Tribute to Donald E. Westlake

In 2008 Donald E. Westlake was given the Gumshoe Award for Lifetime Achievement.

Written by Cameron Hughes

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. Perhaps best known for pioneering the comic caper novel with the John Dortmunder books, he also created one of the most original -- and ruthless -- criminal protagonists in the character of Parker (featured in a series of books written under the alias Richard Stark).

Looking at most criminal-as-protagonist novels, we can detect a sliver of humanity in their characters. Although the crimes depicted might be reprehensible, there is a justification given for them. They're done for a sick relative or perhaps to support a child. There is usually something to redeem the protagonist, to counteract the heinous nature of his crimes. But not Parker. He's motivated solely by greed and will let nothing get in the way of a score. He's a sociopath and a killer with few, if any, redeeming qualities. It's a brilliant series precisely because it's so inhuman.

The character of John Dortmunder is in much the same spirit as Parker. The Hot Rock started life as a Parker novel, but Westlake couldn't make it work, as the thief kept running into obstacle after obstacle. Frustrated, Westlake put the manuscript away, only to return to it years later with the realization that it was actually a comedy.

So Parker transformed into Dortmunder. Westlake has said he thinks of Dortmunder as the more realistic of the two, as he and his gang run into problems that could happen to anyone. Dortmunder and the people he works with are as smart and talented as Parker and his gang -- they just have really bad luck, usually with hilarious results. In many ways the humor of the Dortmunder novels only serves to underscore their hardboiled nature, making them even darker than the Parker books.

As good as the series books are, one of Westlake's best novels was a standalone. The Ax is the story of a middle-aged Midwestern man who gets laid off at the paper mill. Unable to find another job, and with a mortgage and a kid in college, he gets desperate and does, for him, the rational thing: he runs a fake advertisement for a job similar to his, and systematically bumps off whomever replies, thus eliminating the competition.

Although The Ax is darkly humorous, there is a real understanding of humanity, twisted as it is, behind it. The protagonist's actions are monstrous, but it's either that or he loses everything. As Westlake develops the character, we can see that, in his mind at least, he has no choice. The Coen brothers wish they could come up with a story half as good as The Ax.

Donald E. Westlake is one of those rare crime writers that can do it all. He's a brilliant plotter, constructing deliciously twisted worlds filled with both comedy and tragedy. His ear for dialogue is excellent and he has a gift for writing readable, flowing narrative. Best of all, Westlake nails character like few others, making every person he writes about unique, human and always interesting, even if he's been writing about them for decades.

At 74, he's still producing great works, like last year's Dortmunder caper What's So Funny? and this year's Parker novel Dirty Money. He's won all the awards, including the Shamus and the Edgar (three times, a number matched only by Joe Gores). He was named a Grandmaster by the Mystery Writers of America, and was nominated for an Oscar for adapting Jim Thompson's The Grifters for the big screen.

Westlake even wrote a horror movie, 1987's cult classic The Stepfather, about a man who marries into a family, intending to be Ward Cleaver, but when they don't measure up decides to kill them all instead.

There's an old argument about who's the better writer, Westlake or Stark. (I'm a Westlake man, while Montgomery prefers Stark). But no matter which horse you take in that race, Donald Westlake is a true treasure, a writer more than worth discovering. And that is why Mystery Ink is proud to present him with the Gumshoe Award for Lifetime Achievement.

Cameron Hughes reviews crime fiction for January Magazine and CHUD.

Gumshoe Awards 2008

The 7th Annual Gumshoe Awards are given by Mystery Ink to recognize the best achievements in crime fiction. This year's nominees were chosen from books first published in the United States in 2007.

Best Mystery:

James Lee Burke - The Tin Roof Blowdown (Simon & Schuster)

The Nominees:

John Connolly - The Unquiet (Atria)
Ariana Franklin - Mistress of the Art of Death (Putnam)
Charlie Huston - The Shotgun Rule (Ballantine)
Laura Lippman - What the Dead Know (William Morrow)

Best Thriller:

Robert Crais - The Watchman (Simon & Schuster)

The Nominees:

Joseph Finder - Power Play (St. Martin's Press)
Michael Gruber - The Book of Air and Shadows (William Morrow)
Richard K. Morgan - Thirteen (Del Rey)
Lee Child - Bad Luck and Trouble (Delacorte)

Best First Novel:

Sean Chercover - Big City, Bad Blood (William Morrow)

The Nominees:

Philip Hawley, Jr. - Stigma (Harper)
Lisa Lutz - The Spellman Files (Simon & Schuster)
Craig McDonald - Head Games (Bleak House Books)
Nick Stone - Mr. Clarinet (HarperCollins)

Lifetime Achievement:

Donald E. Westlake

Donald E. Westlake is one of the most prolific authors in the crime genre, having written books of nearly every conceivable type, ranging from comic capers to thrillers to noir. He's written private eye novels, cop novels, historical novels, even erotic novels. More impressively, most of them are pretty damn good, and some of them are great. For maintaining a tradition of writing excellence for nearly 50 years, Westlake is a most deserving winner of the award for Lifetime Achievement. (Read the tribute essay to Donald E. Westlake.)

Best Crime Fiction Website:

The Thrilling Detective Web Site
http://www.thrillingdetective.com

Edited by Kevin Burton Smith, The Thrilling Detective Web Site has been a comprehensive resource on private eye fiction, and the crime genre more generally, for over a decade. A one-stop destination with a wealth of information, The Thrilling Detective includes author and book guides, reviews, news, information on film and TV, original fiction and more. It is an essential guide for fans of PI novels or anyone looking to learn more about detective fiction.

Gumshoe Awards 2008 Nominations

The Gumshoe Awards are given by Mystery Ink each year to recognize the best achievements in the world of crime fiction. The nominated books were chosen from those published for the first time in the United States in 2007. The winners will be announced on April 21, 2008.

The nominees are:

BEST MYSTERY

James Lee Burke - Tin Roof Blowdown (Simon & Schuster)
John Connolly - The Unquiet (Atria)
Ariana Franklin - Mistress of the Art of Death (Putnam)
Charlie Huston - The Shotgun Rule (Ballantine)
Laura Lippman - What the Dead Know (William Morrow)

BEST THRILLER

Lee Child - Bad Luck and Trouble (Delacorte)
Robert Crais - The Watchman (Simon & Schuster)
Joseph Finder - Power Play (St. Martin's Press)
Michael Gruber - The Book of Air and Shadows (William Morrow)
Richard K. Morgan - Thirteen (Del Rey)

BEST FIRST NOVEL

Sean Chercover - Big City, Bad Blood (William Morrow)
Philip Hawley, Jr. - Stigma (Harper)
Lisa Lutz - The Spellman Files (Simon & Schuster)
Craig McDonald - Head Games (Bleak House Books)
Nick Stone - Mr. Clarinet (HarperCollins)

Still to be announced is the recipient of the Lifetime Achievement Award, which will be presented at the same time as the other winners.

Congratulations to all the nominees!

Gumshoe Awards 2007

The 6th Annual Gumshoe Awards are given by Mystery Ink to recognize the best achievements in crime fiction. This year's nominees were chosen from books first published in the United States in 2006.

Best Mystery:

Julia Spencer-Fleming - All Mortal Flesh

The Nominees:

Ace Atkins - White Shadow
Ariana Franklin - City of Shadows
George Pelecanos - The Night Gardener
Joseph Wambaugh - Hollywood Station

Best Thriller:

Robert Ferrigno - Prayers for the Assassin

The Nominees:

Lee Child - The Hard Way
Barry Eisler - The Last Assassin
William Lashner - Marked Man
M.J. Rose - The Venus Fix

Best European Crime Novel:

Karin Fossum - When the Devil Holds the Candle

The Nominees:

Ken Bruen - The Dramatist
Gianrico Carofiglio - A Walk in the Dark
Philippe Claudel - By a Slow River
Barbara Vine - The Minotaur

Best First Novel:

John Hart - The King of Lies

The Nominees:

Dave Case - Out of Cabrini
James Church - A Corpse in the Koryo
Thomas Lakeman - The Shadow Catchers
Cornelia Read - A Field of Darkness

Lifetime Achievement:

Robert B. Parker

Robert B. Parker revolutionized the modern detective novel, helping to bridge the gap between the classic Hammett-Chandler-Macdonald tradition and the contemporary stories of Block, Grafton and Lehane. His creation of Spenser, the quintessential private eye, will live on long after his contemporaries have faded into obscurity. (Read the tribute essay to Robert B. Parker.)

Best Crime Fiction Website:

Demolition Magazine
http://www.demolitionmag.com

Edited by Bryon Quertermous and David White, Demolition Magazine is one of the best of the new wave of web-only magazines dedicated to publishing short crime fiction. With stories by such talented writers as Victor Gischler, Mike Maclean, Patricia Abbott and more, Demolition has quickly distinguished itself as a fresh new voice in crime fiction, and a publication worth noticing.

Tribute to Robert B. Parker

In 2007 Robert B. Parker was given the Gumshoe Award for Lifetime Achievement.

Written by Gerald So

Not until the summer of my first year in college did I realize how much reading it would take to be a writer. I picked up The Godwulf Manuscript because I recalled TV's Spenser: For Hire was "based on characters created by Robert B. Parker." I was most interested in reading about Hawk, the amoral enforcer vividly portrayed by Avery Brooks, but by the end of the novel I didn't mind that he hadn't appeared at all. By the end of that summer, I had read the first eighteen Spenser novels at the pace of three-a-week.

Parker showed me that a single character could be a thinker, a fighter, a lover, a gourmet cook, and seem no less real. He showed me that the same few words could convey humor, suspense, and literary significance.

Born September 17, 1932 and raised in Massachusetts, Robert Brown Parker attended Colby College in Waterville, Maine where he began dating his future wife Joan Hall. Parker served with the U.S. Army in Korea from 1954-56 and worked in tech writing and advertising before completing his Ph.D. in 1970. His dissertation traced the classic hero from the Western frontier to the urban landscapes of Hammett, Chandler, and Macdonald.

Spenser debuted in 1973 as a tribute to Chandler's Philip Marlowe, but unlike the solitary brooding Marlowe, Spenser is basically content, with a circle of friends that widens as the series goes on. While these friends (most notably Dr. Susan Silverman and Hawk) keep Spenser grounded, they also increase the relevance of Parker's work. He can tell a tight hardboiled tale and do a little social commentary on the side.

In the late 1980s, at the height of Spenser's popularity, Parker was hired by the Chandler estate to complete the last Marlowe novel, Poodle Springs, and to write a sequel to The Big Sleep. Within the past decade, Parker has introduced series protagonists Chief Jesse Stone (Night Passage) and female P.I. Sunny Randall (Family Honor). He has also written a handful of Westerns, screenplays, and out this month, the teen novel Edenville Owls.

Parker makes no secret that his surge in productivity was motivated by money. Some criticize his businesslike attitude, but the same attitude established him as a reliable favorite, and there's no denying his particular gifts -- thoughtful characters, efficient prose, and appealing voice -- remain intact.

Gerald So is Fiction Editor for The Thrilling Detective Web Site and moderator of Spenser's Sneakers.

Gumshoe Awards 2007 Nominations

The Gumshoe Awards are given by Mystery Ink each year to recognize the best achievements in the world of crime fiction. The nominated books were chosen from those published for the first time in the United States in 2006. The winners will be announced on May 1, 2007.

The nominees are:

Best Mystery:

Ace Atkins - White Shadow
Ariana Franklin - City of Shadows
George Pelecanos - The Night Gardener
Julia Spencer-Fleming - All Mortal Flesh
Joseph Wambaugh - Hollywood Station

Best Thriller:

Lee Child - The Hard Way
Barry Eisler - The Last Assassin
Robert Ferrigno - Prayers for the Assassin
William Lashner - Marked Man
M.J. Rose - The Venus Fix

Best European Crime Novel:

Ken Bruen - The Dramatist
Gianrico Carofiglio - A Walk in the Dark
Philippe Claudel - By a Slow River
Karin Fossum - When the Devil Holds the Candle
Barbara Vine - The Minotaur

Best First Novel:

Dave Case - Out of Cabrini
James Church - A Corpse in the Koryo
John Hart - King of Lies
Thomas Lakeman - The Shadow Catchers
Cornelia Read - A Field of Darkness

Still to be announced is the recipient of the Lifetime Achievement Award, which will be presented at the same time as the other winners. There will also be an award for Best Crime Fiction Website.

Gumshoe Awards 2006

Gumshoe Awards 2006

The 5th Annual Gumshoe Awards are given by Mystery Ink to recognize the best achievements in crime fiction. This year's nominees were chosen from books first published in the United States in 2005.

Best Mystery:

Laura Lippman - To the Power of Three  (William Morrow)

The Nominees:

As Dog Is My Witness by Jeffrey Cohen (Bancroft Press)
The James Deans by Reed Farrel Coleman (Plume)
Savage Garden by Denise Hamilton (Scribner)
The Wheelman by Duane Swierczynski (St. Martin's Minotaur)

Best Thriller:

Joseph Finder - Company Man (St. Martin's Press)

The Nominees:

The Lincoln Lawyer by Michael Connelly (Little, Brown)
The Only Suspect by Jonnie Jacobs (Kensington)
Falls the Shadow by William Lashner (William Morrow)
Creepers by David Morrell (CDS Books)

Best European Crime Novel:

Robert Wilson - The Vanished Hands (Harcourt)

The Nominees:

The Big Over Easy by Jasper Fforde (Viking)
Kiss Her Goodbye by Allan Guthrie (Hard Case Crime)
Jar City by Arnaldur Indridason (St. Martin's Minotaur)
Have Mercy on Us All by Fred Vargas (Simon & Schuster)

Best First Novel:

Randall Hicks - The Baby Game (Wordslinger Press)

The Nominees:

The Color of Law by Mark Gimenez (Doubleday)
Tilt-a-Whirl by Chris Grabenstein (Carroll & Graf)
Sacred Cows by Karen E. Olson (Mysterious Press)
Beneath a Panamanian Moon by David Terrenoire (St. Martin's Minotaur)

Lifetime Achievement:

Ed McBain

The late Ed McBain was the master of the police procedural and a true giant among crime writers. His death in 2005 robbed the world of one of the genre's true literary talents, but his work will live on in perpetuity. (See our tribute essay to Ed McBain.)

Best Crime Fiction Website:

CrimeSpot.net
www.crimespot.net

The brainchild of crime fiction enthusiast Graham Powell, CrimeSpot.net brings together the latest posts from the world of mystery-related blogs, all in one convenient site. Updated throughout the day, CrimeSpot.net allows readers to explore the breadth of the crime blogosphere with a minimum of time and energy.

Tribute to Ed McBain (Evan Hunter)

In 2006 Ed McBain (Evan Hunter) was given the Gumshoe Award for Lifetime Achievement.

Written by Fiona Walker

Known to most readers by the pseudonym Ed McBain, Evan Hunter was a true giant among crime writers, the author who all but created the genre of the police procedural. His death in 2005 may have deprived the world of one of the 20th century’s finest literary talents, but his multitude of works will live in perpetuity.

Born Salvatore Lombino in Manhattan in 1926, the man who would become Hunter served in the Navy from 1944-1946 and attended Hunter College on his return. After a series of jobs which included teaching and working for a literary agent, he legally changed his name to Evan Hunter in 1952, the year his first novel was published. Four years later, he published Cop Hater under the pseudonym Ed McBain, the first book in the series that would be his greatest triumph.

Featuring the policemen (and women) of New York City’s 87th Precinct, the series was a new concept in crime fiction: a series without any one hero, whose protagonist was not one person, but rather a group of men and women who would change and shift as the books went along. (Despite that, it’s clear that Steve Carella is, if not the singular hero, then at least the figurehead of the series.)

This year marks the fiftieth anniversary of the 87th Precinct series, which numbers fifty-five novels and several short stories. Throughout it, McBain chronicled not only the lives of a hugely likeable, dogged bunch of policemen, but the social evolution of a city, and through that an entire country.

McBain’s portrayal of the legwork of policing, forensic techniques and investigative procedures was groundbreaking. The series serves as a history of the shifts in policing methods, science and technique over the past half-century. It is this meticulous and compelling work that won him acclaim as the master of the police procedural.

Although the 87th Precinct series brought Hunter the most acclaim, he was celebrated in other areas as well. Under the McBain pseudonym, he also penned the Matthew Hope novels and the “Women in Jeopardy” thriller series. Under the name Evan Hunter, he published numerous literary novels and short stories, and wrote the screenplay for Alfred Hitchcock’s “The Birds,” along with several other films and teleplays.

Hunter was reportedly rankled at not being taken more seriously by the literary world, never quite getting the accolades he deserved, but his popularity and sizable fan-base are proof that he was a hit where it mattered most: with the reading public. Hunter considered it his job to entertain, and this he did, more than most writers could ever hope to do.

Hunter also won the respect and acclaim of his peers, winning both the Mystery Writers of America Grand Master Award and the Crime Writers’ Association Diamond Dagger, making him the first American writer to be awarded the latter.

It will come as no surprise if, in years to come, the crime fiction world is still reading Hunter (and McBain). His huge body of work deserves to stand the test of time, and will almost certainly do so.

Evan Hunter passed away in 2005, but his books will remain with us forever, a testament to an outstanding talent and much-loved man. The crime fiction community will always be poorer without him.

Gumshoe Awards 2006 Nominations

Gumshoe Awards 2006

The 5th Annual Gumshoe Awards are given by Mystery Ink to recognize the best achievements in crime fiction. This year's nominees were chosen from books first published in the United States in 2005.

The winners will be announced on May 9, 2006.

Best Mystery:

The Nominees:

As Dog Is My Witness by Jeffrey Cohen (Bancroft Press)
The James Deans by Reed Farrel Coleman (Plume)
Savage Garden by Denise Hamilton (Scribner)
To the Power of Three by Laura Lippman (William Morrow)
The Wheelman by Duane Swierczynski (St. Martin's Minotaur)

Best Thriller:

The Nominees:

The Lincoln Lawyer by Michael Connelly (Little, Brown)
Company Man by Joseph Finder (St. Martin's Press)
The Only Suspect by Jonnie Jacobs (Kensington)
Falls the Shadow by William Lashner (William Morrow)
Creepers by David Morrell (CDS Books)

Best European Crime Novel:

The Nominees:

The Big Over Easy by Jasper Fforde (Viking)
Kiss Her Goodbye by Allan Guthrie (Hard Case Crime)
Jar City by Arnaldur Indridason (St. Martin's Minotaur)
Have Mercy on Us All by Fred Vargas (Simon & Schuster)
The Vanished Hands by Robert Wilson (Harcourt)

Best First Novel:

The Nominees:

The Color of Law by Mark Gimenez (Doubleday)
Tilt-a-Whirl by Chris Grabenstein (Carroll & Graf)
The Baby Game by Randall Hicks (Wordslinger Press)
Sacred Cows by Karen E. Olson (Mysterious Press)
Beneath a Panamanian Moon by David Terrenoire (St. Martin's Minotaur)

Best Crime Fiction Website:

To be announced.

Lifetime Achievement:

To be announced.

Tribute to Dick Francis

In 2002 Dick Francis was given the Gumshoe Award for Lifetime Achievement.

Tribute by Yvette Banek

Sad to say, I spent most of my life oblivious to the work of Dick Francis. Oh, I'd heard his name bandied about over the years, and usually thought, disparagingly, "Horse racing...don't think I'd enjoy reading about that." But in 1996, when I finally succumbed, tempted by the Scottish Highlands setting and the artist protagonist of Francis' 35th(!) suspense novel To The Hilt, I immediately knew I'd struck gold.

I write this as an unabashed fan, having since made up for my late blooming status by reading all 39 works of fiction; most more than once. And as for that horse racing thing, I say this: Dick Francis books are about horse racing the way Hamlet is about Denmark. Think about it.

The son of a jockey, Dick Francis was born in 1920 in Lawrenny, South Wales. He served his country in the Royal Air Force during WWII, and afterwards began a successful career as a jockey, riding in the always dangerous British Steeplechase circuit. Upon retiring in 1957, he wrote his autobiography, The Sport of Queens - he'd ridden for the Queen Mother's stable - and began a second career as racing correspondent for the London Sunday Express. With the publication of his first fiction thriller, Dead Cert in 1962, he launched a third career that would ultimately bring him much deserved, worldwide acclaim.

Obviously, Dick Francis has lived an interesting life and we are fortunate he has chosen to share his observations, his talents, and his experience with us. Yet he never allows his own affection for his chosen sport to overwhelm his characters or the clarity of his storytelling. Having spent many years behind the scenes in an often cutthroat world, his writing is stripped of sugarcoating; his stories all the more imaginative for their grounding in a sometimes unfamiliar reality. As for the horses, most of Dick Francis' books have little to do with horses (except as window dressing) and everything to do with the eternal fight between good and evil.

There are authors who successfully hide behind their work. You rarely get a glimpse of them no matter how many of their books you read. And most would say, this is a good thing. No one wants to feel the hand of a specter lurking in the background, manipulating the characters, ready to step in when things go wrong. But that isn't what I mean. Not all writers wish to expose their true selves, but some just can't seem to help it. They are not mere storytellers. They possess a kind of inner light which illuminates their work.

Dick Francis, by word and deed, reveals himself always as a thoughtful, gentle, intelligent soul with a will of steel and a passion for storytelling. This aura touches almost everything he writes and is what I respond to most in his work. Dick Francis cannot be confused with any other writer. His imprint is unique. His heroes are incapable of being any less than their creator. Though known for their intriguing and often fascinating professions, their unruffled natures, their total self-reliance and often alarming ability to do the right thing, the Dick Francis hero is at heart an ordinary man who is capable, when challenged, of doing extraordinary things. This is the underlying theme of every Francis book.

Whether the tale is about the remarkable and enigmatic jockey Sid Halley (who appears in only three books, unfortunately), or a horse breeder, a pilot, an artist, an architect, a jeweler, a vintner, a writer, a photographer, a journalist, a veterinarian, a glass blower, even a toy maker, Dick Francis always gets it right. Though he can make us smile with wit so dry you don't dare strike a match, he can also break our hearts. He seems to understand the sheer banality of evil more clearly than just about any other writer in the genre. He never heralds, he anticipates. Dick Francis is the master of obfuscation, king of the lethal blow delivered quickly, viciously and without warning. When evil rears its ugly head, its appearance is made all the more dreadful by its ordinariness. This is the genius of Dick Francis.

After writing over 3 dozen bestselling works of fiction, winning three Edgar Awards (Forfeit in 1970, Whip Hand in 1981, and Come to Grief in 1996), and delighting millions of fans, Mystery Writers of America Grandmaster Sir Richard Stanley Francis seems finally to have hung up his writing crop. With the death of his adored wife Mary, his spiritual and literary helpmate, he has decided to call it a day. His last published book was 2001's Shattered. When I was a child, I often prayed my favorite writers would live forever. I now realize that they do; in every word they've ever written, in every imagination they've ever touched. Continued good health to you Sir Richard, and thank you from the bottom of my heart for having enriched our lives.