‘Spenser’ novelist Robert Parker dies at age 77

The Boston Herald ^ | January 19, 2010 | NA

[buccaneer81]

‘Spenser’ novelist Robert Parker dies at age 77

Tuesday, January 19, 2010 - Updated 60m ago

Robert B. Parker, the blunt and beloved crime novelist who helped revive and modernize the hard-boiled genre and branded a tough guy of his own through his "Spenser" series, has died. He was 77.

An ambulance was sent to Parker’s home in Cambridge on Monday morning for reports of a sudden death, said Alexa Manocchio, spokeswoman for the Cambridge police department.

[Lurking Libertarian]

I read the first Spenser book, The Godwulf Manuscript, less than a week ago.

The weakest of the series, IMHO-- it reads very much like a Raymond Chandler pastiche updated to the 1970s. The Spenser series got much better after that. He really hit his stride with the 3rd or 4th books.

[buccaneer81]

He really hit his stride with the 3rd or 4th books.

Many writers seem to. Stephen King's third and fourth books were "The Shining" and "The Stand."

[Bubba Ho-Tep]

The weakest of the series, IMHO

Well, I read one other one a few weeks ago, Potshot was easily weaker than Godwulf. I got the sense that it was like one of those James Bond movies before they rebooted the series, where all the obligatory elements that fans expected ended up crowding out anything like an interesting story. Enjoyable, but thin. A friend of mine who has read a lot of them agreed that the later ones got kind of weak. So I decided to go back to the beginning and read Godwulf. I have to get my local used book store this week to see if I can find a copy of God Save the Child cheap. I'm gonna go broke paying $7.99 each for the paperbacks.

I've been catching up on a lot of detective series books that I've always missed lately. I've read about three or four John D. MacDonald Travis McGee books and one Ross MacDonald Lew Archer in the last couple of months. I think I'm avoiding diving into the new James Ellroy for now.

[Lurking Libertarian]

I've read about three or four John D. MacDonald Travis McGee books and one Ross MacDonald Lew Archer in the last couple of months.

Ross Macdonald was not only a great detective novelist, he was a great novelist, period. His "The Chill" was awesome, as were most of the novels he wrote after that (i.e., in the 1960s and 70s; his 50s books were mixed). "The Instant Enemy" is another favorite of mine.