A Google user
I already knew the basic plot, since it was the same plot used in one of the graphic novels (The Outfit).
But there was a subplot in the novel that was not mentioned at all in that graphic novel. The subplot involves the plastic surgeon who altered Parker's face to keep "The Outfit" or their henchmen from recognizing him.
The doctor is murdered sometime after Parker's surgery. The doctor's factotum, a guy named Stubbs, had been with the doctor as a union organizer and had been beat over the head to where he became more like a half-retarded person, loss of memory, affect, ability to use logic, basic intelligence.
After the doctor's murder, Stubbs with the doctor's secretary, May, make a plan to apprehend the murderer. May is the main planner on this, Stubbs just the supposed muscle.
The top three suspects are the three criminals who have had work done by the doctor during the prior year.
Parker is at the top of the list. But when Stubbs shows up right in the middle of his planning for a big heist, Parker is "irritated," and easily overcomes the inept Stubbs. He throws him into a wine cellar at an abandoned farmhouse, where it is dark all the time. He or one of his gang come and "walk" Stubbs, like a dog, once a day.
This all seemed pretty inhumane to me, but then Parker, I suppose, is not supposed to be humane. He is only supposed to be good at his occupation, thievery, and that he is. It's like you might excuse a famous rock musician for cheating on his wife, because he's good at what he does.
Still, this episode lowered my opinion of Parker. He can still be an anti-hero, I guess, but even then he's losing status, in my opinion, by being so petty about imprisoning Stubbs.
Sure, he's afraid the Outfit will find him and do him in, since the threat is that Stubbs and May will spill the beans about his new face to the Outfit. Still, it just seems petty to put him in a dark, dank wine cellar, especially since he's virtually retarded.
Parker's associate, Handy, has pity on Stubbs, and gives him a flashlight for the cave. But Parker has no pity: I guess he learned not to give in to this weak feeling, because it always backfired on him, as Handy's pity does, since the flashlight helps Stubbs to dig a whole and break free.
Overall, a good read. I don't know the northeast U. S. area, Pennsylvania, New Jersey, and New York, where most of this takes place, but if you do know the area, you may enjoy the designation of the various highways Parker and his associates use to first plan, then dry-run, then execute their robbery.
Two other little things (I'm sure there are many more) you will notice about Parker's environment, his environment in his novels, I mean. There are practically no children whatsoever: Parker lives in an almost exclusively adult world. There are quite a few women, but none of them seem to have children. Odd? Well, in Stark's eyes, that's what the male-dominated world of crime entails, a world that rarely crosses paths with the world of kids 17 and under.
Another part of Stark's Parker-environment: There is practically no mention of days of the week. Everyday can be the same day, as far as Parker and his cohorts are concerned. Only if, coincidentally, there is some event that only occurs on a certain day of the week would the day be noted. I want a Sunday kind of crime. Ever heard that one before?