I’ve promoted it on several occasions, and it’s linked in the sidebar, but it’s possible that some of you here aren’t familiar with The Westlake Review.
Fred Fitch (totally his real name) set out to read and review all of Donald Westlake’s novels, with the exception of pseudonymous sleaze titles. And as of shortly before the end of 2017, he has, along with a passel of Westlake’s nonfiction and short stories.
Fred’s style is very different from mine. While I typically start with a plot teaser and then write just a few paragraphs on the book, he goes for in-depth analysis of the characters, themes, and how everything fits into the larger Westlake canon. His pieces aren’t really book reviews, but essays on the books. As a general rule, it’s better if you’ve read the book before you’ve read the piece on it.
If you haven’t bookmarked The Westlake Review yet, you should. As with VWOP, the posts often don’t age much as the books we write about were published some time ago, so there is oodles of great reading material in the archives.
So if you haven’t checked out The Westlake Review, you should. If you have, go back over there and say congratulations!
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I suppose I might actually have to review some of the sleazes now–I’ve read a number of them.
They would not hold up to my usual level of analysis, but it would be interesting to see how Westlake’s mature style(s) developed while he was working on them.