tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5448581132479481740.post907208801657551518..comments2024-03-25T11:29:25.356-04:00Comments on Existential Ennui: Parker Progress Report: Backflash (1998, Parker #18) by Richard Stark, alias Donald E. WestlakeNick Jones (Louis XIV, the Sun King)http://www.blogger.com/profile/17716508525331235684noreply@blogger.comBlogger7125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5448581132479481740.post-19137960660062921642013-01-12T09:57:59.740-05:002013-01-12T09:57:59.740-05:00This is my favorite Parker of the later run. I lo...This is my favorite Parker of the later run. I love the heist and the set-up (riverboat casino), and I enjoy all the old-school characters, particularly Carlow and Wycza. Noelle is a great feminine heister that gives the novel a little different spin. <br /><br />Backflash is definitely in my top ten Parker novels. I've read all 24 novels in order in the last year, intermingled with Dortmunders. That was quite an experience.<br /><br />I agree with other comments stating that the next in line (Flashfire) is one of the weaker Parker novels, but the tagline on that novel "this way you have an always" is one of the best in the series.GArizonanoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5448581132479481740.post-27138816525878973752013-01-12T07:43:14.102-05:002013-01-12T07:43:14.102-05:00My express intention is to watch this movie on a b...My express intention is to watch this movie on a bootleg DVD. It seems fitting, somehow. So when and if I locate one, probably down in Chinatown, or maybe Harlem (damn Bloomberg, cracking down on everything), I can just as easily get two copies as one. Let me know if you're interested. For all I know, street vendors are selling them right now. Contrary to popular myth, bootlegs do not come from guys sneaking shoulder-mounted cameras into movie theaters anymore, so I'm curious to see if I can see this movie before all the people who actually want to see it see it. :)Chrishttps://www.blogger.com/profile/00271250698430923736noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5448581132479481740.post-935248002259445482013-01-12T07:28:01.159-05:002013-01-12T07:28:01.159-05:00Chris: good job you don't charge by the word; ...Chris: good job you don't charge by the word; I'd owe you at least £3.50 or so by now. (Ba-dum tish!)<br /><br />George: It is indeed – I mentioned that at the bottom of the post, but ta for emphasizing. Sadly, it looks like it's not actually out here in the UK until March. Grr.Nick Jones (Louis XIV, the Sun King)https://www.blogger.com/profile/17716508525331235684noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5448581132479481740.post-67586955661916326462013-01-11T20:44:38.283-05:002013-01-11T20:44:38.283-05:00The next Parker novel, FLASHFIRE, is the basis of ...The next Parker novel, FLASHFIRE, is the basis of the PARKER movie opening on January 25th.Georgehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/04546161337366365635noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5448581132479481740.post-54797505278440034192013-01-11T13:55:38.763-05:002013-01-11T13:55:38.763-05:00I have a blog--not cultural in nature, exactly--an...I have a blog--not cultural in nature, exactly--and I hardly ever update it. The world's greatest procrastinator. Motivation is the problem, and I'm looking for the answer. In the meantime, it's not like I charge by the word. ;)Chrishttps://www.blogger.com/profile/00271250698430923736noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5448581132479481740.post-35224552120380903272013-01-11T12:40:25.959-05:002013-01-11T12:40:25.959-05:00Timely indeed – it's almost like I planned it,...Timely indeed – it's almost like I planned it, innit? Also – Chris, mate: you really need to set your own blog up!Nick Jones (Louis XIV, the Sun King)https://www.blogger.com/profile/17716508525331235684noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5448581132479481740.post-56396890022618568692013-01-11T10:20:39.172-05:002013-01-11T10:20:39.172-05:00I live right by the Hudson River, and while we don...I live right by the Hudson River, and while we don't have any floating casinos to my knowledge (we have some brick & mortar ones, times having changed), Westlake really does capture the setting perfectly. Even in Manhattan, much of the riverfront is a kind of no man's land, where you m might find almost anything--a dead body (just this past Tuesday, ten minutes from where I live, though I didn't find it), somebody's private fishing pier nailed together out of found lumber, and I'm sure there have been pot farms. Also you will occasionally find me and my dog, walking alongside the railroad tracks. They keep threatening to clean it up, and they just might do it one of these days. But something tells me it'll always be no man's land. <br /><br />I do like this one a lot--it harks back a bit to "The Score", with the finger for this heist having his own personal score to settle that he doesn't want Parker to know about, and he thinks he can use Parker. <br /><br />The antagonist is a lot less formidable than George Liss, and Parker's only real enemy is lack of information and simple fatigue (all that driving). It has Parker at one point in a situation I really don't like--you know how in the classic hardboiled PI story, the tough-as-nails cagey hero gets knocked out from behind? Well, that doesn't happen much to Parker, but it happens here. But hey, twice in 24 novels isn't such a bad record. I think it happens to Mike Hammer in every single book, but I'd have to actually read them to find that out. <br /><br />I kind of wondered if Dan and Noelle were going to become an item, given the obvious attraction between them, but I guess we'll never know. Maybe Noelle figured it's not a good idea to play with the people you work with, having already made that mistake once. Or maybe it was just harmless workplace flirtation. <br /><br />The heisters are really likable in this one--Dan, in particular, shows his compassionate side, such as it is. I don't think it's really about how 'hard' or 'soft' they are--it's about the situation. The Stark heisters aren't mindless killers--they don't use more violence than they have to. It's just bad policy. It's sloppy, and unworkmanlike. If you can avoid killing, you do. That's why Parker likes working with these people. People who enjoy killing are trouble. <br /><br />Ordinary law-abiding people do things just as cold, and colder, all the damn time--good friend of mine, older man, died in a lousy nursing home last year because his only sister wouldn't lift a finger to get him out, even for Thanksgiving dinner--just concentrated on disposing of his personal items as quickly as possible, making sure all the proper forms were filled out--when she called to tell me he was dead, she told me "we loved him, but we didn't like him." BRRRRR. A bullet in the eye would have been much quicker. <br /><br />What made Parker come across as particularly 'hard' to me in this book was his slapping a woman hard across the face with one of those big veiny hands of his (which you will recall we were told when we first met him were made for slapping). She's not badly hurt, but she just can't believe this has happened to her. Her entire self-image collapses before our eyes. <br /><br />Now we are not supposed to like this woman at all, she's a bit of a petty tyrant in her world, though we learn she has her reasons (as do all nasty people), but it's still shocking, given the relatively modern era this book is set in. It's supposed to be. Westlake is reminding us how the terms of power can change when the situation changes, and how it's a mistake for anyone to assume he or she is going to be powerful in any situation. Power is an illusion, always, unless it comes from inside of you. For most of us, power comes only from our position in life, and that, sad to say, is never assured--for anybody. <br /><br />Be interesting to read your next progress report. Timely.Chrishttps://www.blogger.com/profile/00271250698430923736noreply@blogger.com