Deadly Feasts: Tracking the Secrets of a Terrifying New Plague [Abridged, Audiobook] [Audio Cassette]

Donald E. Westlake (Author), Richard Stark (Author)

Product Details

• Audio Cassette
• Publisher: Audioworks; Abridged edition (August 1, 1999)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0671775049
• ISBN-13: 978-0671775049
• Average Customer Review: 3.5 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (2 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #5,502,402 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

5 of 7 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars 4 and a half stars, really, December 1, 2004

By 

Herr Frog (Washington DC area) - See all my reviews

This review is from: I gave at the office, (Hardcover)

I started reading Westlake in about 1988, and have picked up a novel every year or two since then. "I Gave At The Office" is definitely one of my favorites. If you have never read Westlake, you could hardly pick a better one to start with. I might recommend the very first, "Adios, Scheherazade" also. Like many of my favorite artists, Westlake has done some great ones, and some not so great. If the term "great" is appropriate to Westlake at all, this book is right up there.

Westlake is a rare bird, and a writer's writer, so to speak; and a pundit's pundit. His novels all speak very much of Donald Westlake himself, and his worldview. He started out with a cynical career in dimestore novels, with a worldly bent that speaks volumes about life in the way a man shakes hands, wears a hat, or drives a car, and a blunt sense of humour. He seems to especially love detective and action novels. He also has always been chimpy nutz with intense and wacky humor, and a strong delivery of aforementioned humor. "I Gave At The Office" is one of the most hilarious.

Set in the early '70s, this is the story of a down-at-the-heels news writer assigned to report on a U.S.-financed Carribean insurgency in the making, one that the news agency is so intent on that on finding nothing there, they proceed to help with said financing themselves rather than go home empty-handed. A classic Catch-22 like Westlake was the best at, save, uh, Joseph Heller. A very easy read, and hilarious, this novel would grace the back of any potty.

1 of 2 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars Not the Easiest to Read of Westlake's Comic Capers, June 3, 2008

By 

James N Simpson (Gold Coast, QLD Australia) - See all my reviews
(TOP 1000 REVIEWER)   

This review is from: I gave at the office, (Hardcover)

Westlake has written over a variety of genres throughout his career under his own name and various pen names (the most successful is Richard Stark). His collection of work known as comic capers (crime stories with humorous happenings and sometimes eccentric characters) of which this is one of are very hard and expensive to track down. Most are well worth the search and money but to be honest I Gave at the Office is not really.

I Gave at the Office, first published in 1971 has Westlake using a different style to the normal way of writing. In I Gave at the Office Westlake has written the novel like as a narration of a detailed summation of his part in the Ilha Pombo Affair by Jay Fisher, the main character of this tale, who is recording his account into his tape recorder as he hates to write. Now maybe if you get this as an audio book that style or writing would work well but in print it gets tedious very fast. Also Westlake seemed determined in the opening chapters to (maybe he lost a dare or something) to include the word Network as many times as he could each sentence. This gets annoying real fast.

The basic plot of I Gave at the Office is TV announcer Jay Fisher is sent to Ilha Pombo (Caribbean island) to cover a secret invasion. Of course nothing goes according to plan for any party involved.

Still tracking down some of these comic capers so haven't read them all yet but the best three Westlake Comic Capers at an absolute masterpiece level that I've read so far are, Smoke, The Spy in the Ointment and a New York Dance (also published as Dancing Aztecs). Other comic capers also worth checking out are The Fugitive Pigeon, The Busy Body, God Save the Mark, Who Stole Sassi Manoon?, Help I am Being Held Prisoner, Castle in the Air, Enough and High Adventure. Of course you've also got to read the Dortmunder series and the Parker series (written under the pen name Richard Stark) as well. You've also got to read his greatest stand alone story novel of all time The Ax the ultimate solution to unemployment. Check out a Westlake novel today!