequel to Summer Lightning, gets a mention here for the wrong reason: It was dull and not that funny. It has to be the first Wodehouse novel I didn’t enjoy, and I kept waiting for the comedy to kick in; it’s just a continuation of the plot of Summer Lightning, picking up just a day or two after the previous novel ends, and it lacked both Wodehouse’s typical silly situations and wisecracks and his trick of weaving multiple seemingly unconnected plots into one pat solution.
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I’m writing this on a plane and they’re showing the chick-flick “Ghosts of Girlfriends Past.” I looked up to see Matthew McConaghey destroy a wedding cake because he pushed the cork out of a champagne bottle instead of holding it and twisting the bottle. Really? Does anyone actually open a bottle of champagne by letting the cork go flying? I will say this, though: Whoever the casting director was, he clearly had a good time with this film. That’s a lot of good-looking women in one movie. Otherwise it looks like the kind of flick my wife would watch when I’m traveling.
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Next up: William Styron’s controversial novel, The Confessions of Nat Turner
My dad actually does open champagne that way…he’ll head outside on Christmas eve and let it fly. I wanted to tell him he doesn’t need to do that but he seems to enjoy it. Although he was pretty skeptical and then impressed when I successfully opened it in a room full of people with no one losing and eye or testicle.
I figure that most of the cork-popping nonsense occurs in lockerrooms and at New Years. Though I did discover the “interesting” phenomenon of sabrage. Combining alcohol and sharp swords. Natural selection at its finest…
Keith, you should check John Boorman’s Point Blank with Lee Marvin based on The Hunter. Marvin is in top badass form. Better than the Mel Gibson version Payback, although the director’s cut of that is much better than the theatrical version.
I was just in a wedding this past weekend where both the bride and groom let corks fly. Of course, it was outside and everyone nearby was informed to duck and cover first.
Westlake(/Stark/Coe/Holt/etc.) is a fave of mine. If you want his intricate plotting blended with Wodehouse-ian farce, I highly recommend his Dortmunder series. It feels REALLY dated in a post-Leonard/Ellroy world, but in the best possible way, charming and highly pleasurable.
Not sure if you’d be interested, but Darwyn Cooke recently just came out with a comic adaptation of Richard Stark’s The Hunter. It’s pretty good and Cooke’s art really works well with the genre.
http://www.idwpublishing.com/previews/parker/
Here’s a link with a 21 pg preview just in case you might be.
Keith,
Following up on the expansion discussion from the chat. Isn’t NYC metro the best location for expansion in baseball? I suppose the huge public funds going to new stadiums over the past few years for both existing teams would be a hurdle, but the demographics and income levels can certainly support a 3rd and possibly 4th MLB franchise.
I live in Charlotte and would love MLB here, but don’t get the sense that it’s top of mind for most in the city. The current AAA stadium downtown fiasco has been entertaining though.
Hey Keith,
Do you plan on reading any of the other Stark novels in the series? I picked up The Hunter a few weeks ago (will probably get to it soon) but I haven’t seen any other Stark reviews on the dish. The reason I ask is that I know the day will come soon when I run out of Chandler and Hammett works to read. I”m holding out hope that I will enjoy the Stark works. Boris Akunin was recommended to me as well so I have The Winter Queen on the shef. Have you read any Akunin?
Chris – haven’t read more Stark or any Akunin, although I’m open to it.