Parker: The Hunter

There are few (if any) protagonists in the world of crime fiction as intriguing or as compelling as that of Richard Stark's Parker.  But it took nearly 30 years before I ever dipped into his workmanlike underworld.  The first books I ever read were those of John Grisham, Michael Crichton, and Stephen King.  Bestseller Boys.  Obsessing on them via magazine articles and interviews I would gather a collection of namedropped authors that had to be consumed.  Through King and his novel The Dark Half, I discovered Richard Stark, the pseudonym of crime writer Donald Westlake.  

I read a few short stories and his novel The Hot Rock, but found them to be a little too light for my horrorhound tastes of the time.  And despite the mid-90s resurrection of his Stark/Parker novels, they never made it onto my shelves.  Now, jump ahead a decade and in 2008 The University of Chicago Press started rereleasing the Parker books.  On a trip to Germany I read The Hunter, The Man With The Getaway Face, and The Outfit.  I was hooked on Parker.

A professional criminal who works a job "every year or so, payroll or armored car or bank."  All work, no play.  He doesn't kill unless you give him no choice.  He doesn't care about you.  He can be ruthless, he can be evil.  But he's always cold; the only emotion you ever see on display is rage...and that really only reveals itself in the first novel, The Hunter.

Unlike most of the books in the series (at least the ten I've read so far, I just started The Black Ice Score), The Hunter doesn't deal with a job, but a job-gone-wrong.  So wrong in fact, that when the book opens he's crawled himself from the grips of death and prison and he's war-marching back into New York City to deal with the woman who plugged him and the man who took his loot.  Revenge.  For me, the best kind of narrative drive.

The Hunter has been adapted into two movies (Point Blank, Payback), but the best adaptation is withoutadoubt Darwyn Cooke's 2009 graphic novel.  It's so spot-on I would even say that if you've read the comic than you've pretty much read the book.  That's a bold statement and I might waffle a bit by saying that the book does a slightly better job at portraying Parker's constant state of anger-driven pursuit, but I don't think Cooke could have drawn every panel with RAGE FACE.  

Stark's words are there, Parker's hate is there.  "For You That Tree Is Dead."  Cold.  Villainous.  Parker is a character that you should not enjoy reading, but of course you do.  It's his confidence.  In a way, the Parker books have little suspense; that is to say, you know that Parker is going to achieve his goal.  He's going to get what he wants, he's just good at his job.  Kick him down, he gets back up and stomps your face in.  

Give him the money for pity's sake.  

--Brad