Before the Devil Knows You’re Dead

I’m currently reading Dirty Money by Richard Stark (actually Donald Westlake, one of my all-time favorite writers). His character, Parker, is always getting tripped up by dealing with amateurs at the heist business. This is the story of a heist planned by two brothers with no experience but a desperate need for money. How desperate? They decide to rob their own parents’ jewelry store, figuring they have enough inside information to make it easy and safe. Of course, it isn’t and we watch in horror as they fuck everything up. The story is told in a fractured timeline, so we learn more things about previous scenes as we go along. It’s damn good, but far from Sidney Lumet’s best.