130,000+ Books, Games & Puzzles in-stock 🇳🇿

Slayground

A Parker Novel
4.2 goodreads logo

Ratings/reviews counts are updated frequently.

Check link for latest rating.
( 2,268 ratings, 214 reviews)
Book Hero Magic crafted this summary to help describe this book. While it's new and still learning, it may not be perfect - your feedback is welcome! Summary
In Slayground by Richard Stark, the story follows the resourceful criminal Parker as he becomes trapped in a shuttered amusement park after a botched heist. With his loot in tow, Parker must outsmart a group of local mobsters and the law enforcement who want him captured. Tension builds as Parker uses his wits and the eerie surroundings to stay one step ahead in this crime thriller.
Read More
Format: Paperback / softback
$5000

International Supplier

This title is in-stock with overseas suppliers. While it is not available locally, we fly books in weekly from the US and UK to our Auckland warehouse for immediate dispatch.

AVAILABLE WITH SUPPLIER Ships from our Auckland warehouse within 2-3 weeks

Found a better price? Request a price match

Book Hero Magic created this recommendation. While it's new and still learning, it may not be perfect - your feedback is welcome! IS THIS YOUR NEXT READ?

If you enjoy fast-paced crime thrillers with a gritty edge, this book will seize your attention. Set against an intense backdrop, the story follows a cunning career criminal navigating a high-stakes environment. Its tense atmosphere and clever plot twists offer a gripping experience for fans of hard-boiled crime fiction.

Book Hero thinking about your next read

Parker robs a rock concert, but the heist goes sour, and he finds himself - and his woman, Claire - menaced by a pair of sadistic, drug-crazed hippies. Slayground turns the hunter into prey, as Parker gets trapped in a shuttered amusement park, besieged by a bevy of local mobsters.

Book Hero Magic formatted this description to make it easier to read. While it's new and still learning, it may not be perfect - your feedback is welcome! Description

The hunter becomes prey, as a heist goes sour and Parker finds himself trapped in a shuttered amusement park, besieged by a bevy of local mobsters. There are no exits from Fun Island. Outnumbered and outgunned, Parker can't afford a single miscalculation. He’s low on bullets—but, as anyone who’s crossed his path knows, that definitely doesn’t mean he’s defenceless.

Nobody tops Stark in his objective portrayals of a world of total amorality. —New York Times

Energy and imagination light up virtually every page, as does some of the best hard-boiled prose ever to grace the noir genre. —Publishers Weekly

Book Hero Magic summarised reviews for this book. While it's new and still learning, it may not be perfect - your feedback is welcome! HOW HAS THIS BEEN REVIEWED?

Slayground by Richard Stark is hailed for its straightforward yet gripping storytelling, epitomising the noir genre with its efficiently crafted plot and a protagonist who navigates a morally complex world with ease. The book is praised for its fast-paced narrative that combines pulp fiction elements with sophisticated wit. Stark's character, Parker, stands out as a compelling and refreshingly amoral figure, attracting admiration from notable authors and critics alike for his consistent and charismatic portrayal.

Book Hero reading reviews

Book Details

INFORMATION

ISBN: 9780226770925

Publisher: The University of Chicago Press

Format: Paperback / softback

Date Published: 01 September 2010

Country: United States

Imprint: University of Chicago Press

Contributors:

  • Foreword by Charles Ardai

Audience: General / adult

DIMENSIONS

Spine width: 1.0mm

Width: 13.0mm

Height: 21.0mm

Weight: 227g

Pages: 200

About the Author

Richard Stark was one of the many pseudonyms of Donald E. Westlake (1933-2008), a prolific author of noir crime fiction. In 1993, the Mystery Writers of America bestowed the society's highest honor on Westlake, naming him a Grand Master.

Also by Richard Stark

View all
  • The Score
    It was an impossible crime: knock off an entire town—a huge plant payroll, all the banks, and all the stores—in one night. But there was one thief good enough to try—Parker. In The Score, Parker takes on his biggest job yet. All he needs are the right men, the right plan, and the right kind of help from Lady Luck....
    Paperback
    $5200
    Available
    Ships in 2-3 weeks
  • The Green Eagle Score
    In The Green Eagle Score, Parker cuts his vacation with Claire short for a new job: stealing the entire payroll of an Air Force base in upstate New York. With help from Marty Fusco, fresh out of the pen, and a smart aleck finance clerk named Devers, Parker tries to shorten the odds on the risky job. But the ice...
    Paperback
    $5200
    Available
    Ships in 2-3 weeks
  • The Black Ice Score – A Parker Novel
    A corrupt African colonel has converted half his country’s wealth into diamonds and smuggled them to a Manhattan safe house. Four upstanding citizens plan to rescue their new nation by stealing the diamonds back—with the help of a “specialist”: Parker. Will Parker break his rule against working with amateurs and help them because his woman would be disappointed if he...
    Paperback
    $3199
    Available
    Ships in 3-4 weeks
  • The Man with the Getaway Face
    In New York, there was a contract on his life. In Nebraska, there was an unscrupulous plastic surgeon guarded by a punch-drunk fighter. And somewhere in New Jersey, there was an armored car stuffed with money. In the middle of it all was Parker. Parker goes under the knife in The Man with the Getaway Face, changing his face to...
    Paperback
    $3599
    Available
    Ships in 3-4 weeks
  • The Mourner
    The Mourner is a story of convergence—of cultures and of guys with guns. Hot on the trail of a statue stolen from a fifteenth-century French tomb, Parker enters a world of eccentric art collectors, greedy foreign officials, and shady KGB agents. Hired by a shifty dame who has something he needs, Parker will find out just who intends to bury...
    Paperback
    $3199
    Available
    Ships in 3-4 weeks
  • The Handle
    In The Handle, Parker is enlisted by the mob to knock off an island casino guarded by speedboats and heavies, forty miles from the Texas coast. With double-crosses and double-dealings from the word go, Parker knows the line between success and failure on this score would be exactly the length of the barrel of a .38.
    Paperback
    $3199
    Available
    Ships in 3-4 weeks
  • The Rare Coin Score
    When it comes to heists, Parker believes in some cardinal rules. On this job, he breaks two of them: never bring a dame along—especially not one you like—and never, ever work with amateurs. Nevertheless, with the help of a creepy coin collector named Billy, and the lure of a classy widow, he agrees to set up a heist of a...
    Paperback
    $3199
    Available
    Ships in 3-4 weeks
  • The Seventh
    The robbery was a piece of cake. The getaway was clean. The only thing left to do is split the cash—then it all goes wrong. In The Seventh, the heist of a college football game turns sour and the take is stolen from right under Parker’s nose. With the cops on his tail, Parker must figure out who crossed him—and...
    Paperback
    $3199
    Available
    Ships in 3-4 weeks
  • The Sour Lemon Score
    Bank robberies should run like clockwork, right? If your name’s Parker, you expect nothing less. Until, that is, one of your partners gets too greedy for his own good. The four-way split following a job leaves too small a take for George Uhl, who begins to pick off his fellow heisters, one by one. The first mistake? That he doesn’t...
    Paperback
    $5200
    Available
    Ships in 2-3 weeks
  • Deadly Edge
    Deadly Edge bids a brutal adieu to the 1960s as Parker robs a rock concert, and the heist goes south. Soon Parker finds himself—and his woman, Claire—menaced by a pair of sadistic, strung-out killers who want anything but a Summer of Love. Parker has a score to settle while Claire’s armed with her first rifle—and they’re both ready to usher...
    Paperback
    $5000
    Available
    Ships in 2-3 weeks
  • The Jugger
    They say the past always catches up to you—but if he can help it, Parker won’t let his. In The Jugger, an old contact who could blow Parker’s cover tells Parker he’s in trouble—then turns up dead. With Parker’s skeletons on the verge of escaping from their closet, he must put the pieces together—at any cost—before it’s too late.
    Paperback
    $3199
    Available
    Ships in 3-4 weeks
  • The Outfit
    They wanted Parker dead—and a late-night visit from a hitman proved they meant business. Now Parker plans to get even—dead even. Armed with a new face and his usual iron will, Parker is declaring a coast-to-coast war. In The Outfit, Parker goes toe-to-toe with the mob, hellbent on taking him down. The notorious lone wolf has some extra tricks up...
    Paperback
    $3599
    Available
    Ships in 3-4 weeks

More from Crime & Thriller

View all
  • New Release
    King’s Ransom
    Five innocent hostages. Five private investigators. A fiendish ransom game. Has Detective Sam Speedman met his match? A fast and deadly Matthew Reilly thriller. A DARING ABDUCTION The richest man in the world has been kidnapped. Along with four of his children. THE DEADLY CHALLENGE The kidnapper's demand: the five best private detectives in America must come to the missing...
    Paperback
    $2999
    Elsewhere:
    $3499
    In Stock
    Ships today
  • New Release
    The French Illusion
    Bestselling author John Grisham delivers a new gripping, suspenseful page-turner about aParis honeymoon gone horribly wrong - and the nightmare that follows. After Paul and Chelsea Tanner's fairytale wedding, their future is full of promise. But their honeymoon to Paris takes a dark, shocking turn when they are kidnapped while on a day trip to the French countryside. Who would...
    Paperback
    $3199
    Elsewhere:
    $3799
    In Stock
    Ships today
  • King’s Ransom
    New Release
    King’s Ransom
    Five innocent hostages. Five private investigators. A fiendish ransom game. Has Detective Sam Speedman met his match? A fast and deadly Matthew Reilly thriller. A DARING ABDUCTION The richest man in the world has been kidnapped. Along with four of his children. THE DEADLY CHALLENGE The kidnapper's demand: the five best private detectives in America must come to the missing...
    Hardback
    $4499
    Elsewhere:
    $4999
    (1)
    In Stock
    Ships today
  • New Release
    The Heights
    In The Heights by #1 Sunday Times bestselling author Sir Ian Rankin, murder comes to London's most exclusive high-rise - and every resident is a suspect... MURDER COMES TO LONDON'S MOST LUXURIOUS HIGH-RISE: AND EVERY RESIDENT IS A SUSPECT. The Heights: a gleaming, high-end high-rise looming over Hyde Park. Newly built from steel and smoked glass, it is a billionaire's playground offering sumptuous suites...
    Paperback
    $3199
    Elsewhere:
    $3799
    In Stock
    Ships today
  • New Release
    Death Row
    With all hope of an appeal fading away, the fate of a condemned murderess takes a shocking turn in a breathtaking short story from the #1 New York Times bestselling author of The Housemaid! A thrilling novella from #1 New York Times bestselling author Freida McFadden! Death is coming for her… unless she finds the truth first. Talia Kemper is on death row for murdering...
    Paperback
    $2299
    Elsewhere:
    $2400
    In Stock
    Ships today
  • Signed Copy
    New Release
    Dying Days
    Award-winning writer delivers a pulse-pounding espionage thriller. Missing soldiers, MI6 secrets and European partisans collide in a deadly game where the lines between lies and reality are fast disintegrating. In the dying days of the Second World War, a new conflict is about to ignite. May, 1945: After fighting to liberate Europe from the Nazis, Tito's Yugoslav Army and Allied...
    Paperback
    $3199
    Elsewhere:
    $3699
    (1)
    In Stock
    Ships today
  • New Release
    Fury In Death: An Eve Dallas thriller (In Death 63)
    In the new crime thriller from the bestselling author, Lt. Eve Dallas journeys into the darkness where murder is born… NYSPD homicide detective Eve Dallas has seen a lot in her time but even she is shocked by the savagery of a beating which leaves a wealthy biotech executive dead in his home office. The victim’s corpse is so mangled...
    Paperback
    $3199
    Elsewhere:
    $3799
    (1)
    In Stock
    Ships today
  • New Release
    Tom Clancy Pressure Depth
    Jack Ryan Jr leads a team of divers in a race to beat the Chinese Navy to a weapon of terrible destructive power in the latest entry in the #1 New York Times bestselling series. Jack Ryan Jr. is on Guam to work on a project for Hendley Associates. It's a perfectly ordinary insurance matter, but trouble finds the Ryans...
    Paperback
    $3199
    Elsewhere:
    $3799
    In Stock
    Ships today
  • The Country Road Murders
    New Release
    The Country Road Murders
    From the Sunday Times bestselling author comes a pulse-pounding thriller about justice, vengeance and the roads that lead us home. No one gets this big without amazing natural storytelling talent - which is what Jim has, in spades — LEE CHILD Cross Rivers is the kind of small town where everyone knows your name – and your secrets. Silas Tucker...
    Paperback
    $3000
    Elsewhere:
    $3800
    In Stock
    Ships today
  • New Release
    Every Lake
    Scary stories are fun... until your life becomes one. When Alice was fifteen, her father killed Mia Heywood in their lakefront cottage before vanishing into the trees. At least that's what the locals think happened. Over a decade later, Alice has lost her job as a journalist, she's going through an expensive divorce and she desperately needs to sell the...
    Paperback
    $3299
    Elsewhere:
    $3799
    (2)
    In Stock
    Ships today
  • Nautilus
    New Release
    Nautilus
    The follow-up to the bestselling novel The Turing Protocol. Nautilus is a machine with the astonishing power to send messages eight weeks back in time. Its users must follow a set of protocols established by its inventor, Alan Turing, including that it can only be used by a descendant of his family, and only to avert global disasters. But what...
    Paperback
    $2999
    Elsewhere:
    $3699
    In Stock
    Ships today
  • Cold River
    New Release
    Cold River
    The sensational new novel from the author of the bestselling thriller, The Creeper, winner of the Ned Kelly Award for Best Crime Fiction 2025. Deep in the mountains, secrets grow deadly... Detective Constable Sally White knows how easily hikers can go missing in Victoria's high country. But there's something about the disappearance of Louis Taylor, a young man lost up...
    Paperback
    $3000
    Elsewhere:
    $3800
    (1)
    In Stock
    Ships today

Why buy from us?

Book Hero is not a chain store or big box retailer. We're an independent 100% NZ-owned business on a mission to help more Kiwis rediscover a love of books and reading!

Service & Delivery

Service & Delivery

Our warehouse in Auckland holds over 100,000 books, toys, board games and puzzles in-stock so you're not waiting for your order to arrive from overseas.

Auckland Bookstore

Auckland Bookstore

We're primarily an online store, but for your convenience you can pick up your order for free from our bookstore, which is right next door to our warehouse in Hobsonville.

Our Gifting Service

Our Gifting Service

Books make wonderful thoughtful gifts and we're here to help with gift-wrapping and cards. We can even send your gift directly to your loved one.