One of Us Is Wrong by Donald Westlake writing as Samuel Holt

Writers are neurotic: we all know that, right? (OK, maybe all of us are neurotic, but let's stick with writers for now.) If they're not successful, they're sure they should be successful, and would be, if not for That One Thing.

If they are successful, they probably think they should be more successful, and think something is holding them back - and, maybe at the same time, wonder if it was inevitable that they became successful, and think about how they could possibly test that.

So they write new series, or try out new genres - or, in the extreme, make up a whole new pseudonym. The most famous example is Stephen King as Richard Bachman - but the famous examples are the ones we know; it's possible that there are long-running famous writers that are actually, secretly, other famous writers.

(Well, no. It really isn't. Publishing leaks like a sieve. These things always come out, usually when the first book is published and the sales force has to say something to bookstore reps to get them to buy it. Every secret in publishing has an expiration date.)

Donald Westlake was neurotic, back in the early '80s. He wanted to see if he could launch an entirely separate career, with a series of mostly straight mystery-thrillers about and supposedly by a former TV detective turned actual amateur detective. As it happened - Westlake has an introduction in this edition about how the secret was revealed before publication of the first book; see my parenthetical note above - it didn't work out the way he wanted, so there were only four books.

All four were reprinted about twenty years later, in the mid-Aughts, in a uniform series look with "Donald Westlake" very large and "writing as Samuel Holt" substantially smaller. I've got copies of all of them, and I hope to get through them all this year. (I'd previously read the first three, back about fifteen years ago, and had a post about the third one here.)

One of Us Is Wrong is a solid novel, along the lines of Westlake's straight thrillers of the period like Kahawa. "Holt" is the former star of a TV show called Packard; he's rich enough a few years after it ended not to have to work again, enough of a workhorse that he wants to do something, and typecast enough that he doesn't get any offers. So: rich, recognizable, and with a lot of free time. A decent mix for an amateur sleuth.

In this one, he gets caught up in international intrigue, which Westlake drops us into by starting with Holt nearly being killed on the freeway and then flashing back to how a writer-producer friend dragged him into it. There are plenty of plot twists along the way - though the violent folks are from exactly the part of the world you would expect, both in 1986 and 2024 - which I will not spoil.

Westlake gives Holt an engaging voice and a lot of to do; it's an interesting tight-rope because Holt is obviously hugely privileged (rich ex-TV star! homes in Hollywood and NYC's Village! an honest-to-God English butler!), even here at the beginning of the series, but he's down-to-earth, at least in his own head.

There is derring-do, there are fiendish plots, there are a few (mostly offstage) murders for spice, and Holt is instrumental in solving the crimes. But he does worry about not telling the cops, before he actually does tell the cops, in another nice two-step. It's a self-aware thriller, at least on a minor level - Westlake was always good at looking at all sides of a story - and another fine book from a fine career.