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Double Feature
Mystery Writers of America Grand Master Donald E. Westlake was also an Academy Award Nominee—for the screenplay of The Grifters—and a lifelong fan of the movies. So it’s no surprise that some of his most brilliant writing intersected with Hollywood in unexpected and unforgettable ways.
In New York City, a movie critic has just murdered his girlfriend—well, one of his girlfriends (not to be confused with his wife). Will the unlikely crime-solving partnership he forms with the investigating police detective keep him from the film noir ending he deserves?
On the opposite coast, movie star Dawn Devayne—the hottest It Girl in Hollywood—gets a visit from a Navy sailor who says he knew her when she was just ordinary Estelle Anlic of San Diego. Now she’s a big star who’s put her past behind her. But secrets have a way of not staying buried...
These two short novels, one hilarious and one heartbreaking, are two of the best works Westlake ever wrote. And fittingly, both became movies—one starring Jack Ryan’s Marie-Josee Croze, and one starring Fargo’s William H. Macy and Desperate Housewives’ Felicity Huffman.
In New York City, a movie critic has just murdered his girlfriend—well, one of his girlfriends (not to be confused with his wife). Will the unlikely crime-solving partnership he forms with the investigating police detective keep him from the film noir ending he deserves?
On the opposite coast, movie star Dawn Devayne—the hottest It Girl in Hollywood—gets a visit from a Navy sailor who says he knew her when she was just ordinary Estelle Anlic of San Diego. Now she’s a big star who’s put her past behind her. But secrets have a way of not staying buried...
These two short novels, one hilarious and one heartbreaking, are two of the best works Westlake ever wrote. And fittingly, both became movies—one starring Jack Ryan’s Marie-Josee Croze, and one starring Fargo’s William H. Macy and Desperate Housewives’ Felicity Huffman.
256 pages, Paperback
First published March 1, 1977
78 people are currently reading
458 people want to read
About the author
Donald E. Westlake
434 books981 followersDonald E. Westlake (1933-2008) was one of the most prolific and talented authors of American crime fiction. He began his career in the late 1950's, churning out novels for pulp houses—often writing as many as four novels a year under various pseudonyms such as Richard Stark—but soon began publishing under his own name. His most well-known characters were John Dortmunder, an unlucky thief, and Parker, a ruthless criminal. His writing earned him three Edgar Awards: the 1968 Best Novel award for God Save the Mark; the 1990 Best Short Story award for "Too Many Crooks"; and the 1991 Best Motion Picture Screenplay award for The Grifters. In addition, Westlake also earned a Grand Master Award from the Mystery Writers of America in 1993.
Westlake's cinematic prose and brisk dialogue made his novels attractive to Hollywood, and several motion pictures were made from his books, with stars such as Lee Marvin and Mel Gibson. Westlake wrote several screenplays himself, receiving an Academy Award nomination for his adaptation of The Grifters, Jim Thompson's noir classic.
Some of the pseudonyms he used include
• Richard Stark
• Timothy J. Culver
• Tucker Coe
• Curt Clark
• J. Morgan Cunningham
• Judson Jack Carmichael
• D.E. Westlake
• Donald I. Vestlejk
• Don Westlake
Westlake's cinematic prose and brisk dialogue made his novels attractive to Hollywood, and several motion pictures were made from his books, with stars such as Lee Marvin and Mel Gibson. Westlake wrote several screenplays himself, receiving an Academy Award nomination for his adaptation of The Grifters, Jim Thompson's noir classic.
Some of the pseudonyms he used include
• Richard Stark
• Timothy J. Culver
• Tucker Coe
• Curt Clark
• J. Morgan Cunningham
• Judson Jack Carmichael
• D.E. Westlake
• Donald I. Vestlejk
• Don Westlake
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 85 reviews
September 5, 2023
Drive-In Double Feature
Double Feature really isn’t a true double feature. The two stories are not equal in length or weight. They are not really related much either. Loosely, both stories are connected to the movie world, the world of pretend, the world of make believe. They both in a sense revolve around what’s real and what’s pretend.
“A Travesty” comprises a full seventy percent of Double Feature. It was eventually turned into a TV movie starring William H Macy and Felicity Huffman (before her scandalous cheating ways became front page news). It is a slower, quieter crime thriller and reeks of Westlake’s famed comedic touch. The plot revolves around a film critic who offs his lover during an argument. A private detective ferrets out what happened and offers to lie in exchange for $10,000.
What follows is amusing as the bumbling film critic struggles to come up with the cash for the payoff, emptying out his piggybanks, selling off his prized possessions, and even robbing a bank. But, that’s only where the fun starts because the police detective investigating the murder becomes buddies with the film critic, using the critic’s knowledge of murder mysteries to solve crimes and to brainstorm solutions to Laura’s demise. Of course, in between solving crimes and having dinners with the police detective and his wife, the earnest film critic is bedding the detective’s wife. This novella is Westlake’s private joke, having fun at the whole murder mystery industry which he’s been a part of for so many decades.
The second story, which is a novelette not a novella, is Orly. This one’s not even a crime story. It’s an odd little story about the ways in which fame and fortune change a person as Orly discovers that his ex-wife is now the world’s biggest star, but she doesn’t seem much like his memories of her.
Both stories are interesting short pieces, although not hardboiled, not pulpy, and not earth-shattering.
Double Feature really isn’t a true double feature. The two stories are not equal in length or weight. They are not really related much either. Loosely, both stories are connected to the movie world, the world of pretend, the world of make believe. They both in a sense revolve around what’s real and what’s pretend.
“A Travesty” comprises a full seventy percent of Double Feature. It was eventually turned into a TV movie starring William H Macy and Felicity Huffman (before her scandalous cheating ways became front page news). It is a slower, quieter crime thriller and reeks of Westlake’s famed comedic touch. The plot revolves around a film critic who offs his lover during an argument. A private detective ferrets out what happened and offers to lie in exchange for $10,000.
What follows is amusing as the bumbling film critic struggles to come up with the cash for the payoff, emptying out his piggybanks, selling off his prized possessions, and even robbing a bank. But, that’s only where the fun starts because the police detective investigating the murder becomes buddies with the film critic, using the critic’s knowledge of murder mysteries to solve crimes and to brainstorm solutions to Laura’s demise. Of course, in between solving crimes and having dinners with the police detective and his wife, the earnest film critic is bedding the detective’s wife. This novella is Westlake’s private joke, having fun at the whole murder mystery industry which he’s been a part of for so many decades.
The second story, which is a novelette not a novella, is Orly. This one’s not even a crime story. It’s an odd little story about the ways in which fame and fortune change a person as Orly discovers that his ex-wife is now the world’s biggest star, but she doesn’t seem much like his memories of her.
Both stories are interesting short pieces, although not hardboiled, not pulpy, and not earth-shattering.
March 19, 2023
1977
The first, longer, novella, a Travesty, is amazing. Starts typically (for the genre) with the hero trying to cover a murder he did, but becomes a bit of an absurdist comedy, with him helping the police as a super intuitive, brilliant, detective. It reminded me, above all, of Jonathan Lethem, the way he plays with genre, both making fun and highlighting it.
The first, longer, novella, a Travesty, is amazing. Starts typically (for the genre) with the hero trying to cover a murder he did, but becomes a bit of an absurdist comedy, with him helping the police as a super intuitive, brilliant, detective. It reminded me, above all, of Jonathan Lethem, the way he plays with genre, both making fun and highlighting it.
May 7, 2025
I don't think I've ever read a bad book by Westlake. Fortunately for me, there's plenty more to go!
This one features my favorite Hard Case Crime cover by Paul Mann
Highly recommended.
This one features my favorite Hard Case Crime cover by Paul Mann
Highly recommended.
February 3, 2021
In Double Feature, we’re presented with back-to-back stories related to the movie industry. The first, “A Travesty”, follows film reviewer Calvin Thorpe, as he tries to cover up a murder by staying out of the path of a pair of detectives as well as a blackmailer. The second, “Ordo”, focuses on a man who discovers his long-lost wife has become a Hollywood bombshell.
“A Travesty”, the first of the two stories, takes up about three quarters of the book. Westlake produces a bumbling yet seemingly clever protagonist in Carey Thorpe who consistently evades suspicion despite a litany of bad choices. I can’t decide if he’s just cocky or at times completely oblivious to his actions. Maybe it’s a little of both. In fact, there’s a choice he makes mid-way through the story that was so unbelievably stupid and short-sighted that I wanted to cry-out, “OH, COME ON”. What he did was even more mind-boggling considering he showed that he could be a rather brilliant detective as he helped the two detectives assigned to the murder he was involved in solve a handful of other murders! I guess it was a case of “rules for thee, not for me”.
The second story, “Ordo”, is a philosophical look at the idea of identity and how we sometimes have to completely change ourselves in order to get what we want out of life. Despite its much shorter length compared to the first story, I thought it was the stronger of the two. The main character, Ordo, struggles with the thought that the woman he knew sixteen years prior is someone he no longer recognizes whereas he has not changed in the slightest. This story hit me particularly hard given its deeply introspective subject matter and its emotional finale.
Hard Case Crime continues to be one of my favorite publishers going today and I commend them for unearthing and publishing some of the most interesting work from a by-gone era.
“A Travesty”, the first of the two stories, takes up about three quarters of the book. Westlake produces a bumbling yet seemingly clever protagonist in Carey Thorpe who consistently evades suspicion despite a litany of bad choices. I can’t decide if he’s just cocky or at times completely oblivious to his actions. Maybe it’s a little of both. In fact, there’s a choice he makes mid-way through the story that was so unbelievably stupid and short-sighted that I wanted to cry-out, “OH, COME ON”. What he did was even more mind-boggling considering he showed that he could be a rather brilliant detective as he helped the two detectives assigned to the murder he was involved in solve a handful of other murders! I guess it was a case of “rules for thee, not for me”.
The second story, “Ordo”, is a philosophical look at the idea of identity and how we sometimes have to completely change ourselves in order to get what we want out of life. Despite its much shorter length compared to the first story, I thought it was the stronger of the two. The main character, Ordo, struggles with the thought that the woman he knew sixteen years prior is someone he no longer recognizes whereas he has not changed in the slightest. This story hit me particularly hard given its deeply introspective subject matter and its emotional finale.
Hard Case Crime continues to be one of my favorite publishers going today and I commend them for unearthing and publishing some of the most interesting work from a by-gone era.
December 21, 2020
This book is actually a pair of novellas. Each is different in length and tone. The first, "A Travesty," has the almost lighthearted approach to a murder investigation that marked the best episodes of "Columbo." While people do lose their lives there are some laughs and even the idea that luck plays as big a role in these killings as intention. The second, "Ordo," feels as though it wanted to take itself seriously but gave up halfway through. This tale (more like a long short story instead of a novella) concerns a career Navy man who ventures to Hollywood to look up the major movie star to whom he was briefly married many years before. Both offer a look at what is real and what is make-believe. "Travesty" succeeds because Westlake's tongue is never far from his cheek. He was a master of comic mysteries and it shows here. "Ordo" has no real stakes and not much to expect or hope for from either major character. Three and a half stars, more for "A Travesty" than for "Ordo."
February 5, 2020
'Double Feature' is back in print for the first time in 40 years this February, available in paperback, and ebook formats. Containing the novellas 'A Travesty' and 'Ordo', these were first published in 1977.
This is particularly reflected in 'A Travesty' where the use of epithets and racial stereotyping which made this reader uncomfortable. It's unsure whether they were used for effect (not suggesting that they were, or are, ever acceptable, but illustrating the character)or were reflective of Donald E Westlake's personal beliefs. A scene of police violence towards a female criminal had me wincing, and again, I am unsure of the context but read it as an example of systemic violence against 'the other' (in this case a radical revolutionary) by the police.
'A Travesty' tells the story of a movie critic, soon to be divorced, who is either such a bad guy that his family has taken against him and sided with his ex-wife, or his family are just not nice either. The only perspective the reader has is his, and as he starts the novella having killed one of his girlfriends-he has two and is a serial philanderer-but justified it as an accident.
Instead of admitting to this accident, his sense of vanity and self-importance is such that he uses plots and themes of movies to try and avoid capture, including throwing the scent of the trail onto other individuals in Laura's life. The detective investigating Laura's death is enamoured with Carey's celebrity, and asks him to help him with several cases he is working on.
This is both bizarre and hilarious, as both the reader and Carey are aware of the extremely thin ice that he is treading on. He plays games of 'guess whodunnit' with the lives of others whilst miring himself absolutely, and completely in the death of his girlfriend. As a slice of nostalgic crime fiction, this is brilliantly plotted and immaculately paced. Each chapter has you on edge, waiting for Carey to be found out- he is such an objectionable person, from the way that he is so nonchalant about murder, the way he takes what he wants and justifies his actions.
And yet, he is so charming and is presented by Westlake as a reasonable man, it really shakes your moral compass to find yourself siding with a murderer! Darkly funny, with a meta-theme running through it as he holds a screening event for the movie, 'Gaslight', which becomes a running joke as well as setting the scene for deeply unnerving denouement, 'A Travesty' is about a man getting what he deserves.
'Ordo', on the other hand, is a slighter offering but non the less effective for its size. The tale of a sailor who married a young girl, subsequently snatched back by her mother under claims that she had no idea what she was doing, is bittersweet and haunting.A magazine article on new Hollywood 'sex sensation' Dawn Devayne,has a picture of Dawn with her first husband, a simple sailor named Ordo.
As Ordo, totally immersed in his Navy lifestyle, in a relationship with an understanding that it is heading towards marriage, is mercilessly ribbed and finds his life affected by this revelation that 16 year old Estelle was turned into movie star Dawn under the influence of her domineering mother, he decides to track her down.
In his attempt to establish whether Dawn is still the Estelle that he married, or ever was, he and Dawn/Estelle embark on a voyage of self dicsovery in a land that prides itself on how well it sells a lifestyle based on fakery and flim-flam.
Deeply poignant and so sad, this story has elements that made me think of Marilyn Monroe, and other women, who were set up by the studio system and turned into stars, moulded, manipulated and made to feel obliged to the studio heads for the remodelling of their lives.
I had no idea where either story was going, each was deeply satisfying for their own reasons -being careful to avoid spoilers here!-and as vintage stories cum character studies, they hold up after all this time as fine examples of writing. it's another superb entry into the Hard Case crimes canon and another reminder of why Donald E Westlake was just so very good at what he did, on both the page and the screen. This is why 'Double Feature' is so successful, the two tales balance each other so very well, and remind you how great he was as a screenwriter too.
This is particularly reflected in 'A Travesty' where the use of epithets and racial stereotyping which made this reader uncomfortable. It's unsure whether they were used for effect (not suggesting that they were, or are, ever acceptable, but illustrating the character)or were reflective of Donald E Westlake's personal beliefs. A scene of police violence towards a female criminal had me wincing, and again, I am unsure of the context but read it as an example of systemic violence against 'the other' (in this case a radical revolutionary) by the police.
'A Travesty' tells the story of a movie critic, soon to be divorced, who is either such a bad guy that his family has taken against him and sided with his ex-wife, or his family are just not nice either. The only perspective the reader has is his, and as he starts the novella having killed one of his girlfriends-he has two and is a serial philanderer-but justified it as an accident.
Instead of admitting to this accident, his sense of vanity and self-importance is such that he uses plots and themes of movies to try and avoid capture, including throwing the scent of the trail onto other individuals in Laura's life. The detective investigating Laura's death is enamoured with Carey's celebrity, and asks him to help him with several cases he is working on.
This is both bizarre and hilarious, as both the reader and Carey are aware of the extremely thin ice that he is treading on. He plays games of 'guess whodunnit' with the lives of others whilst miring himself absolutely, and completely in the death of his girlfriend. As a slice of nostalgic crime fiction, this is brilliantly plotted and immaculately paced. Each chapter has you on edge, waiting for Carey to be found out- he is such an objectionable person, from the way that he is so nonchalant about murder, the way he takes what he wants and justifies his actions.
And yet, he is so charming and is presented by Westlake as a reasonable man, it really shakes your moral compass to find yourself siding with a murderer! Darkly funny, with a meta-theme running through it as he holds a screening event for the movie, 'Gaslight', which becomes a running joke as well as setting the scene for deeply unnerving denouement, 'A Travesty' is about a man getting what he deserves.
'Ordo', on the other hand, is a slighter offering but non the less effective for its size. The tale of a sailor who married a young girl, subsequently snatched back by her mother under claims that she had no idea what she was doing, is bittersweet and haunting.A magazine article on new Hollywood 'sex sensation' Dawn Devayne,has a picture of Dawn with her first husband, a simple sailor named Ordo.
As Ordo, totally immersed in his Navy lifestyle, in a relationship with an understanding that it is heading towards marriage, is mercilessly ribbed and finds his life affected by this revelation that 16 year old Estelle was turned into movie star Dawn under the influence of her domineering mother, he decides to track her down.
In his attempt to establish whether Dawn is still the Estelle that he married, or ever was, he and Dawn/Estelle embark on a voyage of self dicsovery in a land that prides itself on how well it sells a lifestyle based on fakery and flim-flam.
Deeply poignant and so sad, this story has elements that made me think of Marilyn Monroe, and other women, who were set up by the studio system and turned into stars, moulded, manipulated and made to feel obliged to the studio heads for the remodelling of their lives.
I had no idea where either story was going, each was deeply satisfying for their own reasons -being careful to avoid spoilers here!-and as vintage stories cum character studies, they hold up after all this time as fine examples of writing. it's another superb entry into the Hard Case crimes canon and another reminder of why Donald E Westlake was just so very good at what he did, on both the page and the screen. This is why 'Double Feature' is so successful, the two tales balance each other so very well, and remind you how great he was as a screenwriter too.
September 1, 2021
Two Movie-Related Novellas
Review of the Hard Case Crime paperback edition (2020) of the M. Evans & Co. hardcover, originally titled Enough (1977)
I've run out of Donald Westlake's (aka Richard Stark) Parker series of hardboiled noir novels but wanted to follow-up by reading several of the other books which established the prolific crime author's reputation. Double Feature consists of two novellas, A Travesty and Ordo, with the latter more of short story length. The tie-in is that they both relate to the movies. The lead character in A Travesty is a movie critic and makes regular film references. The secondary lead in Ordo is a film actress who is the lost 1st wife of the title character.
A Travesty takes more of a noir comedy angle with the movie critic covering up his accidental manslaughter of a girlfriend with increasingly complicated efforts that involve blackmail and then further murders. The police involved are incompetent and actually start using the film critic as a crime consultant to help solve other cases, apparently without a clue as to whom they are dealing with. A karmic resolution still occurs before the end though.
The oddly titled Ordo, is the first name of the protagonist Ordo Tupikos, an American sailor of Greek heritage (Westlake gives an extremely detailed pedigree of the man's family for some odd reason) who discovers that the woman who was his first wife Estelle became a movie star in her later life. The marriage had been broken up by the girl's mother who sought out the pair in order to bring the wayward bride back home. A movie magazine has found a wedding photo from that first marriage and Ordo's shipmates kid him about his lost wife. Ordo takes a leave in order to reconnect with his early lost love and discovers that the woman now with a movie star persona is no one that he recognizes. This short story is not actually a crime or murder mystery at all, so is quite different from most of Westlake's work.
Other Reviews
There is an extremely detailed review and plot summary (with spoilers obviously) of Double Feature at The Westlake Review, February 27, 2020.
Trivia and Links
This edition of Double Feature is part of the Hard Case Crime (2004-) series of reprints, new commissions and posthumous publications of the pulp and noir crime genre founded by authors Charles Ardai and Max Phillips. GR's Listopia is not complete (as of August 2021) and the most complete lists of publication can be found at Wikipedia or the Publisher's Official Site.
A Travesty was adapted as the television movie A Slight Case of Murder (1999) directed by Steven Schachter and starring William Macy and Felicity Huffman. There doesn't seem to be a trailer for it, but you can watch the entire film (as of early September 2021) on YouTube here. There is no apparent tie-in to the same-titled Edward G. Robinson 1938 film.
Ordo was adapted as the French language film Ordo (2004) directed by Laurence Ferreira Barbosa. A trailer (without English subtitles) can be viewed on YouTube here.
The blurb on the Hard Case Crime edition advertises Westlake as an Academy Award Nominee. This is in recognition of his 1990 Academy Award nomination for the screenplay adaptation of Jim Thompson's The Grifters (1963) for the film The Grifters (1990) dir. Stephen Frears and starring Anjelica Huston, John Cusack and Annette Bening. The winner of the 1990 Best Screenplay adaptation was Michael Blake for Dances with Wolves, based on his own novel Dances with Wolves (1988).
Review of the Hard Case Crime paperback edition (2020) of the M. Evans & Co. hardcover, originally titled Enough (1977)
I've run out of Donald Westlake's (aka Richard Stark) Parker series of hardboiled noir novels but wanted to follow-up by reading several of the other books which established the prolific crime author's reputation. Double Feature consists of two novellas, A Travesty and Ordo, with the latter more of short story length. The tie-in is that they both relate to the movies. The lead character in A Travesty is a movie critic and makes regular film references. The secondary lead in Ordo is a film actress who is the lost 1st wife of the title character.
A Travesty takes more of a noir comedy angle with the movie critic covering up his accidental manslaughter of a girlfriend with increasingly complicated efforts that involve blackmail and then further murders. The police involved are incompetent and actually start using the film critic as a crime consultant to help solve other cases, apparently without a clue as to whom they are dealing with. A karmic resolution still occurs before the end though.
The oddly titled Ordo, is the first name of the protagonist Ordo Tupikos, an American sailor of Greek heritage (Westlake gives an extremely detailed pedigree of the man's family for some odd reason) who discovers that the woman who was his first wife Estelle became a movie star in her later life. The marriage had been broken up by the girl's mother who sought out the pair in order to bring the wayward bride back home. A movie magazine has found a wedding photo from that first marriage and Ordo's shipmates kid him about his lost wife. Ordo takes a leave in order to reconnect with his early lost love and discovers that the woman now with a movie star persona is no one that he recognizes. This short story is not actually a crime or murder mystery at all, so is quite different from most of Westlake's work.
Other Reviews
There is an extremely detailed review and plot summary (with spoilers obviously) of Double Feature at The Westlake Review, February 27, 2020.
Trivia and Links
This edition of Double Feature is part of the Hard Case Crime (2004-) series of reprints, new commissions and posthumous publications of the pulp and noir crime genre founded by authors Charles Ardai and Max Phillips. GR's Listopia is not complete (as of August 2021) and the most complete lists of publication can be found at Wikipedia or the Publisher's Official Site.
A Travesty was adapted as the television movie A Slight Case of Murder (1999) directed by Steven Schachter and starring William Macy and Felicity Huffman. There doesn't seem to be a trailer for it, but you can watch the entire film (as of early September 2021) on YouTube here. There is no apparent tie-in to the same-titled Edward G. Robinson 1938 film.
Ordo was adapted as the French language film Ordo (2004) directed by Laurence Ferreira Barbosa. A trailer (without English subtitles) can be viewed on YouTube here.
The blurb on the Hard Case Crime edition advertises Westlake as an Academy Award Nominee. This is in recognition of his 1990 Academy Award nomination for the screenplay adaptation of Jim Thompson's The Grifters (1963) for the film The Grifters (1990) dir. Stephen Frears and starring Anjelica Huston, John Cusack and Annette Bening. The winner of the 1990 Best Screenplay adaptation was Michael Blake for Dances with Wolves, based on his own novel Dances with Wolves (1988).
January 24, 2022
Double Feature was originally published in 1977 under the title Enough. It contains two short novels which both somewhat relate to the movie industry so when this book was republished in 2020 by Hard Case Crime, the name was changed to Double Feature.
The first story in the volume is called "A Travesty" and is very typical of Westlake's crime novels and includes a lot of sardonic humor similar to his Dortmunder stories. The protagonist in the story is a movie critic named Calvin Thorp who accidentally murders his girlfriend with a slap that causes her to fall and hit her head on a coffee table. So he tries to cover this up but is seen leaving the girl's apartment by a private detective who tries to blackmail him. But Thorp is able to turn the tables on the PI which gives him a solid alibi with the police and he is eliminated as a suspect. He then becomes friends with one of the investigating cops when he is able to solve a crime that has them stumped. More murders ensue and Thorp is able to cover his tracks and help the police with more of their cases. But will his luck hold out? This was really a very clever story filled with humor and concludes with a quite perfect ending.
The second story, "Ordo", is quite different and is really not a crime story at all. It is about a Navy sailor name Ordo who finds out through a magazine that his first marriage (annulled by his bride's mother) was to a woman who turned out to be a major Hollywood movie star named Dawn Devayne. His marriage to her was annulled because at the time she was only 16 years old and her name was Estelle Anlic. Ordo can't believe that Estelle was transformed into Dawn -- she looks and acts nothing like he remembers. So he takes leave and goes to Hollywood where he is able to meet her again but her past is something she ends up wanting buried. I really enjoyed this story probably even more than "A Travesty." I think Westlake may have based it on Marilyn Monroe and her first marriage before she became a star. His insight into Hollywood and show business felt right on target and made for some very compelling reading.
Overall, another high recommendation for this one by Westlake. I have read several of his novels and always enjoy them. Glad Hard Case Crime has been republishing some of his forgotten early works. Looking forward to reading more! I was also surprised to find out that both of these stories have been made into movies titled Ordo and A Slight Case of Murder. I'll be on the lookout for them.
The first story in the volume is called "A Travesty" and is very typical of Westlake's crime novels and includes a lot of sardonic humor similar to his Dortmunder stories. The protagonist in the story is a movie critic named Calvin Thorp who accidentally murders his girlfriend with a slap that causes her to fall and hit her head on a coffee table. So he tries to cover this up but is seen leaving the girl's apartment by a private detective who tries to blackmail him. But Thorp is able to turn the tables on the PI which gives him a solid alibi with the police and he is eliminated as a suspect. He then becomes friends with one of the investigating cops when he is able to solve a crime that has them stumped. More murders ensue and Thorp is able to cover his tracks and help the police with more of their cases. But will his luck hold out? This was really a very clever story filled with humor and concludes with a quite perfect ending.
The second story, "Ordo", is quite different and is really not a crime story at all. It is about a Navy sailor name Ordo who finds out through a magazine that his first marriage (annulled by his bride's mother) was to a woman who turned out to be a major Hollywood movie star named Dawn Devayne. His marriage to her was annulled because at the time she was only 16 years old and her name was Estelle Anlic. Ordo can't believe that Estelle was transformed into Dawn -- she looks and acts nothing like he remembers. So he takes leave and goes to Hollywood where he is able to meet her again but her past is something she ends up wanting buried. I really enjoyed this story probably even more than "A Travesty." I think Westlake may have based it on Marilyn Monroe and her first marriage before she became a star. His insight into Hollywood and show business felt right on target and made for some very compelling reading.
Overall, another high recommendation for this one by Westlake. I have read several of his novels and always enjoy them. Glad Hard Case Crime has been republishing some of his forgotten early works. Looking forward to reading more! I was also surprised to find out that both of these stories have been made into movies titled Ordo and A Slight Case of Murder. I'll be on the lookout for them.
August 23, 2021
What a fantastic find! "Double Feature" is a collection of one novella and one short story by Donald Westlake that had been out of print for years. I don't know what I was expecting but it definitely exceeded anything I could have hoped for!
The first story is about a film critic who accidentally kills his girlfriend when he hits her and her head hits the side of a table. The rest of the story is him trying to cover up this killing with increasingly dangerous activities and the stakes continue to raise, higher and higher. The detectives investigating the crime end up turning to him for help. Mix this in with a healthy dose of self-justification and a 1970's sex drive and you've got a humdinger of a story that makes you constantly ask yourself who exactly you're rooting for here.
The second story is of a middle aged sailor who belatedly realizes that his first wife (then a teenager) has reinvented herself as a major Hollywood star. He tracks her down to get some answers but comes away with a lot more (and a lot less).
Westlake is a master story teller and I loved the way he turned my expectations on their head here. Both are more than the sum of their parts and really made me question what makes a person who they are, what is a morally right decision, etc. Entertaining and thought provoking in equal measure.
The first story is about a film critic who accidentally kills his girlfriend when he hits her and her head hits the side of a table. The rest of the story is him trying to cover up this killing with increasingly dangerous activities and the stakes continue to raise, higher and higher. The detectives investigating the crime end up turning to him for help. Mix this in with a healthy dose of self-justification and a 1970's sex drive and you've got a humdinger of a story that makes you constantly ask yourself who exactly you're rooting for here.
The second story is of a middle aged sailor who belatedly realizes that his first wife (then a teenager) has reinvented herself as a major Hollywood star. He tracks her down to get some answers but comes away with a lot more (and a lot less).
Westlake is a master story teller and I loved the way he turned my expectations on their head here. Both are more than the sum of their parts and really made me question what makes a person who they are, what is a morally right decision, etc. Entertaining and thought provoking in equal measure.
December 29, 2020
DOUBLE FEATURE includes a short novel and a novella. The novel, A TRAVSTY, is a slanted whodunit, which is more of a canhegetawaywithit than anything else since the protagonist--a film critic--is the murderer doing anything he needs to do to stay out of prison. A humorous story that builds from the genre usual into something original. The unexpected, but perfect ending gives it appeal.
The novella, ORDO, is more hardboiled than its pairing, and my favorite of the two. A career navy man--Ordo--discovers his short-time wife of fifteen years earlier has become a Hollywood sex symbol, but she is unrecognizable as the girl he knew. Ordo wants find out how his ex-wife become someone else. What he discovers is painful and melancholy.
A great pair of tales, told in very different styles and with contrasting themes, showcase Westlake's brilliant storytelling skills.
The novella, ORDO, is more hardboiled than its pairing, and my favorite of the two. A career navy man--Ordo--discovers his short-time wife of fifteen years earlier has become a Hollywood sex symbol, but she is unrecognizable as the girl he knew. Ordo wants find out how his ex-wife become someone else. What he discovers is painful and melancholy.
A great pair of tales, told in very different styles and with contrasting themes, showcase Westlake's brilliant storytelling skills.
April 26, 2011
This is an interesting combination of two early Westlake pieces: a novel, "A Travesty," and a novelette, "Ordo." I'm particularly surprised that "A Travesty" was never acquired as a film property (if it was, I'm not aware of it). The darkly delightful plot involves a sexually voracious film reviewer who accidentally kills one of his girlfriends (it's Westlake-- you have to just go with it). In his attempts to flee and cover himself up, he encounters a scheming blackmailing private investigator (likened to Martin Balsam in "Psycho" but for some reason conjuring up Danny DeVito in my own head) who complicates matters. The two detectives investigating the death take a liking to him and bring him along on several of their other cases (again, it's Westlake, you have to go with it) and he shows himself to be an excellent amateur detective. As the plot develops he finds it necessary to commit more murders and sleep with absolutely the wrong women. But he seems to be getting away with all of it......
Many of Westlake's earliest books are amusing but tend to be a trifle silly and to lack the tight intricacy and comprehensiveness of his later work. This one holds up well alongside many of his later comic novels. I'd still love to see someone update it as a film.
The second very different entry is "Ordo," a touching story about a rather simple Navy sailor who discovers that a Hollywood sex goddess was the teenage bride he briefly married in his youth. It's a sort of "you can't go home anymore" tale mixed with "the grass is always greener." This makes for an interesting matchup of VERY contrasting stories, to be sure.
Many of Westlake's earliest books are amusing but tend to be a trifle silly and to lack the tight intricacy and comprehensiveness of his later work. This one holds up well alongside many of his later comic novels. I'd still love to see someone update it as a film.
The second very different entry is "Ordo," a touching story about a rather simple Navy sailor who discovers that a Hollywood sex goddess was the teenage bride he briefly married in his youth. It's a sort of "you can't go home anymore" tale mixed with "the grass is always greener." This makes for an interesting matchup of VERY contrasting stories, to be sure.
February 12, 2020
This is a republication of two novellas published in 1977, A Travesty and Ordo, originally published under the title Enough and now published by HCC as Double Feature. The first novella is an excellent crime novel, the latter is not, but nonetheless interesting.
A Travesty reads like Patricia Highsmith rewriting Crime and Punishment. The protagonist, Carey Thorpe calls to mind Tom Ripley, but, while Westlake wrote with same irony as Highsmith, he did so with the humor she lacked.
Ordo is one of the most unique stories I've read, which made it thoroughly unpredictable.
Glad HCC reissued this, otherwise I might never have picked it up. Glad I did.
A Travesty reads like Patricia Highsmith rewriting Crime and Punishment. The protagonist, Carey Thorpe calls to mind Tom Ripley, but, while Westlake wrote with same irony as Highsmith, he did so with the humor she lacked.
Ordo is one of the most unique stories I've read, which made it thoroughly unpredictable.
Glad HCC reissued this, otherwise I might never have picked it up. Glad I did.
May 17, 2021
This book was originally published as Enough in 1977. Hard Case Crime has done its readers a service by bringing it back with a better title Double Feature and a retro, slightly vampy Paul Mann cover. (The original edition featured horrible cover art and horrible frontispiece illustrations to go along with its horrible title.) It contains two stories--a novella and a novelette-- that both revolve around the ultimate land of fantasy and deceit--Hollywood:
1. "Travesty" (3 stars)
Carey Thorpe is a film critic who has killed one of his girlfriends ("Well, she was dead, and there was no use crying over spilt milk.") A private eye knows he is guilty and is demanding blackmail money. Two cops are investigating him. Some men might wilt under all the pressure, but Carey always keeps his cool, stays one step ahead of everyone, and never misses an opportunity to exercise his famous libido.
This is a cleverly plotted and well-told comedy that excels at the deadpan delivery: "It was the first time I'd ever made love to a woman in a bedroom with a murder victim hanging in the closet, particularly a victim of my own, and I must say it made absolutely no difference at all. I was neither turned off nor were my responses heightened. Possibly I'm abnormal."
Carey begins helping the police solve a variety of local crimes, as a ploy to stay close to them and steer their investigation away from himself as a suspect. In these cases, he inhabits the traditional roles of The Murderer, The Detective, The Least Likely Suspect, and The Detective's Sidekick (complete with a Watson joke).
The drawback of this story is that it sometimes gets too cute. Implausible events happen in order to be funny or to set up a dramatic scene. For example, in the end the cops get their man--sort of--but there's no way the evidence they have would get an indictment, much less a conviction. Yet, this fact is completely ignored in order for the scene to play out in the most ironic way possible.
2. "Ordo" (5 stars)
What would you do if you discovered your ex-wife--whom you married and divorced in a few months' span when you were only twenty-one --turned out to become Hollywood's leading sex symbol sixteen years later?
This is exactly what happens to Ordo Tupikos. After he sees a centerfold of his erstwhile underage bride Dawn Devayne, née Estelle Anlic, he cannot reconcile the woman in the magazine to his memories: "Nothing. The face, the eyes, the smile, all different. The stomach and legs were different. Even the nipples didn't remind me of Estelle Anlic's nipples."
He takes leave from his job in the Navy to go to Tinsel Town and find her. He wants to understand how it is possible for someone to so completely become someone else.
Neither a crime story, nor even a comedy per se (although it certainly has its wry sardonic moments), this is on one level an ode to the power of actors who have the talent to be completely absorbed into the role of another human being. It is also about the impact of fame, wealth, and time on our perceptions of other people. As usual with Westlake, there are many characters with nuanced, subtle relationships and interactions with each other.
The story could have gone in many directions, even up until the final few pages. Westlake's ending is pitch perfect. No matter how much you can change about your life, you can never fully escape your past. In Dawn's case, it is her relationship with her mother.. And it is her mother that came between her and Ordo, not once but twice.
1. "Travesty" (3 stars)
Carey Thorpe is a film critic who has killed one of his girlfriends ("Well, she was dead, and there was no use crying over spilt milk.") A private eye knows he is guilty and is demanding blackmail money. Two cops are investigating him. Some men might wilt under all the pressure, but Carey always keeps his cool, stays one step ahead of everyone, and never misses an opportunity to exercise his famous libido.
This is a cleverly plotted and well-told comedy that excels at the deadpan delivery: "It was the first time I'd ever made love to a woman in a bedroom with a murder victim hanging in the closet, particularly a victim of my own, and I must say it made absolutely no difference at all. I was neither turned off nor were my responses heightened. Possibly I'm abnormal."
Carey begins helping the police solve a variety of local crimes, as a ploy to stay close to them and steer their investigation away from himself as a suspect. In these cases, he inhabits the traditional roles of The Murderer, The Detective, The Least Likely Suspect, and The Detective's Sidekick (complete with a Watson joke).
The drawback of this story is that it sometimes gets too cute. Implausible events happen in order to be funny or to set up a dramatic scene. For example, in the end the cops get their man--sort of--but there's no way the evidence they have would get an indictment, much less a conviction. Yet, this fact is completely ignored in order for the scene to play out in the most ironic way possible.
2. "Ordo" (5 stars)
What would you do if you discovered your ex-wife--whom you married and divorced in a few months' span when you were only twenty-one --turned out to become Hollywood's leading sex symbol sixteen years later?
This is exactly what happens to Ordo Tupikos. After he sees a centerfold of his erstwhile underage bride Dawn Devayne, née Estelle Anlic, he cannot reconcile the woman in the magazine to his memories: "Nothing. The face, the eyes, the smile, all different. The stomach and legs were different. Even the nipples didn't remind me of Estelle Anlic's nipples."
He takes leave from his job in the Navy to go to Tinsel Town and find her. He wants to understand how it is possible for someone to so completely become someone else.
Neither a crime story, nor even a comedy per se (although it certainly has its wry sardonic moments), this is on one level an ode to the power of actors who have the talent to be completely absorbed into the role of another human being. It is also about the impact of fame, wealth, and time on our perceptions of other people. As usual with Westlake, there are many characters with nuanced, subtle relationships and interactions with each other.
The story could have gone in many directions, even up until the final few pages. Westlake's ending is pitch perfect. No matter how much you can change about your life, you can never fully escape your past. In Dawn's case, it is her relationship with her mother.. And it is her mother that came between her and Ordo, not once but twice.
September 1, 2025
Charles Ardai found the perfect pun with which to entitle two almost forgotten Donald E. Westlake novellas. Double Feature is perfect to describe the pair since both deal with the film industry (at least, as a backdrop) and both reflect the author’s passion for movies. The first and lengthier novella, “A Travesty,” entails a noir murder and cover-up by a film critic which spirals downward noir fashion, but with comedic counterpoint.
The machinations the protagonist must gyrate through in order to keep suspicion off him are improbable (but such poetic justice that one willingly accepts the required suspension of disbelief). He has an incredible streak of crime-solving an episodic set of mini-mysteries, forging a friendship with the investigating officer as he does so, but it is his own irresponsible, self-destructive behavior which proves his undoing. And the “unfair” nature of that undoing (to use the protagonist’s own description) is deliciously ironic. “A Travesty” is a fascinating and entertaining story that offers intriguing new contexts and consequences for classic noir tropes.
The shorter novella is entitled “Ordo,” the name of the protagonist. It asks the preposterous question as to how it would affect a person to find that someone in their past had become very famous. In Ordo’s case, his first wife (an annulled marriage forced on him by his bride’s mother) was now the rising sex goddess of the cinema. Yet, Ordo was oblivious to this until a buddy pointed it out to him in a girlie magazine.
The more Ordo thinks about this, the more he can’t understand how his child bride could have changed so much. He can’t see the girl he loved in the images and even when he attends the screening of her latest film. So, he seeks her out and engages in a bittersweet reunion which both does and doesn’t answer his question. And while this novella also requires a considerable amount of suspension of disbelief, I found it well worth the ride. Ordo discovers that fantasy makes a pleasant diversion from reality, but realizes that he is reality-based—no matter the cost.
Hard Case Crime publisher Charles Ardai has a fabulous knack for discovering manuscripts (lost, forgotten, ignored) that are somewhat atypical of well-known writers. Much like Stephen King’s non-genre The Colorado Kid, Double Feature gives us a master of genre coloring outside the broad lines of its tropes. And the fact that Charles works so well with the estates of past masters who are no longer physically with us merely adds to the expectation that there will be more pleasant surprises in the future. I would not rate either of these novellas as 5-star noir and certainly not 5-star thrillers, but for me, they are 5-star unique.
The machinations the protagonist must gyrate through in order to keep suspicion off him are improbable (but such poetic justice that one willingly accepts the required suspension of disbelief). He has an incredible streak of crime-solving an episodic set of mini-mysteries, forging a friendship with the investigating officer as he does so, but it is his own irresponsible, self-destructive behavior which proves his undoing. And the “unfair” nature of that undoing (to use the protagonist’s own description) is deliciously ironic. “A Travesty” is a fascinating and entertaining story that offers intriguing new contexts and consequences for classic noir tropes.
The shorter novella is entitled “Ordo,” the name of the protagonist. It asks the preposterous question as to how it would affect a person to find that someone in their past had become very famous. In Ordo’s case, his first wife (an annulled marriage forced on him by his bride’s mother) was now the rising sex goddess of the cinema. Yet, Ordo was oblivious to this until a buddy pointed it out to him in a girlie magazine.
The more Ordo thinks about this, the more he can’t understand how his child bride could have changed so much. He can’t see the girl he loved in the images and even when he attends the screening of her latest film. So, he seeks her out and engages in a bittersweet reunion which both does and doesn’t answer his question. And while this novella also requires a considerable amount of suspension of disbelief, I found it well worth the ride. Ordo discovers that fantasy makes a pleasant diversion from reality, but realizes that he is reality-based—no matter the cost.
Hard Case Crime publisher Charles Ardai has a fabulous knack for discovering manuscripts (lost, forgotten, ignored) that are somewhat atypical of well-known writers. Much like Stephen King’s non-genre The Colorado Kid, Double Feature gives us a master of genre coloring outside the broad lines of its tropes. And the fact that Charles works so well with the estates of past masters who are no longer physically with us merely adds to the expectation that there will be more pleasant surprises in the future. I would not rate either of these novellas as 5-star noir and certainly not 5-star thrillers, but for me, they are 5-star unique.
August 22, 2020
Double Feature was a very enjoyable book to read. I have not always been the biggest fan of Donald Westlake but the Hard Case Crime line has reintroduced me to this author and I must say I have become quite smitten. Double Feature consists of two novellas that showcase both Westlake's masterful grasp of plotting and his understanding of the human heart. This has been out of print for four decades or so and you have to know, Constant Reader, that this does serve to date the stories slightly in a variety of ways, but I guarantee they are still worth reading.
February 9, 2021
Different and Really Good
This is really closer to 4.5 stars. Two novellas , the first a comic crime story and the second a mediation on celebrity and who we are and do we change. The first is an entertaining story of the kind we are used to from Westlake. The second is a more sober story about a man meeting his first wife who has become a Hollywood star. Its not the usual Westlake fare but the guy wrote like a dream and the story is unusually moving. Highly recommended.
This is really closer to 4.5 stars. Two novellas , the first a comic crime story and the second a mediation on celebrity and who we are and do we change. The first is an entertaining story of the kind we are used to from Westlake. The second is a more sober story about a man meeting his first wife who has become a Hollywood star. Its not the usual Westlake fare but the guy wrote like a dream and the story is unusually moving. Highly recommended.
February 1, 2026
Two great stories - one a novella, the other a short - from the crime writer Donald Westlake. The first is a bitter comedy about a movie critic avoiding justice after killing one of his mistresses. It's good fun and moves at a great pace, but it's the short that's the headline here. A great Hollywood romantic tragedy in a few dozen brief pages. It was made into a film in the early 00s. Had it been written in his era, someone like Billy Wilder could have done something really special with it.
April 18, 2021
As you can probably tell from the title this is two different stories. The first one is a great detective story about a murderer. The second tale is about people changing over time. Not really sure why it would be included in a detective novel? Anyway, read the first story and skip the second. You’ll be glad you did.
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July 23, 2024Fabulous short stories/novellas by Westlake that deal in different ways with the movie world. The first is told by an unrepentant murderer— it’s laugh out loud funny.
April 4, 2020
Další knihy z edice Hard Case Crime obsahuje hned dva romány. No, spíš jeden kratší román a jednu delší povídku.
Travesty u nás kdysi vyšlo jako Jak nevodit policii za nos, což byl trochu danajský název, protože člověk pak čekal řachandu ve stylu Jak neuloupit smaragd, a místo toho dostal v podstatě čistý noirový příběh, jen psaný s ironickým nadhledem. Asi něco jako by Pelham G. Wodehouse napsal Americké psycho. Hlavní hrdiny je filmový recenzent a je, jako všichni filmoví recenzenti, sociopat. Na začátku nešťastnou náhodu zabije svou přítelkyni, ovšem jak se to snaží zamaskovat, začne velmi rychle mrtvých přibývat. Shodou okolností je jediný, kdo z vražd není podezřelý - naopak se brzy stane součástí policejního týmu a pomáhá kriminalistům řešit další případy. Což je zábavné – a jak jsou ty případy krátké, tak ani moc nevadí, že řešení jsou obvykle na úrovni záhad detektiva Štiky.
Celý příběh dost odsýpá, sice chvílemi cestou zakufruje a je fakt, že na román je možná trochu uměle natažený kriminálními minipovídkami, ale je to pořád Westlake. Ve formě a zábavný.
A pak je tu příběh Ordo, který vůbec není kriminálka. Dokonce v něm nedojde ani k žádné vraždě či jinému zločinu. Je to Westlakeův odskok do čistého psychologického dramatu. Hlavní hrdina je námořník, který náhle zjistí, že současný filmový sex symbol je holka, se kterou byl v mládí chvíli ženatý. Jenže problém je, že ji vůbec nepoznává. Holka, kterou znával, když jí ještě ani nebylo dvacet, se změnila v něco úplně jiného. A jak se mohla tak změnit, když on zůstává stále stejný?
Hrdina se vydává hledat odpověď na tuhle otázku do Hollywoodu a Westlake rozehrává vlastně dost obyčejný a skoro nedramatický příběh, ve kterém popisuje svět, kde chce být každý hvězdou, z pohledu takového skoro-forresta-gumpa. Vyrukuje s vážně pěknými postřehy, nápady a sarkastickými poznámkami. A dokazuje to, že by Westlake mohl klidně psát velkou literaturu, kdyby zblbnul.
Travesty u nás kdysi vyšlo jako Jak nevodit policii za nos, což byl trochu danajský název, protože člověk pak čekal řachandu ve stylu Jak neuloupit smaragd, a místo toho dostal v podstatě čistý noirový příběh, jen psaný s ironickým nadhledem. Asi něco jako by Pelham G. Wodehouse napsal Americké psycho. Hlavní hrdiny je filmový recenzent a je, jako všichni filmoví recenzenti, sociopat. Na začátku nešťastnou náhodu zabije svou přítelkyni, ovšem jak se to snaží zamaskovat, začne velmi rychle mrtvých přibývat. Shodou okolností je jediný, kdo z vražd není podezřelý - naopak se brzy stane součástí policejního týmu a pomáhá kriminalistům řešit další případy. Což je zábavné – a jak jsou ty případy krátké, tak ani moc nevadí, že řešení jsou obvykle na úrovni záhad detektiva Štiky.
Celý příběh dost odsýpá, sice chvílemi cestou zakufruje a je fakt, že na román je možná trochu uměle natažený kriminálními minipovídkami, ale je to pořád Westlake. Ve formě a zábavný.
A pak je tu příběh Ordo, který vůbec není kriminálka. Dokonce v něm nedojde ani k žádné vraždě či jinému zločinu. Je to Westlakeův odskok do čistého psychologického dramatu. Hlavní hrdina je námořník, který náhle zjistí, že současný filmový sex symbol je holka, se kterou byl v mládí chvíli ženatý. Jenže problém je, že ji vůbec nepoznává. Holka, kterou znával, když jí ještě ani nebylo dvacet, se změnila v něco úplně jiného. A jak se mohla tak změnit, když on zůstává stále stejný?
Hrdina se vydává hledat odpověď na tuhle otázku do Hollywoodu a Westlake rozehrává vlastně dost obyčejný a skoro nedramatický příběh, ve kterém popisuje svět, kde chce být každý hvězdou, z pohledu takového skoro-forresta-gumpa. Vyrukuje s vážně pěknými postřehy, nápady a sarkastickými poznámkami. A dokazuje to, že by Westlake mohl klidně psát velkou literaturu, kdyby zblbnul.
December 21, 2023
This was hard to rate. Initially, I thought it was not going to be one of Westlake's stronger efforts, and I remain unconvinced, but there is enough that is interesting and unconventional here for me to give it some points for trying. Nothing on the front or back cover suggests that this is anything than a novel, though the further I got in, the more puzzled I got by the cover image of the guy in the sailor suit, since it seemed to have nothing to do with the story. Turns out that that's because this is not a novel, but rather two stories, one probably long enough to have been published independently, and the second more novelette length. The first is called "Travesty," and involves Carey Thorpe telling us the story of how he went from film critic to multiple murderer. This seemed to me pretty rough out the gate, and I am not sure it ever gelled. Thorpe rather improbably ends up helping the detectives investigating his first murder (he is the one suspect the clear without reservation) with other crimes, as a sort of ad hoc Sherlock Holmes. He gets to crime scenes spots the clues the dumbbell detectives have missed, and solve the cases. These feel more like interpolated puzzle short stories than part of a single organic narrative. Then Thorpe ends up having an affair with the wife of one of the cops, and gets caught, so the cop frames him for the first of his actual murders. That gives the story its primary interest. The cops are plodders, typical of amateur detective stories, but then they turn out to be willing to frame a man (and therefore, as far as they know, let a multiple killer go free) over a personal offence. Thorpe is also an interesting narrator, clearly a sociopath (he even idly speculates at one point that maybe there is something wrong with him). The fact that this is not a novel but two stories allows as well for a surprising ending. When Thorpe seems nailed dead with about 40 pages to go, naturally I expected him to manage somehow to wiggle out of it, but then, boom, the story was over, and he was off to the jug. The second story, "Ordo," is very tangentially connected to the first by a continued interest in movies. Whereas "Travesty" has meta elements about life imitating film, though, "Ordo" takes a different tack. Ordo is out protagonist, the sailor from the cover, as well as the narrator. He discovers that the current hot actress was (apparently) the woman he was briefly married to sixteen years earlier. Trouble is, when he looks at the actress, he just can't see his former wife in her, so he sets out to reconnect with her and try to figure things out. Westlake red herrings the reader (or this reader, anyway) into believing that this is going to be a story of stolen identity, with the original girl dead and buried somewhere. Westlake is a crime writer, after all, and that is a crime story standby. However, things turn out very differently, with Westlake offering some interesting commentary on the nature of identity and perception. This is so-called "mainstream" fiction, with no crime element at all, ultimately, and to me, all the more interesting for playing on genre expectations. So, maybe 3.5 stars would be more accurate, but given the choice between 3 and 4, I will give this one the benefit of the extra half point.
October 29, 2025
[warning, spoilers, but nothing major]
“Double Feature” combines two novellas that are loosely connected to movies — thus the title — but are in every other way total opposites. The first, “A Travesty”, features a film critic who is clever, quick-thinking, charming, and totally amoral. Artworks featuring despicable critics always suggest special pleading to me, but Carey Thorpe goes well beyond the usual criticisms that authors have about critics. We are introduced to him immediately after he accidentally kills Laura, one of his lovers — he hit her, yes, but didn’t intend for her to hit her head on a coffee table and die — and his response, to immediately remove all evidence of his presence from her apartment and leave, tells us a lot about him. Subsequently, he ingratiates himself with the police investigating the murder in order to ensure that the investigation doesn’t point to him, and impresses them so much that they even begin asking him for help in solving other murders, which he does with elan. In the meantime, the cops aren’t the only ones who are wondering about Laura’s death, and Carey has additional work to do to cover his tracks. It’s brilliant, sharply plotted, and occasionally quite funny, and the fact that Carey essentially has no redeeming features, except possibly for his love for old movies, makes it easy to go along for the ride without worrying about what’s going to happen. By contrast, “Ordo” is far more meditative, with the focus being more on its atmosphere of melancholy than its story. Ordo, the protagonist here, is not clever, quick-thinking, charming, or amoral: he joined the Navy as a young man, and over the course of 20 years has barely risen at all, but he’s a fundamentally decent guy enjoying a quiet life who accidentally discovers that the girl whom he was briefly married to years ago has since undergone a metamorphosis and turned into a major Hollywood star and sex symbol. This shouldn’t matter — at the time, she was so far from being movie star material that he has a hard time believing it — but his coworkers, friends, and even his girlfriend all start seeing him differently when they learn about it, and eventually this disrupts his heretofore placid life to the point that he decides to go out to Hollywood and visit her. The result is another outsider’s account of the reality of Hollywood behind the glitz and glamor: it’s less original than “A Travesty”, but just as successful in its own way. It helps that Westlake avoids being overly judgy: Dawn Devayne’s new life as a famous actress may not be all its cracked up to be, but it’s far from obvious that she would have done any better as Ordo’s wife Estelle. (There’s an early Doris Day musical, “It’s a Great Feeling”, in which her character gives up on making it in Hollywood and goes back to Wisconsin to get married. Her fiance is played, in a cameo, by Errol Flynn: Ordo is basically the opposite of that.) The cover promises dark secrets, but those aren’t what stuck with me: instead, it’s more the overall mood than any individual incidents. Movies are a fairly thin justification for packaging these two novellas together: better to think of them as a demonstration of Westlake’s impressively wide range.
“Double Feature” combines two novellas that are loosely connected to movies — thus the title — but are in every other way total opposites. The first, “A Travesty”, features a film critic who is clever, quick-thinking, charming, and totally amoral. Artworks featuring despicable critics always suggest special pleading to me, but Carey Thorpe goes well beyond the usual criticisms that authors have about critics. We are introduced to him immediately after he accidentally kills Laura, one of his lovers — he hit her, yes, but didn’t intend for her to hit her head on a coffee table and die — and his response, to immediately remove all evidence of his presence from her apartment and leave, tells us a lot about him. Subsequently, he ingratiates himself with the police investigating the murder in order to ensure that the investigation doesn’t point to him, and impresses them so much that they even begin asking him for help in solving other murders, which he does with elan. In the meantime, the cops aren’t the only ones who are wondering about Laura’s death, and Carey has additional work to do to cover his tracks. It’s brilliant, sharply plotted, and occasionally quite funny, and the fact that Carey essentially has no redeeming features, except possibly for his love for old movies, makes it easy to go along for the ride without worrying about what’s going to happen. By contrast, “Ordo” is far more meditative, with the focus being more on its atmosphere of melancholy than its story. Ordo, the protagonist here, is not clever, quick-thinking, charming, or amoral: he joined the Navy as a young man, and over the course of 20 years has barely risen at all, but he’s a fundamentally decent guy enjoying a quiet life who accidentally discovers that the girl whom he was briefly married to years ago has since undergone a metamorphosis and turned into a major Hollywood star and sex symbol. This shouldn’t matter — at the time, she was so far from being movie star material that he has a hard time believing it — but his coworkers, friends, and even his girlfriend all start seeing him differently when they learn about it, and eventually this disrupts his heretofore placid life to the point that he decides to go out to Hollywood and visit her. The result is another outsider’s account of the reality of Hollywood behind the glitz and glamor: it’s less original than “A Travesty”, but just as successful in its own way. It helps that Westlake avoids being overly judgy: Dawn Devayne’s new life as a famous actress may not be all its cracked up to be, but it’s far from obvious that she would have done any better as Ordo’s wife Estelle. (There’s an early Doris Day musical, “It’s a Great Feeling”, in which her character gives up on making it in Hollywood and goes back to Wisconsin to get married. Her fiance is played, in a cameo, by Errol Flynn: Ordo is basically the opposite of that.) The cover promises dark secrets, but those aren’t what stuck with me: instead, it’s more the overall mood than any individual incidents. Movies are a fairly thin justification for packaging these two novellas together: better to think of them as a demonstration of Westlake’s impressively wide range.
August 23, 2023
Continuing my delve into the nails and hair of Westlake's authorial corpse...
A couple of novellas resurrected from being out of print since 1977, the first and more intricate story concerns the doings of film critic Carey Thorpe, standing over the body of his dead mistress, who he has accidentally just killed (you know, by punching her) in her Greenwich Village apartment. Covering up his crime leads to all sorts of complications, including but not limited to kiting checks, bank robbery, and premeditated murder; more bizarrely, it leads him to cooperating with a pair of homicide detectives in solving several locked-room style murders. On the whole, very clever and mordantly humorous, and to be fair, I don't feel that Westlake ever meant us to actually like his rather nauseating protagonist, whose standard post-coital compliment to his many conquests is "I love your pubic hair".
The second novella concerns Ordo Tupikos, a man whose life has pretty much stalled out in the Navy; sixteen years prior, he had married a girl who claimed to be nineteen on the marriage certificate, but it transpired was sixteen at the time, when the marriage was annulled. Now, under a different name, she has developed into a big time, up and coming Hollywood sex goddess; Ordo has been forced into consciousness by being outed in a profile of her in a "lad's rag", to use an anachronistic term, and is struggling to reconcile the fact that, while he still very much the same person who married her, he has no sense that she is in any way the same person who married him. He takes a leave from Navy and goes to Hollywood, to see if he can find the girl he married. While Carey Thorpe appears to have a pubic fixation, Ordo has a strange compulsion to elucidate the ethnicity of the people he is describing, which is almost as weird, but somehow slightly more wholesome, I guess. Notwithstanding, this story does have some interesting philosophical implications.
A couple of novellas resurrected from being out of print since 1977, the first and more intricate story concerns the doings of film critic Carey Thorpe, standing over the body of his dead mistress, who he has accidentally just killed (you know, by punching her) in her Greenwich Village apartment. Covering up his crime leads to all sorts of complications, including but not limited to kiting checks, bank robbery, and premeditated murder; more bizarrely, it leads him to cooperating with a pair of homicide detectives in solving several locked-room style murders. On the whole, very clever and mordantly humorous, and to be fair, I don't feel that Westlake ever meant us to actually like his rather nauseating protagonist, whose standard post-coital compliment to his many conquests is "I love your pubic hair".
The second novella concerns Ordo Tupikos, a man whose life has pretty much stalled out in the Navy; sixteen years prior, he had married a girl who claimed to be nineteen on the marriage certificate, but it transpired was sixteen at the time, when the marriage was annulled. Now, under a different name, she has developed into a big time, up and coming Hollywood sex goddess; Ordo has been forced into consciousness by being outed in a profile of her in a "lad's rag", to use an anachronistic term, and is struggling to reconcile the fact that, while he still very much the same person who married her, he has no sense that she is in any way the same person who married him. He takes a leave from Navy and goes to Hollywood, to see if he can find the girl he married. While Carey Thorpe appears to have a pubic fixation, Ordo has a strange compulsion to elucidate the ethnicity of the people he is describing, which is almost as weird, but somehow slightly more wholesome, I guess. Notwithstanding, this story does have some interesting philosophical implications.
August 4, 2025
My first complaint would be the Hard Case cover is very misleading making you expect a crime case set in 50s Hollywood which is what made me excited to read but was extremely disappointed by the end but for a multitude of reasons.
One thing that came clear very quickly was the book is brilliantly paced and the writer has great technique. A lot of the first story was carried by dialogue that flowed brilliantly. What also became clear was the writer’s personality was absolutely obvious with language that has not aged well. Not only was homophobic and sexist language used, it was used in abundance throughout both stories that my guess was, gay men especially, must have bothered Westlake a lot. Even to the point a gay relationship was the centre of one murder that I didn’t need to guess Weatlake was an obsessive cat after a mouse.
There is a line in the first story where the main character says that they were not in a movie and they needed to be more realistic which felt ironic as the whole story felt extremely unrealistic. In what world would trained policeman enlist a stranger to start solving crimes for them?
The second story had a fantastic premise but the ending felt rushed and went nowhere. The story lacked any crime themes and felt as though it was trying to be a philosophical thinker of a tiny story which was nothing but thin in length and story development.
One thing that came clear very quickly was the book is brilliantly paced and the writer has great technique. A lot of the first story was carried by dialogue that flowed brilliantly. What also became clear was the writer’s personality was absolutely obvious with language that has not aged well. Not only was homophobic and sexist language used, it was used in abundance throughout both stories that my guess was, gay men especially, must have bothered Westlake a lot. Even to the point a gay relationship was the centre of one murder that I didn’t need to guess Weatlake was an obsessive cat after a mouse.
There is a line in the first story where the main character says that they were not in a movie and they needed to be more realistic which felt ironic as the whole story felt extremely unrealistic. In what world would trained policeman enlist a stranger to start solving crimes for them?
The second story had a fantastic premise but the ending felt rushed and went nowhere. The story lacked any crime themes and felt as though it was trying to be a philosophical thinker of a tiny story which was nothing but thin in length and story development.
March 6, 2023
Double Feature is an interesting set of novellas (The first and longer one being much better than the other)... both having a strong movie theme. The first is about a film critic who accidentally kills a girlfriend and then seeks to cover it up. During the investigation, he befriends one of the detectives and somehow winds up solving several murder mysteries for him. Throughout the story, the film critic examines people, scenes, etc. in light of films he has seen, which makes for very interesting reading. Meanwhile, the murder of his girlfriend remains unsolved, a blackmailing private investigator must be dealt with, and he must continue to cover his tracks. It is almost as if he is a genius at criminal behavior...
Westlake offers a fantastic twist at the end of the story.
The second story is not nearly as compelling... A sailor discovers that he was once married to a sexy movie star (marriage was annulled) and now she goes under a different name. The story is much more about how people change and is nothing like most of Westlake's other stories. Though the reader suspects that there will be some kind of crime attached-- there isn't. It is just a story about sad, sad, people.
Westlake offers a fantastic twist at the end of the story.
The second story is not nearly as compelling... A sailor discovers that he was once married to a sexy movie star (marriage was annulled) and now she goes under a different name. The story is much more about how people change and is nothing like most of Westlake's other stories. Though the reader suspects that there will be some kind of crime attached-- there isn't. It is just a story about sad, sad, people.
September 19, 2025
Donald Westlake is one of the premier American crime fiction writers, having published from 1960 until his death in 2008. Several movie versions, most well known for The Grifters but lots of B movies and some TV stuff also. I had never heard of him but I saw a quote from Stephen King about how funny he was and that seemed worth a shot, no pun intended.
He is pretty funny without seemingly trying. It’s kind of Sam Spade, Mike Hammer -ish in style though in the longer novella of this Double Feature, the “hero” is a movie critic. I hedge on hero because he kills 3 people including 2 women and yet I was still rooting for him. The cops investigate the first death, clear him and then use him to solve several other murders as he seems to have a knack for it. This “knack” allows him to escape detection.. in conjunction with the 2 other murders. It’s breezy and funny and pretty readable.
The second story here concerns a quiet man who discovers that years ago he was married to a now movie star. He decides to go to LA and meet her. This short story is handled quite reasonably by Mr Westlake.
I’m not ready to jump into another Westlake right now as I’d. like a bit more depth in my reading., it’s fun though, no complaints
He is pretty funny without seemingly trying. It’s kind of Sam Spade, Mike Hammer -ish in style though in the longer novella of this Double Feature, the “hero” is a movie critic. I hedge on hero because he kills 3 people including 2 women and yet I was still rooting for him. The cops investigate the first death, clear him and then use him to solve several other murders as he seems to have a knack for it. This “knack” allows him to escape detection.. in conjunction with the 2 other murders. It’s breezy and funny and pretty readable.
The second story here concerns a quiet man who discovers that years ago he was married to a now movie star. He decides to go to LA and meet her. This short story is handled quite reasonably by Mr Westlake.
I’m not ready to jump into another Westlake right now as I’d. like a bit more depth in my reading., it’s fun though, no complaints
Read
April 21, 2022I'm going to expand on this more later I think, but this thing was a blast... or more specifically, most of this was a blast.
Comprised of two stories of unequal length, the large bulk (~70%) of Double Feature is incredible. I was on the edge of my seat watching a well-intentioned man fall further and further into the depths of debauchery and it was an absolute joy. I should have seen the ending coming a mile away but it still managed to surprise me.
The second story was... fine? There's nothing really objectionable (aside from some outdated and problematic language) and I found the central concept to be interesting, but I was mostly reading it because it was the second portion of an incredible read. I'm incredibly glad that I read the first story and that it basically landed into my lap out of the blue, but I could take or leave the second story.
Still, considering that the large bulk of this collection IS the first story, I'm viewing this as an absolute win with a fluffy coda at the end. Very surprised and happy that I grabbed this; I liked it way more than I possibly expected.
Comprised of two stories of unequal length, the large bulk (~70%) of Double Feature is incredible. I was on the edge of my seat watching a well-intentioned man fall further and further into the depths of debauchery and it was an absolute joy. I should have seen the ending coming a mile away but it still managed to surprise me.
The second story was... fine? There's nothing really objectionable (aside from some outdated and problematic language) and I found the central concept to be interesting, but I was mostly reading it because it was the second portion of an incredible read. I'm incredibly glad that I read the first story and that it basically landed into my lap out of the blue, but I could take or leave the second story.
Still, considering that the large bulk of this collection IS the first story, I'm viewing this as an absolute win with a fluffy coda at the end. Very surprised and happy that I grabbed this; I liked it way more than I possibly expected.
February 19, 2023
Two novelettes, or maybe more like one novelette and one short story. Westlake is one of my favorite crime fiction writers , but there is a reason this particular one has been out of print for years.
The first, and longest story is about a screenwriter who kills one of his girlfriends and spends the rest of the story trying to dodge the blame. In doing so he compounds the crime by commiting more murders. I think it's meant to read as a comedy. But it's got the tone all wrong. You can't help but hope he gets caught and really suffers. This may be my least favorite Westlake story.
The second story is really good. It really doesn't have anything to do with crime, but has the same tone as a solid crime story. About a sailor who gets married to an underage girl early in his life. He divorces her when he finds out and never hears from her again. Until years later finds out that she is now a famous movie star. The story is about how he comes to terms with the how his ex-wife has changed. I don't say this often, but this is one of the best short stories I have ever read. Too bad it's paired with such a medoicre companion piece.
The first, and longest story is about a screenwriter who kills one of his girlfriends and spends the rest of the story trying to dodge the blame. In doing so he compounds the crime by commiting more murders. I think it's meant to read as a comedy. But it's got the tone all wrong. You can't help but hope he gets caught and really suffers. This may be my least favorite Westlake story.
The second story is really good. It really doesn't have anything to do with crime, but has the same tone as a solid crime story. About a sailor who gets married to an underage girl early in his life. He divorces her when he finds out and never hears from her again. Until years later finds out that she is now a famous movie star. The story is about how he comes to terms with the how his ex-wife has changed. I don't say this often, but this is one of the best short stories I have ever read. Too bad it's paired with such a medoicre companion piece.
October 29, 2020
This is, as the title promises, a double feature, including the novellas "A Travesty", and "Ordo".
Truthfully though, coming in at about 180 pages, A Travesty is long enough to be counted as a novel in its own right, and Ordo is really a novelette. The link between the two is a connection to the movie industry.
I enjoyed A Travesty more. It was a crime story about the cover up of a murder, and is the kind of tale I expect from Hard Case. I liked the way events kept escalating, and was torn between rooting for the protagonist to get away with it and being horrified by his actions.
There are different kinds of mini-mystery homages inserted now and then, and some almost parody deductions.
Ordo is not a typical crime story or mystery. There isn't even a true . But it is a great mood piece and exploration of character.
Truthfully though, coming in at about 180 pages, A Travesty is long enough to be counted as a novel in its own right, and Ordo is really a novelette. The link between the two is a connection to the movie industry.
I enjoyed A Travesty more. It was a crime story about the cover up of a murder, and is the kind of tale I expect from Hard Case. I liked the way events kept escalating, and was torn between rooting for the protagonist to get away with it and being horrified by his actions.
There are different kinds of mini-mystery homages inserted now and then, and some almost parody deductions.
Ordo is not a typical crime story or mystery. There isn't even a true . But it is a great mood piece and exploration of character.
Read
December 8, 2023the second story here was really surprising! not a crime story at all, but a wonderful compliment to the first story (about a NY movie critic who kills his girlfriend then descends into a number of crimes). ordo is a navy man who one day discovers that his ex-wife Estelle has become a big hollywood starlet. he takes leave to find and visit her because he just can't wrap his head around how she changed and he's still the same guy. a look into the world and image of hollywood, how its as real as you let it be. unlike carey thorpe, the protagonist of the first novella, ordo is sympathetic and curious. his interest in his ex-wife is seen suspiciously at first - guys on his boat are all macho sex-obsessed, everyone in hollywood thinks he could be looking for a job or money. but ordo just wants to know what's up. really quietly beautiful.
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