One of Westlake's earliest novels, reissued by Hard Case Crime
Donald Edwin Westlake (born July 12, 1933, in Brooklyn, New York) is a prolific American writer and novelist, with over a hundred books to his credit. He specializes in crime fiction, especially comic capers with an occasional foray into science fiction. He is a three-time Edgar Award winner, one of only two writers (the other is Joe Gores) to win Edgars in three different categories (1968, Best Novel, God Save the Mark; 1990, Best Short Story, "Too Many Crooks"; 1991, Best Motion Picture Screenplay, The Grifters). In 1993, the Mystery Writers of America named Westlake a Grand Master, the highest honor bestowed by the society.
He has also been an occasional contributor to science fiction fanzines such as Xero.
Westlake attended Harpur College in Binghamton, New York, and left early. He spent two years in the United States Air Force, an experience that would later influence his fiction (several of his novels' protagonists, notably John Dortmunder and the protagonist of 361, are ex-military men). He is married to Abigail Westlake (also known as Abby Adams Westlake and Abby Adams), a writer of nonfiction (her two published books are An Uncommon Scold and The Gardener's Gripe Book). The couple lives in upstate New York. Abby Westlake is a well-regarded gardener and the Westlake garden is frequently opened for public viewing in the summer .
In addition to writing consistently under his own name, Westlake publishes under several pseudonyms. The best known continuing pseudonym is that of Richard Stark, which debuted in 1959 as a byline on several short stories published in Alfred Hitchcock's Mystery Magazine and other, similar publications. Then, from 1962-1974, 20 novels about the relentless and remorseless professional thief Parker and his accomplices appeared and were credited to Richard Stark. "Stark" was then inactive until 1997, when Westlake once again began writing and publishing Parker novels under Stark's name.
Other Westlake psuedonyms include
Currently, Westlake publishes both serious and comic novels under his own name, and Parker novels under Stark's name. No other pen-names are known to be currently used by Westlake, nor has he been known to have used any (other than Stark) since the "Samuel Holt" novels of the 1980s.
Donald Westlake is known for the great ingenuity of his plots and the audacity of his gimmicks. His writing and dialogue are lively. His main characters are fully rounded, believable, and clever. Westlake's most famous characters include the hard-boiled criminal Parker (appearing in fiction under the Richard Stark pseudonym) and Parker's comic flip-side John Dortmunder, the hard-luck criminal genius who originally began as Parker getting caught in a comic situation in the 1970 novel The Hot Rock.
Most of Donald Westlake's novels are set in New York City. In each of the Dortmunder novels, there is typically a detailed shortcut somewhere through the city.
Several of Westlake's novels have been made into motion pictures, including Point Blank in 1967 with Lee Marvin, The Hot Rock in 1972 with Robert Redford, Cops and Robbers (1973), The Outfit with Robert Duvall (1973), Bank Shot (1974) with George C. Scott, Jimmy the Kid (1979) with Gary Coleman, Why Me? (1990), Payback (1999), a second film made from the first Parker novel, with Mel Gibson, and What's the Worst That Could Happen? (2001) with Martin Lawrence. Costa-Gavras adapted The Ax for the European screen in 2005, to great critical and public acclaim. Entitled Le Couperet, the film takes place in France and Belgium rather than the novel's setting of New England.
Jean-Luc Godard's Made in USA (1966) was an extremely loose adaptation of "The Jugger." Neither the film's producer nor Godard purchased the rights to the novel, so Westlake successfully sued to prevent the film's commercial distribution in the United States.
Westlake is himself a screenwriter. His script for the 1990 film The Grifters, adapted from the novel by Jim Thompson, was nominated for an Academy Award. (Westlake the screenwriter adapted Jim Thompson's work in a straightforward manner, but Westlake the humourist satirized Thompson later that year in the Dortmunder novel Drowned Hopes, which features a character named "Tom Jimson" who is hard-boiled to the point of absurdity.) Westlake also wrote the original screenplay The Stepfather, the film of which was sufficiently popular to receive two sequels and a forthcoming remake (projects in which Westlake was not involved).
Westlake writing under Richard Stark pseudonym
