Originally published in 1962 as The Hunter by Richard Stark, this edition is titled Point Blank and published in 1986 and features on the cover a stylised still of Lee Marvin from the 1967 film Point Blank.
Donald E Westlake used several pen-names and Richard Stark was one of his most popular – mainly thanks to the amoral Parker, a man without much of a conscience.
The style is omniscient so we don’t get into the soul of Parker or any of the characters. It’s cold, stark (!) and unrelenting narrative throughout. Deceptively simple to read, but cleverly presented.
Parker is out for revenge. His one-time partner Mal Resnick double-crossed him after a heist, aided by Parker’s wife, Lynn. They left him for dead in a burning building. Slowly and methodically, Parker tracks down his wife: ‘Her face was no longer expressionless. Now it was ravaged. It was as though invisible weights were sewn to her cheeks, dragging the whole face down’ (p16),
On his trail of revenge Parker breaks into room 361. Donald E Westlake’s novel 361 was published the year after his pseudonymous The Hunter.
Mal Resnick is aware that Parker has survived and attempts to silence his ex-accomplice by using heavies from the gambling syndicate known as The Outfit. All parker wants is his fair share of the heist’s loot. The Outfit isn’t playing that game so Parker takes on The Outfit as well...
Grim, fast-paced, and before the end there’s a grudging admiration for this Parker. He’s not infallible, which brings a smile, but in the end, he gets what he wants.
Editorial comment:
‘... he came to the grocery. BODEGA, it called itself, Spanish for grocery’ (p89). Sure, in the US it goes by that name and purpose; but in Spain a bodega is a wine shop or wine cellar. So it’s not ‘Spanish for grocery’.
‘He knocked the glass over the air conditioner out and...’ (p109). It would read better like this, maybe: ‘He knocked out the glass over the air conditioner and...’
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