The Blackbird

“No army can withstand the strength of an idea whose time has come.”

This starts off with the same heist that "Slayground" begins - Grofield, Parker, and Laufman's hold up of an armored car! However this one is from Grofield's point of view, as "Slayground" was from Parker's! In "Slayground", Parker doesn't know what happened to Grofield. "The Blackbird" then is the rest of that story. ("Slayground" is the rest of what happens to Parker after the hold up!)

In "Slayground", Parker ends up in an amusement park, dealing with cops and thugs. In this book, Alan wakes up in a hospital, receiving an offer he can't refuse! He jumps out of that frying pan and into the fire of international espionage, Third World countries, and germ warfare! show more And Albanians! The plot is pretty far fetched, but Grofield is a fun character, and Stark is a heck of a writer, so the book was a fast, entertaining read! Now, back to the Parker novels! show less

The Blackbird is the third of four Alan Grofield novels by Donald Westlake's alter ego, Richard Stark. There are four Grofield novels in all, The Damsel, the Dame, The Blackbird, and Lemons Never Lie. The Vlackbird is the weakest of the four. Grofield was a minor character in a couple of Parker novels (specifically the Handle). The Parker series consists of 24 novels about a tough-as- nails thief. Grofield is also a thief, but a different kind of character. Grofield lives in a small midwestern town and his first love is acting. He runs a small community theater with his wife, but makes no money at it, supporting his acting profession with heists, sometimes with Parker. Grofield is humorous and always has some light banter, making him show more quite a bit different than Parker.

The story starts out with a bang. Grofield is involved in an armored car robbery that goes south when the getaway car crashes. Grofield wakes in a hospital, being questioned by CIA type operatives. Either Grofield becomes a spy against two Third World leaders he has been connected to in the past or he does hard time. Grofield is at his witty best as he verbally spars with the agents assigned to him and as he attempts to make a getaway during a plane change at JFK. In Quebec where the rendezvous is to take place, Grofield is caught between warring bands of agents and is ultimately on no one's side but his own. Despite the secret goings on, the kidnappings, the gun battles, and other high drama, this story lacked the pull and compellingness of the other Grofield books. show less

Alan Grofield, who supports his life as theatre actor with scores made as a professional thief, is captured during the same getaway that opens the Parker novel Slayground. “Thankfully” Grofield is offered a way out by a federal agency due to acquaintanceships established in his previous adventures. A meeting of nefarious people representing nefarious nations is taking place in Quebec, and no one seems to know why. Grofield becomes our government’s last ditch attempt at discovering what it is. This seems to be the least liked of the Grofield novels but I enjoyed it the most. Oh, well.

The Blackbird is the third of four Alan Grofield novels by Donald Westlake's alter ego, Richard Stark. There are four Grofield novels in all, The Damsel, the Dame, The Blackbird, and Lemons Never Lie. The Blackbird is the weakest of the four.

Grofield was a minor character in a couple of Parker novels (specifically the Handle). The Parker series consists of 24 novels about a tough-as-nails thief. Grofield is also a thief, but a different kind of character.

Grofield lives in a small midwestern town and his first love is acting. He runs a small community theater with his wife, but makes no money at it, supporting his acting profession with heists, sometimes with Parker. Grofield is humorous and always has some light banter, making
him show more quite a bit different than Parker.

The story starts out with a bang. Grofield is involved in an armored car robbery that goes south when the getaway car crashes. Grofield wakes in a hospital, being questioned by CIA type operatives. Either Grofield becomes a spy against two Third World leaders he has been connected
to in the past or he does hard time. Grofield is at his witty best as he verbally spars with the agents assigned to him and as he attempts to make a getaway during a plane change at JFK.
In Quebec where the rendezvous is to take place, Grofield is caught between warring bands of agents and is ultimately on no one's side but his own. Despite the secret goings on, the kidnappings, the gun battles, and other high drama, this story lacked the pull and compellingness of the
other Grofield books. show less

The Blackbird's opening chapter is almost the same as the first chapter of Slayground from the Parker series. While Slayground follows Parker, Blackbird follows Grofield, who is caught and then offered his freedom in exchange with helping an unnamed agency of the US government.

So Grofield is off to Quebec, where he's supposed to report on a meeting of third world leaders (which just happens to involve characters from the two previous Grofield novels). And there's lots of espionage and counter-espionage action, and Grofield's mouth gets him in trouble, and he escapes, and there's some more espionage action, and in the end he gets he gives the government what it wants and gets to stay out of jail.

This is my personal favorite of these show more three Grofield novels, but again there isn't a whole lot to say about it. I think there's a bit more of Westlake's wit in the writing, and some nice turns of phrase. And there's a better sense of Grofield as a character as opposed to someone who is just reacting to events around him. But there isn't so much here that I'm left wishing we had more Grofield books to look forward to. show less

Grofield stops a WMD Conspiracy
Review of the Blackstone Audio Inc. audiobook edition (June 2013) of the Macmillan paperback original (1969)

Richard Stark was one of the many pseudonyms of the prolific crime writer Donald E. Westlake (1933-2008), who wrote over 100 books. The Stark pseudonym was used primarily for the Parker novels and their spinoff series, the Grofield novels. The Parkers are a hardboiled noir series but the Grofields have more of a lighter touch, often with humorous banter.

In The Blackbird, occasional actor and sometime heist man Alan Grofield is recruited by a secret U.S. Government agency after he is captured during a heist scene which is shared with the opening chapter of the Parker novel Slayground (1971). Grofield show more agrees to work undercover in order to avoid being prosecuted for the heist. He is sent to Quebec City, Canada where there is a meeting of various Third World dictators, some of whom are acquaintances of Grofield from his earlier adventures. Grofield is viewed with suspicion by Vivian Kamdela, an agent of the dictator Marba, but eventually they will work together to stop the conspiracy which they discover involves the underground sale of chemical weapons.

The book is more of a light espionage thriller with a lot of banter between Grofield and the various agents of either the government or the dictators. The only mystery element is the discovery of the WMD sale.

Narrator R.C. Bray does a good job in all voices in this audiobook edition.

The 4 Grofield books are all available for free on Audible Plus.

Other Reviews
There is an extensive review with a detailed plot description (spoilers obviously) at The Westlake Review, February 21, 2015.

Trivia and Links
There is a brief plot summary of The Blackbird and of all the Parker & Grofield books and adaptations at The Violent World of Parker website.

Although The Blackbird's 2013 Blackstone Audio Inc. audiobook edition shares the same cover art as the University of Chicago Press 2012 reprint, it does not include the Foreword by author Sarah Weinman. show less