Criticism > Contemporary Literary Criticism > Condon, Richard (Vol. 100) - Michael Neill (essay date 8 December 1986)

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Michael Neill (essay date 8 December 1986)

SOURCE: "His Years of Self-Imposed Exile Over, Richard Condon Is Back in America, Sitting Prizzi," in People Weekly, Vol. 26, No. 23, December 8, 1986, pp. 129, 131, 133.

[In the essay below, Neill reviews Condon's life and literary accomplishments.]

Like Don Corrado Prizzi, Richard Condon believes in family. For the Don—venomous and ancient, the spider at the center of Condon's Prizzi novels—family has to be protected; family is reason to kill. For Condon, affable but getting on in years himself, family is a reason finally to settle down in America after 19 years living in various spots around the world. And family is the reason he keeps writing at 71, despite the estimated $2 million he has made from his books and despite the two recent abdominal operations.

"A friend asked, 'Why does one still do it?'" Condon says with a laugh in the art-filled living room of the Dallas home...

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1. Introduction
2. Principal Works
3. Criticism
   1. John F. Baker (interview date 24 June 1983)
   2. John Skow (review date 22 September 1986)
   3. Michael Neill (essay date 8 December 1986)
   4. Roderick Mann (essay date 16 August 1987)
   5. Charles Champlin (review date 18 September 1988)
   6. Vincent Patrick (review date 9 October 1988)
   7. Jonathan Yardley (review date 7 February 1990)
   8. Ray Blount Jr. (review date 11 February 1990)
   9. Herbert Mitgang (review date 14 February 1990)
   10. Carolyn See (review date 26 February 1990)
   11. Sarah Booth Conroy (review date 10 May 1990)
   12. Alex Heard (review date 10 September 1991)
   13. Herbert Mitgang (review date 18 September 1991)
   14. Kirkus Reviews (review date 15 September 1992)
   15. Jay Cantor (review date 29 November 1992)
   16. Herbert Mitgang (review date 2 December 1992)
   17. Donald E. Westlake (review date 13 December 1992)
   18. Joe Queenan (review date 6 February 1994)
   19. Chris Petrakos (review date 20 February 1994)
   20. Lorrie K. Inagaki (review date Summer 1994)
   21. Mel Gussow (obituary date 10 April 1996)
   22. Charles McCarry (obituary date 10 April 1996)
   23. Myrna Oliver (obituary date 10 April 1996)
4. Further Reading
5. Copyright