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The Mourner: A Parker Novel (Parker Novels), by Richard Stark
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You probably haven’t ever noticed them. But they’ve noticed you. They notice everything. That’s their job. Sitting quietly in a nondescript car outside a bank making note of the tellers’ work habits, the positions of the security guards. Lagging a few car lengths behind the Brinks truck on its daily rounds. Surreptitiously jiggling the handle of an unmarked service door at the racetrack.
They’re thieves. Heisters, to be precise. They’re pros, and Parker is far and away the best of them. If you’re planning a job, you want him in. Tough, smart, hardworking, and relentlessly focused on his trade, he is the heister’s heister, the robber’s robber, the heavy’s heavy. You don’t want to cross him, and you don’t want to get in his way, because he’ll stop at nothing to get what he’s after.
Parker, the ruthless antihero of Richard Stark’s eponymous mystery novels, is one of the most unforgettable characters in hardboiled noir. Lauded by critics for his taut realism, unapologetic amorality, and razor-sharp prose-style—and adored by fans who turn each intoxicating page with increasing urgency—Stark is a master of crime writing; his books as influential as any in the genre. The University of Chicago Press has embarked on a project to return the early volumes of this series to print for a new generation of readers to discover—and become addicted to. This season’s offerings include volumes 4–6 in the series: The Mourner, The Score, and The Jugger.
The Mourner is a story of convergence—of cultures and of guys with guns. Hot on the trail of a statue stolen from a fifteenth-century French tomb, Parker enters a world of eccentric art collectors, greedy foreign officials, and shady KGB agents. Next, Parker works with a group of professional con men in The Score on his biggest job yet—robbing an entire town in North Dakota. In The Jugger, Parker travels to Nebraska to help out a geriatric safecracker who knows too many of his criminal secrets. By the time he arrives, the safecracker is dead and Parker’s skeletons are on the verge of escaping from their closet—unless Parker resorts to lethal measures.
“Whatever Stark writes, I read. He’s a stylist, a pro, and I thoroughly enjoy his attitude.”—Elmore Leonard
“Westlake knows precisely how to grab a reader, draw him or her into the story, and then slowly tighten his grip until escape is impossible.”—Washington Post Book World
“Donald Westlake’s Parker novels are among the small number of books I read over and over. Forget all that crap you’ve been telling yourself about War and Peace and Proust—these are the books you’ll want on that desert island.”—Lawrence Block
- Sales Rank: #807930 in Books
- Brand: Stark, Richard/ Banville, John (FRW)
- Published on: 2009-04-15
- Released on: 2009-04-15
- Original language: English
- Number of items: 1
- Dimensions: 8.00" h x 1.00" w x 5.25" l,
- Binding: Paperback
- 232 pages
Review
“The UC Press mission, to reprint the 1960s Parker novels of Richard Stark (the late Donald Westlake), is wholly admirable. The books have been out of print for decades, and the fast-paced, hard-boiled thrillers featuring the thief Parker are brilliant.”
(H. J. Kirchoff Globe and Mail 2009-04-17)
“Perhaps this, more than anything else, is what I admire about these novels: the consistent ruthlessness of an unapologetic bastard. And so if you’re a fan of noir novels and haven’t yet read Richard Stark, you may want to give these books a try. Who knows? Parker may just be the son of a bitch you’ve been searching for.”
(John McNally Virginia Quarterly Review)
“Parker is refreshingly amoral, a thief who always gets away with the swag.”
(Stephen King Entertainment Weekly)
“Parker . . . lumbers through the pages of Richard Stark’s noir novels scattering dead bodies like peanut shells. . . . In a complex world [he] makes things simple.”
(William Grimes New York Times)
“Whatever Stark writes, I read. He’s a stylist, a pro, and I thoroughly enjoy his attitude."
(Elmore Leonard)
“Richard Stark’s Parker novels . . . are among the most poised and polished fictions of their time and, in fact, of any time.”
(John Banville Bookforum)
“Parker is a true treasure. . . . The master thief is back, along with Richard Stark.”
(Marilyn Stasio New York Times Book Review)
“Westlake knows precisely how to grab a reader, draw him or her into the story, and then slowly tighten his grip until escape is impossible.”
(Washington Post)
“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)
“Donald Westlake’s Parker novels are among the small number of books I read over and over. Forget all that crap you’ve been telling yourself about War and Peace and Proust—these are the books you’ll want on that desert island.”
(Lawrence Block)
“Richard Stark writes a harsh and frightening story of criminal warfare and vengeance with economy, understatement and a deadly amoral objectivity—a remarkable addition to the list of the shockers that the French call roman noirs.”
(Anthony Boucher New York Times Book Review)
"Parker is a brilliant invention. . . . What chiefly distinguishes Westlake, under whatever name, is his passion for process and mechanics. . . . Parker appears to have eliminated everything from his program but machine logic, but this is merely protective coloration. He is a romantic vestige, a free-market anarchist whose independent status is becoming a thing of the past."
(Luc Sante New York Times Book Review)
"I wouldn't care to speculate about what it is in Westlake's psyche that makes him so good at writing about Parker, much less what it is that makes me like the Parker novels so much. Suffice it to say that Stark/Westlake is the cleanest of all noir novelists, a styleless stylist who gets to the point with stupendous economy, hustling you down the path of plot so briskly that you have to read his books a second time to appreciate the elegance and sober wit with which they are written."
(Terry Teachout Commentary)
"The University of Chicago Press has recently undertaken a campaign to get Parker back in print in affordable and handsome editions, and I dove in. And now I get it."
(Josef Braun Vue Weekly)
"Whether early or late, the Parker novels are all superlative literary entertainments."
(Terry Teachout Weekly Standard)
“If you’re looking for crime novels with a lot of punch, try the very, very tough novels featuring Parker. . . . The Hunter, The Outfit, The Mourner, and The Man with the Getaway Face are all beautifully paced, tautly composed, and originally published in the early 1960s."
(Christian Science Monitor)
About the Author
Richard Stark was one of the many pseudonyms of Donald E. Westlake (1933-2008), a prolific author of noir crime fiction. In 1993 the Mystery Writers of America bestowed the society’s highest honor on Westlake, naming him a Grand Master.
Most helpful customer reviews
10 of 10 people found the following review helpful.
Whilst we all Mourn Westlake's (aka Richard Stark) Death, It's Great Parker and His Older Adventures Have Been Given Life Again!
By James N Simpson
It's great to see publishers such as University of Chicago Press republishing old classics such as Westlake's originally published in 1963 Parker novel The Mourner. They've actually republished quite a number of his novels from the start of his under Richard Stark pen name Parker novels, all have a similar gun silhouette and a couple of images in front, with of a different colour background for each book which incidentally all look quite good together on a shelf. I wasn't even alive back when this originally came out so am quite grateful to be able to read these now without having to pay a small fortune for them.
You certainly don't need to have read the three previous Parker adventures to enjoy this as a standalone read but this one (in chapter 4) does give away key happenings in those first three books so it's probably a good idea to put this one aside and pick up the other three first. In order they are The Hunter, The Man with the Getaway Face (aka The Steel Hit) and The Outfit. If you've just finished this, the next one to look for is The Score (aka Killtown).
In The Mourner, Parker needs to steal a 15th century small white statue of mourner (hence the title of the book) which a Russian diplomat named Kapor has in his collection. Unfortunately for Parker, this diplomat has funded his collection by syphoning off money that should have gone back to the Soviet Union, so KGB policeman August Menlo, has been sent to discreetly dispose of Kapor and bring back the money. However first he's got to find just where Kapor hid it, so when Parker's colleague in this caper Handy McKay shows an interest in one of Kapor's female servants, Menlo has him abducted. Parker has no idea why Handy was taken but he doesn't take kindly to someone else muscling in on his action.
This is easily the best novel in the series up to this point since The Hunter. August Menlo is an excellently written character who you'll thoroughly enjoy following his journey through the pages.
It's a shame Donald E Westlake passed away in December 2008 so the Parker adventures ended with Dirty Money published that year. It's a great series and it's great that these old adventures that were published before many of our times can be obtained again so easily through republication. Incidentally Westlake's first ever novel (not a Parker adventure) has also been republished under the title The Cutie.
8 of 8 people found the following review helpful.
Parker's Maltese Falcon
By Michael Gebert
One of the things you realize reading these in their University of Chicago "approved classic" editions is that the guy who wrote them was a working stiff trying to find what would sell; so while the character of Parker is fairly constant, the situations hop genres. This one clearly starts out in a mix of Dashiell Hammett and 60s spy movie territory, with a Peter Lorre-esque collector on the trail of a Maltese Falcon-like historical dingus also sought by KGB agents and other grotesque characters, the kind of caper that was typical back then in movies like Topkapi or The Pink Panther. At first that seems a little cheap, but in the end it's interesting to see how Parker functions in that environment-- and the answer is, ten times more unsentimentally than even Sam Spade, since he's not going to fall in love with any dame, or worry about sending one up the river, either. Still, too much of this seems out of place in Parker's world, too movieish for a guy who inhabits a lowlife world of untraceable cars and stagnant small towns, and the convenient use of a genuine piece of standard issue spy equipment to finish off one major character seems cheap and wrong. The next book, The Score, will return Parker to a world he belongs in.
1 of 1 people found the following review helpful.
Parker, The Fat Man, The Statue Everyone Wants, and the Femme Fatale
By Dave Wilde
"The Mourner" is the fourth in the 24-strong Parker series. Parker is Donald Westlake's creation although he published it under the pseudonym, Richard Stark. Briefly, Parker is a thief, a burglary, a robber, a heister. Parker works with a few other thieves and is often at odds with the Outfit or the Syndicate. He is a tough-nosed, unyielding individual. These Parker stories are solid action from cover to cover and are all highly recommended.
This book is Westlake's nod to the Maltese Falcon in too many ways to be ignored. One of the things he is tasked with stealing is a fourteenth-century statute, the Mourner, and there are many parties after it, including an ex-spy from a small Communist nation somewhere near the Carpathian mountains. Ex-spy, August Menlo, is often described as a fat man, just like Gutman in the Maltese Falcon. Westlake does a great job of developing Menlo, who is just the most unusual character as he misunderstands a Southern small-town speed trap and reacts very badly to the stop, perhaps because he has $100,000 of stolen money in his car.
Another character fairly well-developed is the voluptuous Bett Harrow, who is holding onto a gun Parker had used in a killing and, with her father, wants Parker to steal the statue. Bett is always lounging around in a hotel room and has moves like a burlesque dancer. Parker isn't interested in her because, when he is on a job, he is celibate and focused on only one thing. When the job is done, well, that's something else entirely. Bett is your no-holds-barred femme fatale and she is willing to go off with whoever appears to be the strongest.
In this novel, Parker is attacked, knifed, shot, and left for dead. Well, that doesn't distinguish it from other Parker novels, but he is quite roughed up here.
With the thievery, the constant battles with the Outfit guys, the spy vs. spy capers involving the statute and other things, and the machinations involving Bett's constantly shifting loyalties, it is a solid, action-packed Parker outing.
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