The Rare Coin Score

The Rare Coin Score by Richard Stark (1967) This is “A Parker Novel” by Donald E. Westlake, writing under the name Richard Stark. Somewhere in the middle of the series—Number 9, I guess. I think I read a Parker book way back, but now I’ve forgotten, so I’m kind of new to the series. I’ve seen several movies based on them—all of them too brutal, but still—I like the idea of a really stripped-down story. I was just thinking about my old coins—I have a few, not well-preserved or anything, and probably worth nothing. But I never get them out, and as far as them being old, I was thinking the ones that were 50 years old when I got them, like from relatives—those coins are now 100 years old! Maybe I should try to sell them. Anyway, this book is probably the wrong place to learn about rare coins. What it’s good for, to learn about, is how people will fuck everything up! It’s a heist, of course, of coins, at a convention at a hotel—so I like the setting. As the story starts gathering the cast of misfits, we get to know them a little, and we also get the setup, as if we are the criminals trying to figure out how to pull it off. Right from the start, I’m saying, no! Abandon this one! Forget it—it’s got bad news written all over it. Of course, no one listens to me, and if they did, there wouldn’t be a book. The character of Parker is pretty off-putting at the beginning, and I was thinking of ditching it after the first few chapters, but as soon as the caper planning started clicking the book started clicking. Parker doesn’t like himself between jobs, either. I quickly got caught up in it, and the rest was irresistible. Nothing really spectacular as far as characters (except for Parker), or the way it’s pulled off, or the language—except for maybe that it’s told in a crystal-clear matter-of-fact way—and there’s a lot of pleasure just in that. Now, I might be hooked—or if not hooked, exactly, curious, certainly, about the series.

7.23.25