Castle in The Air

by Donald E. Westlake

Overview

In the funniest crime caper ever from Grandmaster Donald Westlake, four teams of international thieves race through Paris to steal a king's ransom from the walls of a disassembled castle.



A DIRTY DOZEN WITH A FRENCH CONNECTION

When four groups of international heist artists team up to pull off the theft of the century – stealing an entire castle, and the treasure hidden in its walls –what could possibly go wrong? Well, consider this: none of the master thieves speak each other’s languages... and no one knows precisely where the loot is stashed... and every one of them wants to steal it all for him or herself. It’s MWA Grand Master Donald E. Westlake at his wildest, a breathless slapstick chase through the streets of Paris only one step ahead of the law – and each other.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781785657221
Publisher:	Titan
Publication date:	03/30/2021
Pages:	208
Sales rank:	476,327
Product dimensions:	5.10(w) x 7.80(h) x 2.60(d)

About the Author

Donald E. Westlake is widely regarded as one of the great crime writers of the 20th century. He won three Edgar Awards and was named a Grandmaster by the Mystery Writers of America. Many of his books have been made into movies; Westlake also wrote the screenplay for The Grifters for which he received an Academy Award nomination.

Editorial Reviews

"This fast-moving, relatively short caper novel is worth your time, attention and money.... Westlake’s cinematic narrative ability is on full display here." — BookReporter


"So much enjoyment to be had from reading this caper ... a cross between The Italian Job and Ocean's Eleven" — Crime Fiction Lover


"An exciting adventure all the way through, with laughs on every page... another great entry to the Hard Case Crime collection." — Cinema Sentries

From the Publisher

2020-12-26
Another posthumously reprinted over-the-top comic heist that Westlake, the universally acclaimed master of the subgenre, originally published in 1980.

On his way out the door from the country of Yerbadoro, President Escobar Lynch plans to exit with the greater portion of the presidential castle he’s occupied, which is to be disassembled and shipped stone by stone to the French countryside for reassembly on a lot he and his wife, Maria, have carefully selected. And that’s not all he’s taking: Some of those stones have been hollowed out so they can serve as receptacles for a fortune Lynch has plundered from his people. It seems only fair that someone else should steal his ill-gotten goods in turn, so beautiful Yerbadoroan insider Lida Perez engages master criminal Eustace Dench to engineer the heist, splitting the proceeds equally with her. Since it’s impossible to tell in advance which stones are treasure troves and which are nothing but stones, Dench contracts with French con man Jean LeFraque and veteran German criminal Herman Muller to assemble teams that will be responsible for different phases of the intricate operation. What could possibly go wrong? As it happens, several noncomplications, from general ignorance of the caper by law enforcement to too few opportunities for individual team members to showcase their varied skills to lots of relatively innocent jostling among teammates competing for prominence with their more consequential double-crossing of each other, keep this from achieving the heights of Westlake’s best work.

What remains is the lazy, teasing mastery of a cat playing with a ball of exceptionally high-priced yarn.

Kirkus Reviews