Specify Books Conducive To Drowned Hopes (Dortmunder #7)
| Original Title: | Drowned Hopes |
| ISBN: | 0446400068 (ISBN13: 9780446400060) |
| Edition Language: | English |
| Series: | Dortmunder #7 |
| Characters: | May Bellamy, John Dortmunder, Andy Kelp, Tom Jimson, Myrtle Street, Edna Street, Tiny Bulcher, Stan Murch |
Donald E. Westlake
Mass Market Paperback | Pages: 464 pages Rating: 4.13 | 1315 Users | 97 Reviews
Define Epithetical Books Drowned Hopes (Dortmunder #7)
| Title | : | Drowned Hopes (Dortmunder #7) |
| Author | : | Donald E. Westlake |
| Book Format | : | Mass Market Paperback |
| Book Edition | : | First Edition |
| Pages | : | Pages: 464 pages |
| Published | : | April 1st 1991 by Mysterious Press (first published 1990) |
| Categories | : | Mystery. Humor. Crime. Fiction |
Commentary To Books Drowned Hopes (Dortmunder #7)
For a series of criminal capers, Westlake’s Dortmunder novels unspool at their own comfortable pace. Readers just sit back and let the whole thing unravel in front of them. The same amusing characters – Andy Kelp, Stan Murch, et al – appear again and again, and it’s like being with friends (shady, criminal and sometimes incompetent friends, but friends nevertheless). That’s not to say that these books lack dramatic tension or suspense, as Westlake will happily take his readers to a point of real jeopardy. These are your friends after all, and you do care what happens to your friends.An old and very mean cellmate of Dortmunder’s emerges from prison with the tale of how his greatest ever hoard is now buried beneath the soil and water of a large reservoir. He enlists Dortmunder to help him recover it. If Dortmunder fails, the old cellmate will just blow up the reservoir and drown everybody below.
It’s a beautiful scenario of difficult operation versus greed (as well as responsibility to fellow man), and is perfect for Westlake’s laid-back comic set pieces. I’m not spoiling anything by saying that attempt after attempt goes wrong, so that by the end the reader really does empathise with how frazzled Dortmunder is. A particular highlight is the attendance of a low-taste wedding and then – in my favourite plot strand – the activities of the gang unwittingly costing the bridegroom his sanity.
It’s always tempting to compare these books to the work the same writer did under his Richard Stark non de plume, but they come from different directions. The Parker tales are a deadly cut-throat razor on a cold dawn, while the Dortmunder capers are a nice lie-in followed by a hot breakfast later that very same morning.
Rating Epithetical Books Drowned Hopes (Dortmunder #7)
Ratings: 4.13 From 1315 Users | 97 ReviewsWrite Up Epithetical Books Drowned Hopes (Dortmunder #7)
Funny Caper MysteryThe usual suspects are back once again proving crime really doesn't pay. Dortmund comes up with the plans, Andy Kelp gets the transportation, Stan Murch drives it and Murch's mom and May provide support. But when the pay off is fifty feet under water and a ruthless killer is involved, the result is bound to be chaos and mayhem and rib splitting laughs.
This may be my favorite of the Dortmunder novels (that I've read). Which is funny because while they all share the pessimistic worldview of Dortmunder himself, this was the first one where Westlake's side narratives painted a truly dark and misanthropic, if humorously done, picture of the world. Maybe because the antagonist of this book is so much darker then the ones in the other D. novels I've read? So, anyway, that tonal switch interested me. I also favor this book because it had a three
Worst in the series so far. The book is twice the length of some of the previous ones, and for no apparent reason some of the shortest have had much more elaborate plots. This one merely plods along, with very little cleverness or humour in the main plot (rather than in the asides), and the dialogues between Wally and his computer are simply painful.
This is my all time favourite book in the Dortmunder series. It has all the regulars, plus a series of side plots which follow other characters and their (sometimes incredibly tenuous) links to the current caper and those involved. Laugh out loud funny! I really enjoyed all the different character point of view chapters in which all the main characters and their capers are described by the supporting cast- you get a sense of how truly ridiculous Dortmunder's world is.
Dortmunder gets roped into a little job for an old cell mate in upstate New York which has everyone in the gang over their heads, literally. But, with this kind of problem, it's sink or swim. Can Dortmunder pull it off?
Apparently there is a whole series of "Dortmunder" books and this isn't the first. It's a mildly amusing crime caper novel, in which Dortmunder is the brains (allegedly) for the underwater salvage of a recently released psycho's spoils from an armed robbery. It would have been a lot better, though, if not for the computer geek and his computer. The book was published in 1990 and the PC was still pretty new-fangled (the first time I used one was only the year before). The computer geek as comedic
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