can’t wait to explore the world with our parker totes in tow 😛

Made the world's first Tough Business merch at my wife's local library @lilyslabo.bsky.social 💗💗💗

"The planning of the job is like rehearsal" - An Exclusive Interview with Stephen R. Thorne

Tough Business recently had the great pleasure of interviewing actor, director, and audiobook narrator Stephen R. Thorne. Stephen has narrated several of the audiobook versions of the Parker novels published by the University of Chicago Press, and he kindly joined us for an insightful chat about his acting choices, the process behind the recordings, and his thoughts on the characters. 1) You've narrated nine out of twenty-eight books in Richard Starks Parker series, were you at all familiar with the novels beforehand? Have you read the other books in the series? I was not familiar with Westlake (or Stark's) work before recording the audiobooks. Actually the very first book I was hired to do way back in 2008, 1 think, was Somebody Owes Me Money by Donald Westlake. I really enjoyed it primarily because of his writing style. It is direct and colorful and has a distinct rhythm. And that book, if I'm remembering correctly, is in the first person, so really clicking in with the voice of the character was a lot of fun. I haven't read all the Parker books - I have to confess that my reading habits changed once I started narrating full-time - essentially I started reading less - mostly because I would spend many hours reading out loud. But from that first book, I became a fan of his. Revisiting them in this interview makes me want to start a Parker summer reading challenge.

5) Stark's work is renowned within the crime genre for its very distinct style, his short blunt sentences especially. How does that translate to reading out loud, and is maintaining the rhythm of an author's work something you're aware of while recording? My appreciation for Westlake/Stark's work came from that first book I mentioned earlier, but not having read a lot of crime fiction, and (at that point) not having done a lot of audiobook work, I didn't really appreciate how good he is/was. You mention rhythm. That is everything, especially when narrating. Once I began working on other books - and finding myself struggling to find a rhythm - I realized how much the flow is essential to the Parker books. Yes, they are short and direct - they move really well. I'm being a little litcrit here, but maybe that's reflective of Parker's experience of the world, how he has carved out his own way to navigate the very specific and high-stress and risky terrain he inhabits. He is no frills, wants to get in, do his business and get out because lingering excessively is dangerous. Listening to some of them again made me really appreciate that and want to record more of his work!

We just posted a new interview on Tough Business with actor and audiobook narrator Stephen R. Thorne! He chatted with us about the process behind his work and his thoughts on the books themselves.

Take a look below:

toughbusiness.neocities.org/stephenthorn...

just finished reading wicked ways and it was extraordinary. one of those books that would've been wildly formative had i read it aged 16-18

Johnny Cash having a cigarette outside of Folsom Prison in California, 1968.

by Dan Poush/AP.

Jean-Paul Belmondo portrait.

Jean-Paul Belmondo. Born on this day in 1933.

nancy was crying and trying to jump up on me to eat the tacos too. cats literally love when you make food with a bunch of stuff in it that will poison them

i wanted to show everyone the shrimp tacos i made but i got embarrassed by the pool of grease where i put the shrimp while i was cooking the tortillas so i put a sticker over it. and then i put nancy there too

I’m so proud of everything we‘ve accomplished! Check out a nice selection of pieces below:

extras | tough business: a parker site

We've got the world's only archive of men's magazines reprints of Mr. Stark's work and a multitude of exciting interviews with major figures in the world of crime fiction (everybody from Charles Ardai to Shane Black to Ed Brubaker!), both of which can be found here toughbusiness.neocities.org/extras

The Italian Hack Job: Richard Stark's Parker & Foreign Language Editions | tough business: a parker site

We've got a fascinating piece on the 1970 Italian giallo edition of The Sour Lemon Score, and all the ways its translation goes off the rails and fails to capture Stark's text!
toughbusiness.neocities.org/italian

Da Parker Con Furore | From Parker With Fury - Foreword | tough business: a parker site

We've also got the only English translation of Laura Grimaldi's in-depth foreword to the Italian Parker omnibus. This is one of my favorite pieces ever written on Parker, and there's some great parallels drawn between him & Grofield and Dortmunder & Kelp. toughbusiness.neocities.org/itaforeword

"Golden Androgyny" – Homoerotic Subtext in Point Blank (1967)

We've got a collection of academic analyses of the homoerotic subtext in John Boorman's Point Blank (1967), a favorite adaptation of a whole lot of Parker fans. toughbusiness.neocities.org/pointblanksu...

In Defence of Grofield: Stark’s Non-hero

And we've also got two essays analyzing Grofield, both as character and as a vital part of the Richard Stark canon. toughbusiness.neocities.org/grofielddefe...

"Essence of Theater": Alan Grofield & The Glass Closet

Both pieces were written by me, one of them specifically focusing on Grofield as a gaycoded character in the context of 1960s crime fiction. Possibly the only sincere bit of Grofield analysis you're likely to find!
toughbusiness.neocities.org/grofieldsubt...

Play Dirty’s Parker DNA: A Collection of References | tough business: a parker site

And finally, Tough Business also features a lovely list of novel references in Shane Black's Play Dirty - complete with sources and images! toughbusiness.neocities.org/playdirtyrefs

thank you!!! happy colors :)

obsessed with YOU forever

YOU’RE INCREDIBLE THANK YOU!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

lazy afternoon

Mifune sitting down in the desert, foregrounded by tiny little yellow wildflowers. he's wearing a yellow short-sleeved turtleneck & cream corduroy pants, drinking a beer in a glass, and grinning.

Mifune in a cream turtleneck, gazing thoughtfully into his beer

Mifune smiling at us in a white short-sleeved turtleneck, holding a glass of beer with a tiny bit of foam on his tooth, some foliage hanging above him

Toshiro Mifune for Sapporo beer

he redeemed himself in the end

march was an insane month for letterboxd likes

jean-paul belmondo was so wonderful and beautiful.

strangely enjoyed magnet of doom despite really disliking the other melvilles i’ve seen. i have the same problem with godard where i feel super ambivalent towards their work

us parker fans gotta stick together

if anyone wants to see something specific from either parker martini edition let me know by the way. I just figure I’d post a few things I hadn’t seen anywhere online hence the art

Anna Karina in Made in U.S.A (1966) by Darwyn Cooke

From Richard Stark’s Parker: The Martini Edition (2014)

Peter Coyote in Slayground (1983) by Darwyn Cooke

Jack Palance by Darwyn Cooke, from Richard Stark’s Parker: The Martini Edition (2014)