"Parker thriller"

In a Cincinnati hotel room, seven buddies play poker intending to discuss a heist. Parker, sitting out the hand, gets up, takes off his tie, and wraps it around the throat of Harbin who is wearing a wire. Dalesia and Mott pretend the game is still on as Parker kills Harbin. McWhitney, who brought Harbin to the game, disposes of the body. The game breaks up with Fletcher pretending to be Harbin informing the others he will clean up. Stratton thanks "Harbin" as they all leave.

However, Dalesia and Parker, who have a bit of history together, talk about being out of work. Dalesia says he has a somewhat risky idea for a heist of over a million dollars being transported by four armored trucks guarded by twelve security agents. Parker wants in though he understands that the prime risk comes from two key "rookies", the banker's wife and a former bank employee, neither of which can keep their enthusiasm nor fears quiet. Meanwhile Harbin's partners hunt for him by tracking the poker players. Now the gang, Harbin's partners, and Police Detective Gwen Reversa rendezvous with four armored-cars.

NOBODY RUNS FOREVER is a typical exhilarating Parker tale that leaves no prisoners from start to finish. Parker displays his professionalism from the onset as he calmly kills the informant in the opening scene and continues on that criminal path that makes him a popular antihero. Though his partners are so tyro and unprofessional that long term fans would doubt he would try the caper with them, all things considered readers will appreciate Richard Stark's latest Parker thriller.

Harriet Klausner

Reviewed by Harriet Klausner
Posted November 29, 2004

Summary

Master criminal Parker is back--and this time hes in deeper, darker trouble than ever before. When a clandestine meeting of shady friends and shadier strangers ends with the death of a stool pigeon and Parker on the run, Richard Starks classic anti-hero is forced to reconsider his lifes work. But when he finds that his expertise is called for in the heist of a lifetime, money problems and sheer boredom override several glaring warning signs. Teamed with a crew of undesirables and incompetents, Parker heads to Smalltown, USA, to pull a bank job based on shaky inside information and an even shakier plan of action. A booze-addled and disgruntled bank heiress with a philandering social climber of a husband wants her money to herself. Parker and his posse need to keep her happy just long enough to make off with the loot, but an overzealous sheriff and a bounty hunter in search of the dead pigeon conspire to make life difficult. With Starks master craftsmanship at its peak, Parker will need every trick in his dubious arsenal to avoid having to pay the ultimate price for his questionable line of work.