Thursday, January 01, 2009

Donald E. Westlake

The passing of Donald E. Westlake has already been widely noted (and blogged about), and nearly everyone has commented on his versatility as a writer. It's certainly true that he did fine work in a variety of genres. When talking about Westlake's work, people often mention the Parker novels he wrote as Richard Stark and the Dortmunder books and other comedies he wrote under his own name. Probably my favorites of Westlake's work, though, are the novels he wrote as Tucker Coe, about retired, disgraced cop Mitch Tobin, who functions as a reluctant and (if memory serves) unlicensed PI. These are bleak but wonderful books that really had an impact on me when I read them back in the Seventies. I may have to hunt them up and read some of them again. Rest in peace, Mr. Westlake.

4 comments:

Patrick Shawn Bagley said...

The Mitch Tobin series sounds like it's right up my alley. I'll have to look for the books.

By the way, "Jackpot's" comment is on pretty much every blog post about Westlake's passing that I've read tonight.

James Reasoner said...

Yeah, I highly recommend the Mitch Tobin series. There are some similarities to Block's Matt Scudder books, but the Tobins hit me harder for some reason.

Jackpot's comment, for those of you who didn't see it, was spam and has been deleted.

Gary Dobbs/Jack Martin said...

Yet another great passed on

Charles Gramlich said...

I was sorry to hear that. Lana told me last night.