Finished: Westlake's 'Help I Am Being Held Prisoner'

 Pretty ominous title in this novel by Donald Westlake. A scary thriller of kidnapping, rape, torture? Naaa.

It's Westlake. He doesn't roll that way. Even his prison novels are funny.

In this one, the main characters name is even funny and a rolling joke throughout. I'd type it but can't find the umlaut key. The guy with the funny name is a prankster. And he goes to prison for a prank gone wrong on the wrong people (a couple congressmen). He keeps up his jokes while in prison, while falling in with a gang who has a tunnel out of prison, where he spends most of his days in an apartment with his girlfriend, while unwantingly being forced to plan a bank robbery.

Westlake is so clever he makes me mad, because I can't come up with a plot half as clever as his. In all his books. The man was a genius and I don't use that term lightly.

I gave it a solid 7 on the Haugenometer. Amazonians were even higher at 4.5 of 5 and Goodreaders a 4 of 5.