Robert B. Parker - Potshot: A Spencer Novel

Pros: More characters, more tough guys
Cons: Predictable and anti-climactic ending

I have reviewed several novels by Robert B. Parker, particularly the Spenser series. Sometimes I wonder why I keep reading them. None of them have a particularly complicated plot, the bad guy is usually known, and the ending is never in doubt. I guess ...

Pros: Classic Spenser wisecracks; some good action; interesting twist at the end
Cons: Mostly predictable; big action scene is right out of a western cartoon

Nothing makes the time go by on a trip like a Spenser novel by Robert B Parker. I stopped at a yard sale and found Potshot by Parker as a recorded book on cassette -- for just 25 cents! I parted with the quarter and was soon immersed in ...

Pros: Typical Robert B. Parker novel featuring Spenser, Super Detective and Good Guy.
Cons: Typical Robert B. Parker novel featuring Spenser, Super Detective and Good Guy.

You may not know it, but I actually rather like the Spenser novels. Very simplistic usually, they are guaranteed to have lots of action and minimal plot twists. Evil is usually just that, evil. No moralizing or explanation as to why the evil is evil, it ...

Pros: Snappy dialogue. Brisk read. Minimal Susan and Pearl.
Cons: Spenser's comic book persona is growing tiresome.

Robert B. Parker's Spenser was the first detective (unless you count Encyclopedia Brown) that made me want to read the whole series of books. As my love for the mystery genre has grown in the eleven years since I first read Parker, it has been...

Pros: Easy reading. Contains many of the characters from the best Spenser novels. Well-crafted.
Cons: Constantly resorts to stock Parker lines. Standard issue plot; characters seem flat and static.

I have read every virtually every novel by Robert B. Parker (I haven't found the love story Three Weeks in Spring, co-written with his wife), including all of the Spenser books. This is the first one that left me shaking my head and wondering if we'll...

Pros: The master of the genre captures us again with his characters and dialog.
Cons: The premise of the story is farther from believable than most Spenser novels...

Ask me my favorite author and I will without hesitation tell you "Robert B. Parker". Ask me my favorite of his characters and I will utter just as quickly "Spenser." That said, I will admit that the more recent offerings from Parker to ...

Pros: Multiple supporting characters from past books.
Cons: None that I can find.

Potshot, the most recent installment of the Spenser series, is an instant classic. The story sets Spenser, Hawk, Vinnie Morris and other of the major heavy hitters in the history of the series against a set of criminals in Potshot, AZ. The storyline is...