Donald E Westlake
1) The hook
Author
Language
English
Description
Critically acclaimed for his recent bestseller, "The Ax, " Westlake returns with a tale of twisted psychological suspense involving two cunning authors—and one deadly proposition.
Author
Language
English
Formats
Description
In this uproariously funny novel from "a national literary treasure," a career criminal is offered a new life outside of prison — if he can steal a compromising video of the president (Booklist).
Meehan, a career thief staring at life without parole, is awaiting sentencing at the Manhattan Correctional Center when he is called to a meeting by someone masquerading as his lawyer.
The man, it turns out, represents the presidential...
Meehan, a career thief staring at life without parole, is awaiting sentencing at the Manhattan Correctional Center when he is called to a meeting by someone masquerading as his lawyer.
The man, it turns out, represents the presidential...
Author
Series
Dortmunder novels volume 11
Language
English
Description
In this "furiously funny" new novel from Donald Westlake, career thief John Dortmunder is back to steal a fleet of vintage cars from a corrupt CEO (New York Times).
The con is on. The mark is Monroe Hall, a CEO who lavished more of his company's money on himself than the boys at Enron and WorldCom combined.
The loot? A fleet of vintage automobiles that would leave the Sultan of Brunei blushing.
The catch? Trying to outsmart...
The con is on. The mark is Monroe Hall, a CEO who lavished more of his company's money on himself than the boys at Enron and WorldCom combined.
The loot? A fleet of vintage automobiles that would leave the Sultan of Brunei blushing.
The catch? Trying to outsmart...
4) Get real
Author
Series
Dortmunder novels volume 14
Language
English
Description
When a TV producer convinces John Dortmunder and his merry gang to do a reality show that captures their next score, Dortmunder hatches an ingenious plan to outwit viewers glued to their television sets and end the shoot with money in his pockets
Author
Series
Dortmunder novels volume 12
Language
English
Description
In his classic caper novels, Donald E. Westlake turns the world of crime and criminals upside-down: the bad get better, the good get worse, and God save anyone caught between a thief named John Dortmunder and his most improbable plans.
It's a long way from the island of Manhattan to the island resort where Preston Fareweather has his hedonistic hideout-avoiding the legal prosecutions of five embittered ex-wives and enjoying the attentions...
It's a long way from the island of Manhattan to the island resort where Preston Fareweather has his hedonistic hideout-avoiding the legal prosecutions of five embittered ex-wives and enjoying the attentions...
Author
Series
Publisher
Titan
Pub. Date
2012
Language
English
Formats
Description
The year is 1977, and America is finally getting over the nightmares of Watergate and Vietnam and the national hangover that was the 1960s. But not everyone is ready to let it go. Not aging comedian Koo Davis, friend to generals and presidents and veteran of countless USO tours to buck up American troops in the field. And not the five remaining members of the self-proclaimed People's Revolutionary Army, who've decided that kidnapping Koo Davis would...
7) Bad news
Author
Series
Dortmunder novels volume 10
Language
English
Description
From Mystery Writers of America Grand Master Donald E. Westlake comes the eagerly anticipated return of unlucky master crook John Dortmunder.
Dortmunder doesn't like manual labor. So when Andy Kelp relays the offer of a grand to help dig up a grave in a far-flung cemetery, he balks...until he begins to wonder just why Fitzroy Guilderpost, criminal mastermind, wants to pull a switcheroo of two 70-years-dead Indians. Central to the plan is...
Dortmunder doesn't like manual labor. So when Andy Kelp relays the offer of a grand to help dig up a grave in a far-flung cemetery, he balks...until he begins to wonder just why Fitzroy Guilderpost, criminal mastermind, wants to pull a switcheroo of two 70-years-dead Indians. Central to the plan is...
Author
Series
Dortmunder novels volume 13
Language
English
Formats
Description
In what may be the "best Dortmunder yarn yet," Westlake's seasoned but often scoreless crook must take on an impossible crime, one he doesn't want and doesn't believe in — but a little blackmail goes a long way (Associated Press).
All it takes is a few underhanded moves by a tough ex-cop named Eppick to pull Dortmunder into a game he never wanted to play.
With no choice, he musters his always-game gang and they set out on a perilous...
All it takes is a few underhanded moves by a tough ex-cop named Eppick to pull Dortmunder into a game he never wanted to play.
With no choice, he musters his always-game gang and they set out on a perilous...
Author
Series
Dortmunder novels volume 9
Language
English
Formats
Description
It started with a ring. A cheap ring. The yellow metal said brass, not gold, and the sparkly bits were certainly not diamonds. But the ring belonged to May's horse-playing uncle, who swore it brought good luck. Dortmunder, who wouldn't kick a little good luck out of bed, puts it to the test when he goes to burglarize Long Island billionaire Max Fairbanks. As luck would have it, Dortmunder is greeted by Fairbanks himself--and a loaded gun--as soon...
10) The ax
Author
Language
English
Formats
Description
The multi-award-winning, widely-acclaimed mystery master Donald E. Westlake delivers a masterpiece with this brilliant, laser-sharp tale of the deadly consequences of corporate downsizing.
Burke Devore is a middle-aged manager at a paper company when the cost-cutting ax falls, and he is laid off. Eighteen months later and still unemployed, he puts a new spin on his job search — with agonizing care, Devore finds the seven men in the surrounding...
Burke Devore is a middle-aged manager at a paper company when the cost-cutting ax falls, and he is laid off. Eighteen months later and still unemployed, he puts a new spin on his job search — with agonizing care, Devore finds the seven men in the surrounding...
11) Kahawa
Author
Language
English
Formats
Description
In Uganda in 1977, a particular trainload of coffee, mostly belonging to dictator Idi Amin, is worth six million dollars. As a group of scoundrels and international financiers hijack the train, the double and triple crosses pile up and the comic tension escalates in a brawling brew of buffoons, bumblers, beans and boxcars.
Author
Language
English
Formats
Description
One of America's best-loved authors returns with a delightfully chilling new stand-alone in the vein of his bestsellers The Ax and The Hook.
Josh Redmont was 27 when the first check arrived, and he had absolutely no idea what it was for. Issued by "United States Agent" through an unnamed bank with an indeterminate address in D.C., someone seemed to think Josh was owed $1,000. One month later, another check arrived, and then...
Josh Redmont was 27 when the first check arrived, and he had absolutely no idea what it was for. Issued by "United States Agent" through an unnamed bank with an indeterminate address in D.C., someone seemed to think Josh was owed $1,000. One month later, another check arrived, and then...
13) The hot rock
Author
Series
Dortmunder novels volume 1
Language
English
Formats
Description
Edgar Award Finalist: A comical crime caper “filled with action and imagination” (The New York Times Book Review).
John Dortmunder leaves jail with ten dollars, a train ticket, and nothing to make money on but his good name. Thankfully, his reputation goes far. No one plans a caper better than Dortmunder. His friend Kelp picks him up in a stolen Cadillac and drives him away from Sing-Sing, telling a story of a...
John Dortmunder leaves jail with ten dollars, a train ticket, and nothing to make money on but his good name. Thankfully, his reputation goes far. No one plans a caper better than Dortmunder. His friend Kelp picks him up in a stolen Cadillac and drives him away from Sing-Sing, telling a story of a...
14) Bank shot
Author
Series
Dortmunder novels volume 2
Language
English
Formats
Description
A crew of thieves hopes to hijack a mobile home full of money in this crime caper from “the funniest man in the world” (The Washington Post).
John Dortmunder has been working an encyclopedia-selling scam while waiting for his next big heist. Unfortunately, his latest mark seems to be wise to the con, and he has to cut his sales pitch short and make a quick escape.
But opportunity awaits: Main Street...
John Dortmunder has been working an encyclopedia-selling scam while waiting for his next big heist. Unfortunately, his latest mark seems to be wise to the con, and he has to cut his sales pitch short and make a quick escape.
But opportunity awaits: Main Street...
15) Jimmy the kid
Author
Series
Dortmunder novels volume 3
Publisher
M. Evans
Pub. Date
c1974
Language
English
Description
Taking cues from a pulp novel, Dortmunder arranges a kidnapping Kelp has a plan, and John Dortmunder knows that means trouble. His friend Kelp is a jinx, and his schemes, no matter how well intentioned, tend to spiral quickly out of control. But this one, Kelp swears, is airtight. He read it in a book. In county lock-up for a traffic charge, Kelp came across a library of trashy novels by an author named Richard Stark. The hero is a thief named...
16) Good behavior
Author
Series
Dortmunder novels volume 6
Publisher
Mysterious Press
Pub. Date
c1985
Language
English
Description
Dortmunder agrees to do a dangerous favor for a gang of nuns It was supposed to be a simple caviar heist. Dortmunder is almost in the building when the alarm sounds, forcing him up the fire escape and onto the roof. He leaps onto the next building, smashing his ankle and landing in the den of the worst kind of creature he can imagine: nuns. Although decades removed from his Catholic orphanage, Dortmunder still trembles before the sisters' habits....
17) Dancing Aztecs
Author
Publisher
M. Evans
Pub. Date
c1976
Language
English
Description
When sixteen copies of a famous Aztec statue arrive in New York, men will die to find out which one is the real thing A small South American republic has decided to capitalize on its national symbol: a prized gold statue of a dancing Aztec priest. The president asks a sculptor to make sixteen copies of it for sale abroad. The sculptor replaces the original with one of his fakes, and ships the real one to New York City for an under-the-table sale to...
18) Why me
Author
Series
Dortmunder novels volume 5
Publisher
Viking
Pub. Date
1983
Language
English
Description
John Dortmunder, professional thief, went out to rob a pawn shop and just happened to pick up the world's most valuable ruby, which just happened to have been heisted (by somebody else) hours before. And while the rest of the world goes ga-ga, Dortmunder doesn't even know he has the Byzantine Fire until it's too late. But now everyone from bomb-toting terrorists to Chief of Detectives Francis Mologna, from the Turkish charge d'affaires to the guys...
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Series
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English
Formats
Description
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...
20) Memory
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Series
Language
English
Formats
Description
"Hospitalized after a liaison with another man's wife ends in violence, Paul Cole has just one goal: to rebuild his shattered life. But with his memory damaged, the police hounding him, and no way even to get home, Paul's facing steep odds--and a bleak fate if he fails."--P. [4] of cover