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Put a lid on it

Westlake, Donald
Meehan, a thief up on a Federal beef, is recruited by the CREEP to steal some incrimidating materials. LATER: Read it again, still good!

Read:

4/2003

Read:

7/2006

Sacred Monster

Westlake, Donald
A very strange recounting of the life of an actor, told in strange flashbacks. The crime is revealed at the end, never fear.

Words I Had To Look Up:

crapen neck (pg. 30) -- Does not seem to be a "real" word. Is crapelike at dictionary.com.
steep hills serving as the only redan against the proles of the Valley (pg. 69) -- A v-shaped projection from a fortification.

Read:

7/2010

Smoke

Westlake, Donald
Freddie gets turned invisible, which has its good points, as he is a burglar, and its bad points, as it freaks out his girlfriend. And then there all those people who want to use him for their own nefarious projects... With a cigarette company playing a central part in this story, one would think there would be some good Smoke Quotes.

Words I Had To Look Up:


Oriel -- A bay window projecting from an upper floor. (pg. 98)
Boniface -- The keeper of an inn, hotel, nightclub, or eating establishment.(pg. 107)
Ferslugginer -- Confounded, darned, wretched.(pg. 118)

Quote:

It was a thirty-gear bike, a virtual thesaurus entry of power and speed, adaptable to any terrain known to man; there was probably a gear for going across ceilings. (pg. 354)

Quote:

Around the curve he went, shifted into the good-level-road gear, and hit forty-five without working up a sweat.(pg. 358)

Read:

1/2008

The Axe

Westlake, Donald
A downsized-man commits murders to elimate possible job competitors.

Read:

12/2004

The Comedy Is Finished

Westlake, Donald
Published after the author died, but written in the 80s. Radicals kidnap a popular comedian to get prisoners released. Things go wrong.

Read:

7/2012

The Hook

Westlake, Donald
A famous writer without a book with a bad divorce going on runs into an old friend who is a writer with a book and no publisher. Good story.

Read:

3/2001

The Hot Rock

Westlake, Donald
Well, I've seen the movie several times, I've read the book AT LEAST once before, at least, but I guess it was before I started this data base. Great story, five stars!!

Quote:

Afghanistan banana stand.

Read:

10/2023

The Road To Ruin

Westlake, Donald
The Dortmunder Gang tries to steal a collection of valuable cars.

Read:

9/2004

Thieves' Dozen

Westlake, Donald
A collection of Dortmunder tales, mostly. I can't have too much Dortmunder!

Read:

4/2010

Watch you back!

Westlake, Donald
Dortmunder saves the O.J. and tries to burgle a penthouse.

Read:

6/2005

What's So Funny?

Westlake, Donald
Dortmunder steals a gold chess set. Very good.

Words I Had To Look Up:

pied-à-terre -- A secondary or temporary place of lodging.(pg. 247)

Read:

1/2008

What's The Worst That Could Happen?

Westlake, Donald
Dortmunder goes to Las Vegas to get his ring back. Very funny! But no cigarette jokes this time!

QUOTE:

...Tiny was in the process of explaining to a panhandler why it had been rude to ask Tiny for money. "You didn't earn this money," Tiny was saying. "You see what I mean?" The way Tiny was holding the panhandler made it impossible for the fellow to nswer questions, but that was okay; Tiny's questions were all rhetorical, anyway. "For instance," he was saying, for instance, "the money I got in my jeans this minute, where do you suppose I got it? Huh? I'll tell you where I got it. I stole it from some people uptown. It was hard work, and there was some risk in it, and I earned it. Did you earn it? Did you risk anything? Did you work hard?" ..."Get a job," he said, "or get a gun. But don't beg. It's rude."

Read:

7/1999

Empty

Weyn, Suzanne
An image of a gas gauge on "E" illustrates the book jacket. Ten years from now the world is running out of petroleum, and this is how it impacts the lives of high school students in a small valley in New York state.

Not great reader reviews on Amazon, and I agree with their points. I was thinking, "No one has heard of solar cell phone chargers?". And some of the tech seems sketchy, especially that wonderful perpetual motion generator.

Read:

2/2011

Janet Hardy In Radio City

Wheeler, Ruthe S.
Published in 1935, this is about some girls who are acting in a movie western. They have a hot time while doing so! Then they go to Radio City in New York City to do some promotional radio work for the movie. A mystery is solved in the climatic finish. It is NOT, however, about amateur radio.

Read:

3/2023

Listening for lions

Whelan, Gloria
An orphaned English girl (who was born in Africa) is forced to impersonate a girl who died of influenza, so the dead girl's parents can get hold of an inheritance. Really good.

Read:

4/2006

The Mouse That Roared

Wibberly, Leonard
Great story of a little country that declares war on the United States back in the 50s. Peter Sellers played several of the parts in the movie.

Quote:

"But continue, have you other reasons?"
"I have, but I have already been rebuked by your Grace with a reference to the breeding of horses, and do not feel at leave to proceed."
"Oh," said Gloriana. "Oh."

Read:

1/2013

Countdown

Wiles, Deborah
Franny is an Air Force kid who lives near Andrews AFB. She is coping with growing up, an uncle with issues from WWI, and the threat of nuclear annihilation in the 60s. Profusely illustrated. It took me until page 276 to realize that Uncle "Otis" was actually spelled Uncle Otts. Ain't old eyes great?

Read:

10/2010

Each Little Bird That Sings

Wiles, Deborah
Comfort's family lives in a large house that is also a funeral home, so she is familiar with dealing with death. Except when it's too close.

Read:

12/2008

Love, Ruby Lavender

Wiles, Deborah
Ruby lives in a very small town in Mississippi. She love her grandmother, and she loves the chickens they rescued. But she hates Melba Jane. Dealing with a death in the family seems to be a theme of the author.

Read:

12/2008

The Aurora County All-Stars

Wiles, Deborah
House Jackson is trying to get his arm back in shape for pitching the annual (and only) baseball game against the kids from the neighboring county, but a Pageant is scheduled for the same time. Ruby wants to be catcher (No Girls!), and even Comfort makes a cameo. And of course, someone dies.

Read:

12/2009
20 books displayed
[Waldman - Weber] [Weber - Weir] [Weir - West] [Westerfeld - Westlake] [Westlake - Wiles] [Wiles - Wodehouse] [Wodehouse - Woods] [Wouk - Wroblewski] 

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