| Can I Come Look At These Items? | | This online store is in association with Amazon.com, so these great, high-qualiy products will come from their warehouse or from other partners. Thanks for shopping! |
|
|
|
The Man with the Getaway Face: A Parker Novel (Parker Novels) | 
 enlarge | Author: Richard Stark
Publisher: University Of Chicago Press
Category: Book
List Price: $14.00
Buy New: $8.76
You Save: $5.24 (37%)
New (26) Used (10) from $6.50
Avg. Customer Rating:  8 reviews
Sales Rank: 80300
Media: Paperback
Edition: Reprint
Number Of Items: 1
Pages: 224
Shipping Weight (lbs): 1.6
Dimensions (in): 7.9 x 5.2 x 0.5
ISBN: 0226771008
Dewey Decimal Number: 813.54
EAN: 9780226771007
ASIN: 0226771008
Publication Date: September 1, 2008
Availability: Usually ships in 1-2 business days
Shipping: Expedited shipping available
Shipping: International shipping available
Condition: INTERNATIONL SHIPPING!!! SHIPS from 5 locations based on your Zip Code and availability! (PA TN IN OR SC) *-* Gift Quality *-* Orders Processed Immediately! - We get your book to you Very Quickly!
|
| Also Available In:
|
| Similar Items:
|
| Editorial Reviews:
Product Description
You probably haven’t ever noticed them. But they’ve noticed you. They notice everything. That’s their job. Sitting quietly in a nondescript car outside a bank making note of the tellers’ work habits, the positions of the security guards. Lagging a few car lengths behind the Brinks truck on its daily rounds. Surreptitiously jiggling the handle of an unmarked service door at the racetrack.
They’re thieves. Heisters, to be precise. They’re pros, and Parker is far and away the best of them. If you’re planning a job, you want him in. Tough, smart, hardworking, and relentlessly focused on his trade, he is the heister’s heister, the robber’s robber, the heavy’s heavy. You don’t want to cross him, and you don’t want to get in his way, because he’ll stop at nothing to get what he’s after.
Parker, the ruthless antihero of Richard Stark’s eponymous mystery novels, is one of the most unforgettable characters in hardboiled noir. Lauded by critics for his taut realism, unapologetic amorality, and razor-sharp prose-style—and adored by fans who turn each intoxicating page with increasing urgency—Stark is a master of crime writing, his books as influential as any in the genre. The University of Chicago Press has embarked on a project to return the early volumes of this series to print for a new generation of readers to discover—and become addicted to. Parker goes under the knife in The Man with the Getaway Face, changing his face to escape the mob and a contract on his life. Along the way he scores his biggest heist yet: an armored car in New Jersey, stuffed with cash.
“Westlake knows precisely how to grab a reader, draw him or her into the story, and then slowly tighten his grip until escape is impossible.”—Washington Post Book World
“Elmore Leonard wouldn’t write what he does if Stark hadn’t been there before. And Quentin Tarantino wouldn’t write what he does without Leonard. . . . Old master that he is, Stark does all of them one better.”—Los Angeles Times
“Donald Westlake’s Parker novels are among the small number of books I read over and over. Forget all that crap you’ve been telling yourself about War and Peace and Proust—these are the books you’ll want on that desert island.”—Lawrence Block
|
| Customer Reviews: Read 3 more reviews...
 Parker is Back! September 21, 2008
The Man with the Getaway Face has the most intrequing name among all the Parker novels, but readers expecting the same fast pace and brutal goings on from Parker's first outing in The Hunter (Payback/Point Blank) will be a little dissapointed.
The first part of the story deals with Parker recovering from a face lift to hide his identitiy from the Outfit, who he severly angered in the last book, but then the stroy shifts into low gear to show how Parker and his cohorts go about setting up and then executing a heist; sort of like a criminal procedural.
The set up in this case is a mundane robbing of an armored truck. It's very small time for a professional robber like Parker, but his desperate need for cash after spending time on the run from the mob forces him to follow through with the job despite the small haul and partners obviously bent on crossing him and absconding with the loot at the first opportunity.
Richard Stark's writing is still sharp and to the point, even though he spends a little too much time describing Highway routes and such, but there is a lot to like about this second book in the series: and de does end the story with a bang. I paticularly like how each of the early novels ends with a cliff hanger leading to the next.
My one complaint about this new edition is the cover. This University of Chicago edition is very badly designed. We have a nifty silloghette of a hand gun on the cover, but a kitchen sink and wall mirror? This is college sophmore graphic design quality stuff. I hope that future covers from this publisher are much better than this.
 Snoozefest October 25, 2004
3 out of 7 found this review helpful
Huh? Did we all read the same book? I rarely do reviews on books that I didn't like, but I'll make an exception in this case. I've enjoyed many of Stark's books....really enjoy Parker's escapades and no nonsense way, but I think he kind of slept through this one. This is a very short read about one heist. The reader is forced to read through every little detail about the job, including road directions that you could actually follow, directions that are often repeated. Details are important to flesh out mission impossible style plots, but this is a very basic armored car take-down at an out of the way cafe. The adjoining plot has more potential, but never really builds up any suspense or momentum. There is a daily bathroom break for someone Parker has "on ice", and that's real exciting too. This is a short story stretched out to novel proportions. Very disappointing..........had to force myself to finish it. Won't stop reading Stark, but will research future purchases better.
 Great follow up January 13, 2003
2 out of 5 found this review helpful
You don't need to read the predcessor of this book to enjoy it, but you might as well. This is book is great from start to finish. It is thoroughly enjoyable.
No-Nonsense Criminal May 31, 2002
8 out of 9 found this review helpful
Most people who have just had their face reconstructed would be inclined to go through a period of mourning as they lament the loss of their familiar appearance. Not so with Parker. Apart from a quick glance in the mirror to make sure he looked different, he is completely unaffected.This reaction probably best sums up this mysterious and dark character. He always prefers to take the most prudent action rather than be ruled by his emotions, giving him a cold, calculating persona. But these same qualities also make him very efficient and strangely likable. After receiving his new appearance, Parker goes straight back to work in planning an armoured truck heist. He has some misgivings about the job because it involves someone he has never worked with before, but this is just another contingency for him to plan around. Indeed, it appears that Parker has been built with no reverse gear installed. Once a course of action has been planned, it's full steam ahead and as obstacles rise up, as they inevitably do in this caper, he deals with them head on, scarcely breaking stride. This is the second Parker book, following his appearance in The Hunter and is a thoroughly enjoyable story. The no-nonsense attitude of Parker, whether it's going ahead with a plan or casually shooting someone in the ankle makes for very entertaining, if a little cold-blooded, reading.
Making a buck in the early '60s March 17, 2002
8 out of 8 found this review helpful
Donald Westlake writes of Dortmunder, a bumbling petty criminal it's really hard to like. Then as Richard Stark he gives us Parker, a much more competent crook who will kill when he has to, and surprisingly or not, a much more likeable character.It was written in 1963 when the mob was "The Outfit", Exxon was still Esso and you took the ferry to Brooklyn, not the Verrazano Narrows Bridge. Parker gets a new face from Dr. Adler, a plastic surgeon in Nebraska who was a pre 50s Commie, then goes back to New Jersey for an armored car heist. Skim and Elma, Skim's overbearing waitress girlfriend, set up the heist, develop an unworkable plan that Parker fixes and set up a doublecross that Parker anticipates. All would be fine except Dr. Adler has been killed, and a guy named Stubbs is sent to find the killer. The interaction between Parker and Stubbs and their search for a swindler named Wallenbaugh, now Wells, take up the rest of the story. Parker's reasons for getting to Wells and going back to Nebraska to square things come from logic only his mind could concoct, but it makes for a fun adventure.
|
|
|
| |
News 
