This Week's Travel Reading

His name is Parker. Don't ask if that's his last name--or his first, for that matter--because we don't know. It's all he's ever called. Even his woman, Claire, calls him by that name.

Except when he's working, which is whenever he needs money to get by. Then he uses various aliases. Charles Willis. Ronald Kasper. Edward Lynch.

Parker's job? He's a professional thief--or a "heister," to use the vernacular of the trade.

Parker is very good at his job, whether he's knocking over a bank, lifting some jewelry, snatching a payroll or stealing an armored car. He's tough. Determined. Agile of mind and body. And damned hard to kill.

His associates in these jobs, however, are not always so professional. Some get greedy. Others get stupid. And some decide it's a good idea to cross Parker.

For the record: It is not a good idea to cross Parker. He's just about the last person on this earth you want to cross. Because Parker will find you. And he will make you pay.

Donald Westlake (working under the non de plume Richard Stark) wrote 24 Parker novels--the first, The Hunter, first appeared in print 50 years ago in 1962; the last, Dirty Money was published in 2008, the year Westlake died. There was a substantial gap in there--there were no Parker novel's between 1974's Butcher's Moon and 1996's appropriately named Comeback--but the gap made no difference in quality. Westlake's novels move with a ruthless efficiency of narrative and character, making them perfect for my train rides to and from work.

So far, I've only read the novels Westlake wrote after the 20-plus-year gap (I'm on Nobody Runs Forever right now) and the two excellent graphic novel adaptations by Darwyn Cooke (The Hunter and The Outfit) that introduced me to Westlake's prose. However, after I finish Dirty Money, I'll backtrack--damn, that would have been a good title for a Parker novel--and read some of the older material.