Flashfire

Melander likes to do things flashy. When Parker finds himself working with Melander on a bank heist in a mid-sized midwestern city, his job is throwing a Molotov cocktail into a gas station. The resulting explosion sends the cops & fire trucks to the east side of town, while Melander & his gang plunder the bank on the west side. But Parker doesn't care for Melander's plan for a new heist, one that will clean out Palm Beach of a lot of very expensive jewelry. What Parker really dislikes is Melander's intention to use the proceeds from the bank job to capitalize the Palm Beach job...including Parker's cut. Melander is very polite about Parker's disinterest, & very sincere about paying him his share....with interest...after the jewelry job goes down. But that's not the way Parker works. Now he's tailing the gang down South, with a plan for getting his own back...and the entire swag of gems besides. Parker appeared in a series of celebrated crime novels between 1962 & 1974. Mysterious Press published the the first two Parker novels of his late '90s return: Backflash (1998) & Comeback (1997), both of which were chosen by The New York Times as Notable Books of the Year. Mel Gibson's Payback, an adaptation of The Hunter, was one of the top hits of the spring 1999 Hollywood season, increasing interest in the Parker novels. Joel Silver Productions (Die Hard, Predator) has acquired the film rights to Backflash, The Man with the Getaway Face, & Butcher's Moon. Richard Stark is also Mystery Writers of America Grand Master Donald E. Westlake.Richard Stark is the author of 'Flashfire' with ISBN 9780892967100 and ISBN 0892967102.