Trust Me on This (G K Hall Large Print Book Series) [Large Print] [Hardcover]

Donald E. Westlake (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: September 1989 | Series: G K Hall Large Print Book Series

What would it take to lure a young newswoman from a respectable New England paper to the most notorious tabloid in America? How about the promise of a salary that's triple what she's making! En route to her new job at the Weekly Galaxy, Sarah Joslyn stumbles across a bloody corpse in a Buick Riviera. A big story? Not in this paper. Instead, Sara finds herself scheming over 100-year-old twins and hunting down a mega-star!

--This text refers to the Mass Market Paperback edition.

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

Versatile Westlake delivers another offbeat story about picaresque types in his inimitably satiric, irresistible style. The action jets forward from the minute Sara Joslyn notices a corpse on the way to her new job as a reporter for the Weekly Galaxy in Florida. Naively, Sara congratulates herself on writing a big story right away but is quickly disillusioned. Her editor ignores the scoop, ordering Sara to concentrate on drumming up flaky features, the pseudo-newspaper's reason for being. The place is a madhouse with the staff competing with one another to contribute lurid, sleazy "articles." Catching on, Sara becomes as adept as shameless "Boy" Cartwright, tough Ida Gavin and the rest of the reportorial roster. After scoring a coup with a phony piece about 100-year-old twins, Sara gets a prize assignment. With her young editor Jack Ingersoll and other reporters, she travels to Martha's Vineyard, using every ploy to crash the securely guarded wedding party of a TV star. When luck saves her several times from mysterious gunshots, Sara remembers the victim she saw on her first working day and realizes why someone wants her dead, too. This is a boffo performance, the tone set in Westlake's foreword. Disclaiming the existence of any newspaper like the Galaxy, he states, his tongue firmly in cheek, that a factual equivalent would involve people "even more lost to all considerations of truth, taste . . . or any shred of common humanity."
Copyright 1988 Reed Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

About the Author

DONALD E. WESTLAKE has written numerous novels over the past thirty-five years under his own name and pseudonyms, including Richard Stark. Many of his books have been made into movies, including The Hunter, which became the brilliant film noir Point Blank, and the 1999 smash hit Payback. He penned the Hollywood scripts for The Stepfather and The Grifters, which was nominated for an Academy Award for Best Screenplay. The winner of three Edgar awards and a Mystery Writers of America Grand Master, Donald E. Westlake was presented with The Eye, the Private Eye Writers of America's Lifetime Achievement Award, at the Shamus Awards. He lives with his wife, Abby Adams, in rural New York State. --This text refers to the Mass Market Paperback edition.

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Product Details

• Hardcover: 429 pages
• Publisher: G K Hall & Co; Lrg edition (September 1989)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 081614740X
• ISBN-13: 978-0816147403
• Product Dimensions: 9.8 x 6.5 x 1 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.6 pounds
• Average Customer Review: 4.2 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (9 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #6,820,604 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

6 of 7 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Very funny, typically Westlake, January 5, 2004

By 

airfirehorse (Outer Space) - See all my reviews
(VINE VOICE)   

This review is from: Trust Me On This (Mass Market Paperback)

This was a very funny book. It had the usual Westlake shenanigans and completely outlandish behavior, but the twist is how the newspaper in the story is modeled after The National Inquirer. It made good fun of the "excessive news" industry and added a new concept: the body in the box. This is the holy grail of excessive news stories in this book. The protagonists try to take a picture of a dead famous person in his coffin. Absolutely hilarious! The female protagonist is naive and personable, very believable. The male lead is also believable as a cad who just wants stories that sell. I highly recommend this one to fans of Lawrence Block, Elmore Leonard, and Janet Evanovich (as well as Westlake fans).

6 of 7 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars My favorite Westlake, May 22, 1999

By 

[e-mail] (New England) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Trust Me on This (Hardcover)

This is one of my annual must-reads. I have read it every year since it first came out and I still laugh uproariously at it. Westlake is famous for his comedy capers and this is the best of the bunch.

8 of 10 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Hysterically funny, November 27, 1997

By 

[e-mail] (New York, NY) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Trust Me On This (Mass Market Paperback)

If you're a Westlake fan, you'll really like this one. If you haven't tried him yet, you're in for a treat. Think about what a loony bin a tabloid like the National Enquirer must be like, and then multiply it by ten, throw in a murder and Westlake's as-always warped perspective, and you will be rolling on the floor. While this isn't great literature, I was literally gasping for breath as I kept cracking up.

-David S. Rose