Thu 19 Dec 2013
Reviewed by Allen J. Hubin: DONALD E. WESTLAKE – Drowned Hopes.
Posted by Steve under Bibliographies, Lists & Checklists , Characters , Reviews[2] Comments
Allen J. Hubin
DONALD E. WESTLAKE – Drowned Hopes. Mysterious Press, hardcover, 1990; paperback, 1991.
While it seems to me that Donald E. Westlake’s Dortmunder series began at its highest point with The Hot Rock in 1970, succeeding volumes have certainly been amusing. And now, with the seventh, Drowned Hopes, you can also add long. Four hundred and twenty-two pages long, in fact.
Tom Jimson turns up one day in John Dortmunder’s apartment. Rather surprisingly, since Jimson, one of nature’s nastiest creatures, was sentenced to seven consecutive life terms. But prison budgets in New York being what they are, here’s Tom, looking for help in retrieving $700,000 in armored car loot buried twenty years before.
On land which the state, in its wisdom, has turned into a reservoir, so the money is under three feet of earth and fifty feet of water. If John won’t help, Tom will simply dynamite the dam, killing a few thousand people, and retrieve the money from the reappearing turf.
It’s a matter of some indifference to Tom how the money is recovered, but John is of finer mettle and begins to plan furiously. There are several noteworthy things about Dortmunder’s plans: they are carefully, thoughtfully conceived, the details are painstakingly worked out, and they usually fail in spectacular ways.
Pleasant Drowned Hopes is, with chuckles and some poignancy, though it’s a little attenuated and gifted with the season’s least imaginative title.
Vol. 12, No. 4, Fall 1990.
The John Dortmunder series —
1. The Hot Rock (1970)
2. Bank Shot (1972)
3. Jimmy the Kid (1974)
4. Nobody’s Perfect (1977)
5. Why Me? (1983)
6. Good Behaviour (1987)
7. Drowned Hopes (1990)
8. Don’t Ask (1993)
9. What’s the Worst That Could Happen? (1996)
10. Bad News (2001)
11. The Road to Ruin (2004)
12. Watch Your Back! (2005)
13. What’s So Funny? (2007)
14. Get Real (2009)
Thieves’ Dozen (ss collection; 2004)
December 19th, 2013 at 12:42 pm
Not only the title, but the cover is also about as unimaginative as you can get. When an author is well-known (e.g. Sue Grafton) there’s no need for publishers to spend money on cover art to get their books to sell.
I seem to have lost track of this series after #9. The titles of #10 and higher are pretty much unfamiliar to me. That five-year gap between 9 and 10 was fatal, at least as far as I’m concerned.
It’s also hard to believe that the first book in the series came out in 1970. That’s a long time ago.
December 19th, 2013 at 3:48 pm
Much as I admire Westlake I wandered in and out of the series, read a few, move on, then come back later. Good Behavior was the last one I read.
That doesn’t mean I shouldn’t rectify the situation.
Somewhere along the line I became hypercritical, and if a book didn’t feel special or interest me I moved on. The Dortmunder’s are always clever, but at some point I wanted more. The series always seemed better for wading than immersing yourself in.