I suddenly remembered a third writer who belongs to the
"Three Edgars in Three Different Categories" club, the late,
great William DeAndrea. And, to add symmetry, he was also a
friend of Westlake's. He wrote the intro to the Gregg Press
reprint edition of *The Score*.
DeAndrea didn't do much that could truly be called
"hardboiled," though his two-book series about Lobo Blacke
and Quinn Booker in which he applies the
"Nero Wolfe paradigm" to the Old West might be noted by those
looking for
"hardboiled westerns."
He was, however, an enormously entertaining writer, whether
HB or not, and a great fan and incisive critic of the entire
genre. His *Encyclopedia Mysteriosa* is one of the best
reference works on mystery fiction, and won him his
well-deserved third Edgar, in the Critical/Biographical
category. He was also one of mystery-dom's nicest guys.
Since this particular thread on three-time Edgar winners grew
out of Westlake's *Grifters* screenwriting credit, it should
be noted that his pleasure at how well that script, featuring
criminal protagonists, came out was one of the things that
led him to resume the Parker series after more than a quarter
of a century.
JIM DOHERTY
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