The Ax - Hardcover

Westlake, Donald E.

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 0892965878 ISBN 13: 9780892965878

Publisher: Mysterious Press, 1997

Synopsis

The multi-award-winning, widely-acclaimed mystery master Donald E. Westlake delivers a masterpiece with this brilliant, laser-sharp tale of the deadly consequences of corporate downsizing.

Burke Devore is a middle-aged manager at a paper company when the cost-cutting ax falls, and he is laid off. Eighteen months later and still unemployed, he puts a new spin on his job search -- with agonizing care, Devore finds the seven men in the surrounding area who could take the job that rightfully should be his, and systematically kills them. Transforming himself from mild-mannered middle manager to ruthless murderer, he discovers skills ne never knew ne had -- and that come to him far too easily.

About this title

From the Back Cover

Burke Devore is a paper company manager, a man who can tell you everything you ever wanted to know about bleaching processes and the edible wood pulp they put in ice cream. For twenty-five years Burke has provided for his family and played by the rules. Until now. Now Devore is slipping away: from his wife, his family, and from all norms of civilized behavior. Burke Devore wants his life back. And he will do anything to get it. Donald E. Westlake has written a tale of dark, mesmerizing power about one quiet, ordinary victim of corporate downsizing - who reacts in a most extraordinary way. From his attempts to land a new job, to the growing rift between him and his loved ones, Devore knows that he is running out of time. Believing that there is just one way to earn the only job he has a chance of getting, he sets off on a path from which there can be no turning back - no matter how bizarre and violent, no matter who gets in the way; no matter how evil Burke Devore becomes. Burke Devore is gunning for his competition, and it's getting easier every time...

Reviews

A downsized line manager plots a murderous way to winnow the competition for his next job, in this unusually somber tale from the reigning king of crime comedy. Though he saw the co-workers dismissed along with him turn instantly from teammates to competitors, Burke Devore knew from the first that they weren't the cause of his misery; the real enemy was the bosses, the board of directors, the shareholders willing to do anything to squeeze every ounce of profit from the paper company that's laid him off. But there's nothing he can do about the enemy, he ruefully acknowledges after two years of anguish; the only way he can claw his way back to a job is to create a vacancy through homicide--having first identified and eliminated the half-dozen most likely fellow-managers he'll be competing with. So he prepares a list of the best-qualified people close enough to his Connecticut home to be realistic competitors; practices firing his ancient Luger; and sets out on a purposeful odyssey to eliminate them. Westlake, the unrivaled master of the formula caper comedy (What's the Worst That Could Happen?, 1996, etc.), rises effortlessly to the challenge of varying these executions, keeping up the tension--even though you know (or think you know) exactly what's going to happen every time--by interspersing them with vignettes of Devore's quietly ruined home life, as his wife, who's obviously taken up with another man, drags him to counseling and his teenaged son is picked up for burglary. What's missing is any sense of cumulative horror or revulsion as Devore, doggedly distancing himself from his targets by reviewing their resum‚s and thinking of them by their initials, methodically works to make his next job opportunity happen. Though this lack of affect--especially in the chilly epilogue--is presumably Westlake's point, it sadly limits the range and psychological penetration of this grim `90s update of The Man in the Gray Flannel Suit. -- Copyright ©1997, Kirkus Associates, LP. All rights reserved.

In a sharp departure from his comic crime novels, veteran author Westlake has penned a chilling portrait of a downsized middle manager turned serial killer. Two years after being laid off from his job at a paper company, Burke Devore is becoming increasingly desperate as he watches everything he's worked for slip out of his grasp. He hatches a bizarre plot to target the job he wants and then eliminate his likely rivals for the position, literally killing off the competition. Soon suburban streets and shopping malls are littered with the bloodied corpses of unemployed paper executives as Devore schools himself in the methods of murder, variously shooting, hacking up, and running over his victims. Bypassing satire and heading straight for horror, Westlake offers an ingenious depiction of the perfect nineties employee--a cold-blooded assassin whose only loyalty is to himself and his family. This cold, clever novel is bolstered by Westlake's inventive plotting, his meticulous use of abundant, credible details, and his burning anger over corporate tactics. Joanne Wilkinson

Burke Devore, 52, laid off from his middle-management position at a paper mill two years before, decides to eliminate competitors for a dream job at a mill in New York. He places dummy ads in trade journals to attract them, then stalks and kills them (at first with a pistol, later in a variety of disgusting ways?most in broad daylight, with no witnesses). That's about all there is to this strange novel from the author of the John Dortmunder mystery series, e.g., What's the Worst That Could Happen? (LJ 9/15/96). A potentially compelling look at the effects of long-term unemployment on the psyche of a man of limited prospects and intellect, the result is merely a step-by-step guide to executing innocent people, generally lacking in conflict, irony, and farcical elements. Devore's wife and children are sketchy, and humorous situations are underdeveloped. The point of all this is buried deep. Not recommended.?Laurel A. Wilson, Alexandrian P.L., Mount Vernon, Ind.
Copyright 1997 Reed Business Information, Inc.

Edition details

• Publisher: Mysterious Press
• Publication date: 1997
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 0892965878
• ISBN 13: 9780892965878
• Binding: Hardcover
• Number of pages: 288