'361' by Donald E. Westlake

Finished Tu 4/17/18

I picked this up at the Prairie Archives Book Store on Th 3/15/18. It was in one of the bins by the front door and only cost a quarter- worth every hard boiled penny of it!

I'm not sure what the title refers to. It's not a police code, but this is what is written before the novel begins-

".361 (Destruction of life, violent death. Killing".- Roget's Thesaurus of words and phrases

Willard 'Bill' Kelly
Ray Kelly
Bill Kelly

Eddie Kapp

Story line-

Ray Kelly is just twenty-three and is being mustered out of the Air Force after being stationed in Germany. His father, Willard Kelly picks him up from the bus station in NYC where they stay for a few days. While driving back home in Binghamton, NY, his father is shot and killed while driving, and ray is badly injured in the accident. He loses his left eye and one ankle is disfigured.

Ray learns that during Prohibition (the novel is set about 1960) his father was a lawyer for the Mob. Ray and his brother, Bill Kelly, seek revenge and try to locate the mobster that was responsible for the hit.

Eddie Kapp is being released from prison after a twenty year sentence. He is planning a take-over to become the main mafioso on the scene. On the day he is released, Ray and Bill are outside the prison and save Kapp from a hit.

They go with Kapp and later learn that Kapp is Ray's biological father. Kapp wants Ray to become his 'son and right-hand man'.

All the heads of the mob assemble at an upstate lodge in Lake George, NY to decide how they will divide up the mob world.

Ray learns that Kapp staged Bill's murder to look like a suicide. Ray doesn't want any part of the life, and he kills Kapp.  He grabs Kapp and another mobster at their hotel. He tells them what and why he is killing Kapp and lets the other guy live so that he can tell rest of the mob. Later, the mobsters pay him $500 (with a note "No Hard Feelings- LG"; he gets it that 'LG' stands for Lake George) for the hit and tell him that they won't bother him.

The novel ends as Ray is recounting his story to a journalist, Arnold Beeworthy, and ready to begin his new life.

The book only took me a day and a half to read. It's terse and tense and the epitome of 'tough talkin', no nonsense hard-guy'. JUST THE FACTS.

I loved it and Westlake has so many different tones. Not at all like Westlake's,  Dortmunder series, but he's so versatile that I like all of his writing styles. Anything by Westlake is fine by me.