Watch Your Back!

Let us go, through certain half-deserted streets, the muttering retreats of restless nights in one-night cheap hotels and sawdust restaurants with oyster-shells; streets that follow like a tedious argument of insidious intent to lead you to an overwhelming question ... What rough beast is slouching toward the O.J. Bar & Grill? Why, who else but John Dortmunder, discount-rack mastermind and Louis Napoleon of Crime? On the first page of "Watch Your Back," Dortmunder enters the O.J. in a perfectly routine way to do what he routinely does, plan a crime. Tonight's proposed caper, though, evaporates before it can even start. (Routine, again, for even if Dortmunder should hear the mermaids singing, each to each, I do not think they will sing to him.) With no crime to plan, it hardly seems worthwhile to stay, so Dortmunder slouches home. But the next time he steps into the O.J., he meets something unthinkable--change! "What was going on? Was it a wake around here? Nobody wore a black armband, but the faces on the regulars were long enough. They, all of the them, men and the women's auxiliary, too, were hunched over their drinks with that thousand-yard stare that suggests therapy is no longer an option. In short, the place looked exactly like that section of the socialist realist mural where the workers have been utterly shafted by the plutocrats. Dortmunder looked up, half-expecting to see top hats and cigars in the gloom up there, but nothing." This disturbing discovery leads by a series of incremental steps including, but not limited to a sojourn at Club Med, an alimony exile, a bust-out, a fence transformed, a younger son attempting to achieve success in the family business, a cabal of ex-wives, a serial betrayer betrayed, and a big-money score with unforeseen result--an all-too routine thing for Dortmunder, alas--that lead the low-rent mastermind and his seedy associates ... to a couple of guys stealing a pig. All this, mind you, with an inevitability even Sophocles or Euripides might envy. And it's funny, too. I find myself reading quite a few mysteries these days; it beats measuring out my life with coffee spoons. Oh, they are satisfactory enough, not "Hamlet," nor are meant to be. The average practitioner of the mystery novel form is, well, average. Prose lying between the covers of most mysteries is deferential, glad to be of use, politic, cautious and meticulous; full of high sentence, but a bit obtuse; at times, indeed, almost ridiculous-- But occasionally there is a writer who can write, really write, someone who has mastered the tools of the profession, rhetoric, dialogue, plot development, pacing, characterization--in short, all the things banished from literary fiction during our lifetimes. Donald E. Westlake is just such a writer. In spades. For proof that Westlake is much more than just a journeyman wordsmith, consider how he puts these thoughts of a bright young man happily embarked on a new career: "I

Dortmunder and his gang of not very threatening (or competent) thieves is back, and the good news is that "Watch Your Back" is a welcome improvement over the rather flat "Road to Ruin". This time, the planned heist is a raid on an art-filled penthouse apartment whose owner is temporarily absent, hiding from an army of ex-wives. Like so many Dortmunder victims, he is so despicable that the reader cannot hope that he does get robbed. But, as usual, there are complications. In this case, the main complication is that the Dortmunder gang's favorite bar and meeting place has been taken over by the Mob and looks to become extinct in the near future, meaning that the gang may have to resort to holding planning sessions in Dortmunder's livining room, and nobody wants that. So, first, Dortmunder and his friends must find a way to thwart the Mob and save the bar. And in the end, everything comes together in a complex, not entirely expected, and satisfying conclusion. "Watch Your Back!" may not be quite the equal of "The Hot Rock" or "The Bank Shot", but it nonetheless is another funny romp on the wrong side of the law.

A fence and a thoroughly unpleasant human being, Arnie Albright sets the new John Dortmunder caper in motion. A man who "finds himself so disgusting, he shaves with his back to the mirror," Albright calls his sometime burglar associate Dortmunder immediately on his return from Club Med. His relatives, who were about to kill him on general principles, sent him there as an intervention to improve his personality. Predictably, Albright hated the place, particularly the sun and the ocean, but he did have the good fortune to meet someone even more dislikable than himself. Preston Fareweather is condemned to remain at Club Med indefinitely, avoiding his ex-wives' process servers and amusing himself tormenting the vacationing gold diggers. At home in his Manhattan penthouse apartment is a fabulous art collection, all but unguarded. Meanwhile, something bad is happening at the O.J. Bar and Grill, where Dortmunder and his confederates have always met in the back room to work out their jobs. The back room is now off limits and some New Jersey mobsters are hanging around ruining business. On purpose. The narrative, as wry and hilarious as ever, focuses primarily on Dortmunder, a man with two missions, burglary and saving the O.J. But frequent digressions encompass other points of view: Fareweather, his latest vacationing opportunist, the O.J. owners past and present, Dortmunder's usual cronies and a new one, a young eager beaver who promises to endow future capers with a puppyish sense of fun. And, as always, the writing is great; the characters' eccentricities organic rather than gimmicky, the dialogue snappy and economical, the plot tidily constructed to supply many fateful, funny, disastrous twists and leave not a single loose end. - Portsmouth Herald

Many years ago, Donald Westlake made himself a promise that he would never write two novels in a row starring his bad luck burglar, John Dortmunder. Well, now he's broken that promise with WATCH YOUR BACK! which follows on the heels of last year's Dortmunder tale THE ROAD TO RUIN. And it is great news for mystery fans that he did. Westlake, along with Ed McBain, Elmore Leonard and Lawrence Block, has rightfully earned a place as one of the greatest American mystery writers of all time. Author of more than 50 books and a Mystery Writers of America Grand Master, Westlake knows crime. His Parker novels, written under the pseudonym Richard Stark, are pure hard-boiled noir. His stand-alone novels, like THE AX and THE HOOK, are masterful literary works of darkness, desperation and suspense. Then there is John Dortmunder, described in a Westlake short story many years ago as "a guy who just keeps slipping the mind of Lady Luck." What delights fans of the series is not the crime, but the remarkable bad luck that follows Dortmunder and his crew of lovable rogues. Besides being funny and lighthearted, the Dortmunder series is the literary equivalent of the Hollywood "road trip" movies. We can't wait to go along with these guys and see how they pull off the perfect heist, which, of course, ends up being far from perfect in the end. WATCH YOUR BACK! is the 12th novel in the series and one of the best. Early on, we are reintroduced to Dortmunder's men. There is Stan Murch, socially responsible car thief who, since he is driving, will always pour salt into his beer to revive the head and limit his alcohol intake. Then there is Andy Kelp, the upbeat and easygoing lock man, able to breeze past any alarm or safe. And no Dortmunder story would be complete without Tiny, whose "body appeared to be the size and softness of a Hummer, in broad brown slacks and a green polo shirt, as though he was trying to disguise himself as a golf course." Tiny is needed for "heavy lifting" and in case anybody has to be "rolled off a roof." This time around the boys are given a sure thing by another series regular, Arnie Albright, the fence. Arnie is a recovering obnoxious person just back from rehab in Club Med, where he met an ever more obnoxious rich guy, Preston Fareweather. Fareweather is in exile at Club Med, hiding from numerous ex-wives seeking his fortune. Needing to avoid U.S. process servers and courts, Fareweather leaves his luxury penthouse apartment on New York's Fifth Avenue empty. And it just happens to be filled with priceless art. Could it be any simpler for a crew of professional thieves? But, alas, Lady Luck once again has other things on her mind when it comes to the dour and sober Dortmunder. When Dortmunder calls a meet to "get the string together" at their usual place, the backroom of the O.J. Bar and Grill on Amsterdam Avenue, he receives a bad shock when he discovers that another bunch of dangerous thieves --- mob guys from Tony Soprano's New Jersey

This is a very funny book. It's the latest installment in the series about John Dortmunder, who's misadventures in crime never cease to amuse. Summary, no spoilers: Arnie Albright is New York fence who comes up with the plan for the perfect crime. While at a Club Med, he meets billionaire and jerk extraordinaire, Preston Fareweather. He is mistreated by Fareweather (who isn't?), and decides to get revenge. Fareweather is hiding out from process servers who are trying to contact him at the behest of four angry ex-wives. He has not been to his New York apartment in over two years, and doesn't plan to return anytime soon. Arnie contacts his buddy, Dortmunder, and they decide to round up the usual gang, and burglarize Fareweather's apartment and steal his BMW....since he isn't around. As usual, with any Dortmunder scheme, anything and everything goes wrong. Enter New Jersey mobsters, mishaps at the OJ (Dortmunder's favorite bar), and the newest member of the gang, a naive but enthusiastic 19 year old named Justin. And of course the important lesson that timing is everything. This book is highly recommended. It's funny and satisfying, and you are left with a big smile on your face when you finish the last page. Westlake at his best.