Helpful Tips for Job Hunters

My fiancee has been looking for a new job ever since I met him, over a year ago. He currently works at the State Penitentiary (not an overly cheery job, as you can imagine) and is always lamenting about the lack of good job prospects in the area. After reading Donald E. Westlake's The Ax, I've got a few helpful job hunting tips for him...

The Plot

Burke Devore has been out of work for over two years since the paper mill he was a manager at decided to move all of their jobs to the cheaper labor force of Canada. Although Burke has been laboriously looking for a job since then, the job market is tight and his talents are in a special area of paper production where there are few job openings and an excess of prospective employees. All parts of Burke's life are suffering because of his lack of employment. His marriage is going south, they have to sell one of the family's two cars, they can't live in nearly the same style they're used to and it won't be long before they have to sell the house. So what's a man supposed to do? Why, kill off the other prospective employees, of course!

Burke makes up his own paper company and puts an ad in a trade magazine asking for resumes that have the exact same talents and experience that Burke himself has. After receiving hundreds of resumes, Burke sets his sights on four men that will be competition for the job he wants. The plan is, kill off these four men, then kill off the man who has the job he wants and he'll be a shoe-in for the now open position. The perfect solution to all his problems!

What I Liked

Donald writes in a straight-forward, no frills style that is incredibly easy to read and read quickly. I got through this book in two days with about five or six hours of reading time put in.

The premise of the book is very interesting and unique. An idea like this wouldn't occur to your average job hunter (at least I hope my fiancee has never thought of this), but what would happen if someone very desperate did think this was the only option? Very intriguing.

I also thought the author did a good job of showing the progression of Burke and how it became easier and easier for him to do bad things. After he'd killed a couple people, it became much easier to imagine covering up for his kid when he got arrested for burglary and to imagine killing other people who got in his way.

What I Wasn't So Sure Of

WARNING!!! SPOILER!!! Skip this paragraph if you plan on reading the book: Throughout his murdering spree, Burke Devore, a 50+ year old man who has never done a violent thing in his life, never makes a big mistake or even becomes close to getting caught. This a)takes away from the suspense a bit b)isn't very realistic and c) almost gives the message 'murder is easy to get away with!' I thought there should have been more close calls and that he should at least be suspected a bit.


Killing people is a huge step over the line (especially if it's cold-blooded) for most ordinary people. You either have to be predisposed to this type of thing (i.e. mentally unbalanced or a natural born killer) or you have to be so extremely desperate that no other option makes any sense and you've gone a bit out of your mind due to the desperation. So, which is Burke Devore? Well, he's portrayed as your every day working man with a nice family and a nice home. You never really get a hint of psychosis or bloodthirst and he seems genuinely upset about what he has to do. So that leaves the second option--desperation. Here's where the problem comes in. I wasn't convinced that our Mr. Burke Devore was substantially desperate enough to jump to this solution of killing people. After all, in the two years he has been unemployed, he's never even attempted to get a different kind of job other than his specialty in the paper mill. Don't you think you'd explore other options, such as working a job that wasn't 'good enough' for you, before you decided to start killing people? I think I would have been more convinced if Burke had tried everything else before he landed at this option.

Another problem I had was the stereotypes of the book. Burke's wife (a college graduate) has seen her family go to poo-poo in front of her eyes, mostly due to the lack of money in the family. So, what does she do? Why, work a part time job that pays $100 a week, of course! What else would she do? After all, she gets the impression that her husband wouldn't want her working full-time. I wanted to punch her in the face. If my husband had been out of work two years and we were in danger of losing our house, you better bet your heiney I'd get a full-time job and probably a part-time job added on to it! But no, she stays home, cooks dinner, cleans and works her piddly part-time job. Westlake makes a feeble attempt at describing this by saying 'there isn't a full-time job out there for a woman who's been out of the job market for so long'. Give me a break. ANYONE can find a full-time job, especially anyone with a college degree. Granted, she's not going to be employed as a brain surgeon, but she can sure as hell get a full-time job at a quick stop, office or something. I just felt like the author was perpetuating the 'women shouldn't work full-time, they should take care of the household' stereotype. If explained better (Burke had actually TOLD his wife not to work, the wife couldn't handle full-time employment, SOMETHING), it would have been okay because it wouldn't be the author's stereotype, it would be the characters' and we all know that characters, just like people, have plenty of stereotypes.

The other stereotype concerned their black marriage counselor. When they first meet him, Burke wonders, "Did my wife know he was black when she hired him?" (like it matters) and later the black character himself makes a comment about "I'm wondering how you feel about taking advice from a black man," which comes off as crazy as if he said, "I'm wondering how you feel about taking advice from a squealing pig." Why shouldn't they take advice from a fully licensed counselor who just happens to be black? Again, it would be okay if it was explained that Burke and his wife are a bit racist, but instead it comes off as plain fact that we should be uneasy about taking advice from a black man.

Just a side not here: the book was published and takes place in 1997, so it's not like we're talking about the 1950s when women didn't work outside of the home and there weren't many black professionals.

Final Recommendation

I'm recommending the book because it's a very good premise for a story, the action rolls right along and it's an entertaining read. I had a few problems with the content, but I still enjoyed the book and thought it was by and large well written.

Now I'm going to hurry and take it back to the library before my fiancee gets any ideas...