Stardust

Book Description

When a Hollywood-based TV series schedules filming in Boston, Spenser smells trouble. When he signs up to protect the show's star, Jill Joyce, he knows it's on its way.

First, there's Jill herself. She's spoiled, arrogant, drugged out -- made worse by fear. Someone is out to get her -- does she imagine it, or is it real?

Spenser monitors her neurosis, but finds evidence of harassment. It escalates to murder. Now begins the dangerous part -- while the act may have ended, the murderer lingers on.

"STARDUST is a four-star noir suspense that no Spenser fan will be able to resist." (Publisher's Source)

Customer Reviews:

Neurotic TV star adds bit of spice to Spenser's life.......2007-07-14

Spenser is hired by Zenith Meridian Television to protect their star television personality, Jill Joyce - who says she has been receiving harassing telephone calls and letters. When Spenser tries to find out more about these calls, Jill refuses to elaborate - insisting, however, that he protect her from "Him," as she calls her stalker, while all the while refusing to answer any questions relating to details about the problem, her past or pretty much anything at all and at the same time alternating between trying to get Spenser into bed and drinking herself into a torpor. Finally Spenser leaves her in Hawk's care and sets out to find out what he can on his own.

Jill is probably one of the least appealing people Spenser has ever set out to "save." He, however, sets out with great patience nonetheless, to do just that. He follows every lead, steps on toes from the East to the West coast in the process, has his life threatened several times and finally gets to the bottom of the situation. It ain't pretty.

Of course, you'll have to read the book to find out what happens.

I enjoyed this story, mostly because the character dynamics were so interesting. Jill Joyce was so terribly unpleasant, yet at the same time she engendered great sympathy and loyalty among so many people that it was really unbelievable. As one character remarked, she had a "quality" about her, something deep inside her that got buried under the booze and drugs. Parker did a good job with his writing skills of showing that vulnerability as well as the prickly and unpleasant exterior. Very good job. Strong recommend from me.

Well, at least he can write.......2007-06-04

Two stars because Parker is able to write, zero for plot (what plot?) characters(Puh-leeze). I tripped over this in the library needing an easy read. What amazes me is that this was apparently a popular series in the 80's. So much for the 80's. Spenser and Susan are so superior to the rest of the human race we should all be ashamed. They are witty, they are sensitive, they are honest, they are loving, they are perfect. As a natural offshoot of this they are tiresome, they are snide, they are racist, they are class-driven in their outlook and tastes. They are, frankly, very creepy. Anyway I guess something happens in the novel, I was too sick to stay around.

Gold Dust Rising from Ashes of Coal Dust.......2007-04-17

What might burn to what purification and perfection, within the ashes of impoverished beginnings ...

Again, a Spenser novel kept my focus away from the snow-packed, icy curves of a Rocky Mountain corridor over the Continental Divide on Colorado State highway 50, edging the high, steep cliffs over Monarch Pass. If any feat would recommend the ability of a novel to hold a reader captive, that should.

The fascination in this # 17 in the series seemed to pivot around a flickering disgust Vs appeal of the Star of the plot, Jill Joyce, as those dark/bright flashes played through Jill's evolving relationships with Spenser, Susan, and residual characters, who mostly viewed "Jillie" as a "high-octane pain in the ..." (quoting one the book's descriptive terms of her). Parker worked an amazing double-sided realism into the plot, contrasting Jill's spoiled, impatient, sour personality; to her youthful vulnerabilities, her having not one true friend, and her carrying the weight of the job title's specific and actual demands. With drunk, druggie, an nympho added to the liabilities in this Star's aura, the scales slipped south, and provided Spenser with a challenge he couldn't refuse. I may have left out a couple descriptive terms of the down side of Jill Joyce's personality, but guessing what they might be would be a snap.

STARDUST is a classic character study, and an excellent example of fine writing, especially given Parker's vivid, delightfully sardonic descriptions of various settings, descriptions based on weather conditions and wealth divergence, contrasting Boston and surrounding areas with the San Diego and LA extended environments.

During the writing of my previous review on PLAYMATES, # 16 in this series, I began noticing an edge of embarrassment about my ongoing compulsion to write reviews on each novel in the Spenser series. Therefore, I seem to be pushed at the moment by a nag from my Left Brain to explain personal and professional motivations in feeding the continued pursuit of this "study." Actually, that's precisely what my dedication to reviewing this series has become, a study. I feel blessed to be able to observe three decades (and counting) of cultural evolution through Parker's liberal notations of styles of dress, tastes in food, ways of thinking, repartee dance-steps, etc. Yet, I'm making note of much more than that.

I'm observing the steady, methodical, dedicated evolution of an author's voice, talent, perspective, and ethical philosophy ... over thirty years of annual production in a sequential offering repeating characters, locale, and genre.

I'm observing "current" events unfolding within Parker's plots. I'm noticing subtle publisher presence and reader preference as that backdrop appears to play into Parker's choices of subject, theme, and style variances in each novel in this chain adding links upon links of evolving ethical considerations.

My interest was maintained well in STARDUST as my curiosity grew about how Spenser could save this child, who was screeching in repulsively offensive ways, for someone to take care of her, someone, anyone to care about anything in her, qualities beyond beauty, which might lie more deeply and lastingly in Jill's soul... someone to care about more than her capacity to draw in dollars. As a prostitute to overwhelming demands on her presence and physical perfection, given nothing truly refueling of self in return; Jill reminded me of Spenser's April Kyle, clearly showing that money, fame, success, and adulation are able to starve the life out of a young heart needing TLC, compassion, and a savior.

As has become Parker's relished signature, several scenes of dialogue exchanges in STARDUST were highly satisfying. One of the cheer inducements I regularly enjoy in a Spenser novel is his ever-growing-repertoire of ways to burst odorous balloons of pompous buffoons who overrate their importance by metaphoric measures of mountains of compost heaps. (See Marty Riggs in this one, especially the scene in chapter 29 with Quirk, regarding Jill having been misplaced. And, for a story about mountains of coal dust and a young Mom starring in a bull-dog win, see Coal & Coca-cola)

And then, we had here the entrance of Victor del Rio and gang-of-two, Chollo and Bobby Horse. Yep, another fascinating bad, bad, bad dude ... with a couple honorable qualities, who related well with Spenser in scene after engrossing scene.

My favorite scene in STARDUST, though, was the one noted above, with Riggs, Quirk, a collection of big wigs at Zenith, and Spenser. Quirk gives Riggs a prime-spot-comeuppance to either kill or die for. Parts of that chapter I had to read aloud to my husband. After I had read a couple paragraphs, then asked a few minutes later if he wanted to hear more, his positive pose slid immediately into an ear-toward-my-direction.

The last line in this one could serve as the beginnings of purification of poverty, if not an outright activation of alchemy.

What is Hope,
Linda Shelnutt

Unfortunate.......2006-08-17

I stopped reading Parker a long time ago because I just couldn't stomach Spenser's self-indulgent preachiness and very creepy homophobia, Hawk is a comic-book hero. The stories drag, bogged down by Spenser's annoying POV.

I've always said, Parker is a good writer, but a terrible novelist.

Mixed reaction.......2006-07-15

I think this is Parker's take on the tv series Spenser For Hire. He doesn't seem to have a high opinion of Hollywood actors/actresses. The other book in this series that this one is most like is : Looking For Rachel Wallace.

While I am a huge Spenser fan I wouldn't say this novel is a must-have. It is more for those who are die-hard Spenser/Parker fans. It is still a good read, but many other novels in this series is better than this one.

Average customer rating:

Double the action
Twist and Turns
We learn some of the history of Hawk
The Young & The Jaded. Minors & Minorities Seethe in Stereotype City. Compulsion, Coercion, Connivance, Corruption.
hush money

Hush Money (Spenser Mysteries (Audio))
Robert B. Parker
Manufacturer: Audio Literature
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Audio Cassette

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ASIN: 0787118982

Amazon.com

Twenty-five years and 26 books into the Spenser series, Hush Money dishes up another solid installment that is sure to fulfill the cravings of Parker fans new and old. This time Spenser and his buddy Hawk are helping a couple of troubled friends (i.e., they're working without a fee). The first case involves the denial of tenure for Professor Robinson Nevins. While tenure meetings are always closed-door affairs, Nevins assumes that the recent suicide of graduate student Prentice Lamont (who some claim was having an affair with Nevins) ruined his chances for a coveted permanent position. Spenser and Hawk cut a brawl-strewn path through the members of the tenure committee on their way to the surprising truth of the Nevins case. The other investigation pits Spenser against the unknown stalker of K.C. Roth. Spenser's girlfriend, Susan, has known K.C. for a while, and while the PI finds Ms. Roth a bit melodramatic, he's always eager to help a damsel in distress. The only problem is that after he's apparently resolved the case, K.C. begins a little stalking of her own--of Spenser.

The book is driven by the controversies surrounding political correctness that Parker always loves to confront, and it's fun to watch Spenser struggle (a little) to resist K.C.'s advances. It's also a (slightly disturbed) pleasure to see Spenser and Hawk address some academic hypocrisy with their own special brand of reasoning. Not a mystery for the cozy-loving palette, Hush Money's literate, tough-guy dialogue shows why Parker is the rightful heir to the throne of Chandler. --Patrick O'Kelley

Amazon.com Audiobook Review

Sometimes a detective's life is all work for no pay. As a favor to his buddy Hawk, Spenser agrees to investigate a man unjustly denied tenure. Then Spenser's girlfriend, Susan, asks Spenser to help stop a stalker. Plenty of work, sure, but all done pro bono. "Two cases at a time. I thought about having 'Master Sleuth' added to my business cards." As the cases unfold, Spenser (and Hawk) charm and batter their way past policemen, stockbrokers, hit men, white supremacists, an unstable woman, and a stuffy tenure committee. Author Robert B. Parker tells a good story, but his real strength is in his dialog--the rhythm of which Burt Reynolds captures perfectly. A fantastic reader, Reynolds uses a wide range of voices and accents to bring Parker's characters to life. (Running time: 3 hours, 2 cassettes) --C.B. Delaney

Customer Reviews:

Double the action.......2007-08-19

Spenser takes on two cases in "Hush Money," both as favors and both free. First Hawk comes to him with a request to help out a man named Robinson Nevins, who believes he was denied tenure inappropriately. Apparently a rumor was started that Robinson was responsible for the suicide of a young man; the rumor being that they were romantically linked and when Robinson broke it off, the young man (Lamont Prentice) killed himself. When Spenser begins to investigate, however, he quickly uncovers evidence that not only was the death not a suicide, but also that Lamont was running a blackmail ring where he would threaten to out closeted homosexuals unless they paid.

Secondly, Susan asks Spenser to help a friend of hers - KC - who is being stalked. Spenser has to discover who is stalking KC while at the same time fending off her ever-increasingly obsessive advances.

Plenty of twists and turns make this quite a story. The despicable Amir Abdullah made for some great comedy relief at times - at least I got a lot of laughs out of him. I'm not certain he was meant to be funny, but I found him to be.

Twist and Turns.......2007-02-06

Very good book. Lots of action twists, moral turns, ethnic turns, action and a tidbit of the human side of Hawk. Typical Parker with multiple plots, subplots and a . . . motivated woman.

We learn some of the history of Hawk.......2006-10-08

While this Spenser novel follows the same formula as the others, there is one significant difference. In this one, we learn much more about the enigmatic Hawk. When he encounters a man that tried to sexually abuse him as a child, Hawk roughs him up, an action that puzzles Spenser. Hawk explains, describing some of the events of his youth and how he became a boxer. There is less wisecracking in this story as there is in some of the others, which is unfortunate. The best Spenser novels are those where he interacts with officers Quirk and Belsen, which seems to bring out the best in wisecracking repartee.
Spenser is once again the noble crusader, risking his life to help a friend, in this case Hawk. The man who took Hawk off the streets has a son who was denied tenure at a university. Believing it to have been unfair, the man denied tenure goes to Hawk, who goes to Spenser. This begins a trek into the undercurrents of gay life and the hypocrisy of so many of those who consider it a scourge of civilization. There is also a second plot line that has a woman very aggressively pursuing Spenser in an attempt to get him to engage in sex. Like the gallant man he is Spenser maneuvers the situation so that Susan is given the opportunity to deal with it. Which is does, in a manner that impresses Spenser.
This is not the best Spenser novel, parts of the plot are a bit too exaggerated. Nevertheless, it is very good, and is one that I will probably reread in a few years.

The Young & The Jaded. Minors & Minorities Seethe in Stereotype City. Compulsion, Coercion, Connivance, Corruption........2006-04-13

This one began with a smoothly captivating, yawning weather "report" brought to the reader through the ambiance of a baseball game singing over radio waves. Spenser was bemoaning the contrast of slower ages passed, when a sports announcer could linger leisurely around springtime baseball news, between sudden screams of stand-up-and-cheer, bat cracking action. But, that day, as Spenser narrated, the radio voice was sliding so fast through a long list of ads, the endless promotions threatened to overrun notice of ongoing fly-balls busting and bursting through air.

A few of the early chapters took off slowly, mesmerizing-ly, with Spenser's sensual briefs of weather reports giving lazy home-runs to the sleepy emergence of spring, as money was extorted subtly in underplots.

Loved the way Parker posed Spenser slipping into such a still mode of respect as to consciously quiet his breathing as Hawk opened an accounting of a childhood experience with one of the suspects who had triggered a brief loss of control in Hawk's steel-studded cool.

The dual cases in HUSH MONEY, one a favor for Hawk, the other a favor for Susan, were a switch from the usual focus on a single client case, which has been the deal in the 7 Spenser novels I've read, with each additional one making me more glad I have around 26 left to read, with Parker still penning posh. The alternation of cases was a tantalizing treat of contrasts, especially as I wondered if a connection might emerge between them, even though the way each was introduced would, in "reality" cause them to have no cross over, no bleeding through, as it were.

Well, except that in the real world serendipity and synchronicity exist. And in fiction there's always the Right Brain at work, which causes authors to slip in amazingly cohesive, subtle themes which they weren't aware of as they were writing, maybe weren't aware of after the book was published and selling for a few decades. Then a sneaky reviewer comes along and sees a shiny silk thread woven through the words, visible only after the activation of some type of predestined ray to The Spectrum of Light, brought into reality by a time-release "code" built into the Laws of Physics during Day Two of Implementation of The Plan of The Genius.

Okay, all right. This is a P.I. novel. It isn't sci fi. But. Physical Reality is. Sci fi. It's the best sci fi in the evolution of life. What I'm v-rooming and v-rooming and v-rooming to say is that two totally disconnected cases which a detective is working simultaneously, whether in fiction or in reality, might have Right Brain, serendipitous connections. And, I, of course, having written a series of sci fi novels, with a couple of stand alone sci fi mss in progress, have a brain which looks around every fictional word for clues to the glue which connects seemingly unrelated happen stances.

So. For a time in my reading of HUSH MONEY I admit to having wondered if a seemingly nice, quiet lady in the gay (was he?) professor's case may have actually been the stalker in the "rescue me" conniving female case.

Most readers expect that, in the world of The Novel (feel very free to read my review of James A. Michener's book of that title) sub plots will religiously cooperate toward a tied-together denouement, ultimately joining with the main plot in an ever twisting vine of cranial convolutions contrived within the mind of the author.

The main theme of this novel, under which all the machinations play, seems to be a dramatization of sexual variations among various levels of human purity and pollution, with these variations brought into a cross-stitching pattern laid over stereotypes and sub-cultural demands, with the saffron thread of hypocrisy overcoming all within a tight weave of labyrinth proportions.

It was amazing how Parker brought out the admirable and the putrid within multiple types of sexual exchanges among multifaceted characters. But, KC Roth took the cake of the conniving female. As Parker described her, she had so many layers of contrivances, if they were all peeled away, nothing would be left. And yet, Spenser found a simple, natural a way to "save" KC from her "rescue me" contrived cries. However, after that didn't last, Spenser had to call in Susan, the "Big Gun," who played a few extraordinarily delightful scenes in this one.

The reader is required to make do with only one cooking scene rearing a fry pan and pasta pot in HUSH MONEY, but what an entry! My menu of it would drool in describing, "Black Bean Linguine, with the beans olive-oil-sauteed with garlic cloves, laced with Sherry, finished with fresh cilantro."

Yep, "Leftovers R Us." Given his perpetual ability to take whatever ingredients are at hand and gourmet the heck out of them, Spenser began joking about his new catering business taking over his not having a single clue to chew.

Spenser again ran through his evolving ethics of "to kill (in cold blood but with `just cause') or not to kill." And he made no bones about Hawk's willingness to kill (without a license, sans cultural sanction) human vermin. As usual, creativity won, and Spenser found ways of less bloodletting to solve injustices and end problems, which sometimes required more than one application of solutions. With two cases to juggle in HUSH MONEY the plots became so convoluted I wasn't sure how/if they interconnected, except to make the point that race, color, creed, and sexual persuasions had nothing to do with a person being a pig, or human with integrity (I don't mean to denigrate the cleaner species).

Layers upon layers of excellent pig interviews exposed their stench so plainly the pages reeked (entertainingly, of course). With that setting established in stinky spades, when a real human being stepped into a session with Spenser the fresh air was so evident my eyes literally widened (and quit watering). I was hugely impressed that Tommy (David) Harmon seemed so absolutely real. I've met only a small number of people like him in my life. Every word of dialogue in that interview refreshingly set David aside and above, but one reply stood out. It was David's reply to Spenser's repeated ease-setting promise that, in his line of business he wouldn't get far if he blabbed heavy secrets divulged in an interview.

Spenser said: "I can avoid mentioning your name."

Harmon replied: "If I said it, I'm responsible for it."

Being responsible for everything one has ever blabbed or written, wow. Given my overboard spontaneity, and foot-in-mouth tendency, I've had some tough chewing eating certain words I've spewed without proper clues. Ohhhh. Myyyyyy.

I'll conclude by quoting my nephew Lonnie, with his adorable 5 years-old voice still speaking clearly in my mind nearly 40 years later. He had been spouting off at the mouth into my tape recorder for several minutes when he stopped suddenly, face glowing, and grinned around the words, "Shut my mouth."

Linda G. Shelnutt

hush money.......2005-08-30

Typical Spenser. witty, hard nosed, careing, and plenty of other characters to play off of. Keeps you turning the pages

Average customer rating:

This is a must-read in the Spenser series!
Satanic Voice of The Gray Blues. A Good Man is the child to nurture. He saves us from Evil physical and deadly.
Bravo!
One of the best books in the Spenser series.
Reminiscent of Philip Marlowe, Spenser beats death to get (both) his men!

Small Vices (Spenser Novels (Audio))
Robert B. Parker
Manufacturer: Phoenix Books
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Audio CD

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ASIN: 1597770159

Amazon.com

While the rest of us grow older, Spenser seems suspended in perpetual early middle age. Oh, he talks about getting older, but his body is still firm, his muscles toned, and his reflexes are still hair-trigger fine. Even so, it is Spenser's body that betrays him when he is almost killed by an assassin's bullet two-thirds of the way through Robert B. Parker's latest Spenser adventure, Small Vices. Hired to discover the truth behind a four-year-old murder, Spenser soon runs afoul of "the Gray Man," who eventually shoots and partially paralyzes him. Spenser, his stalwart girlfriend Susan, and his almost mythical friend Hawk then hole up in Santa Barbara until the detective can get back on his feet again.

There's never any doubt that Spenser will get back on his feet, or that he will eventually track down the man who shot him and solve the mystery that started the whole ball rolling in the first place. What makes the Spenser mysteries interesting is Spenser himself, the thinking person's private eye, a man of honor and of conscience who understands that every action has consequences.

Book Description

Ellis Alves is no angel. But his lawyer says he was framed for the murder of college student Melissa Henderson...and asks Spenser for help.

From Boston's back streets to Manhattan's elite, Spenser and Hawk search for suspects, including Melissa's rich-kid, tennis-star boyfriend. But when a man with a .22 puts Spenser in a coma, the hope for justice may die with him...

* A New York Times bestseller
* Fantastic reviews from The New York Times, Kirkus Reviews, Chicago Tribune, and many more
* A Book-of-the-Month Club Main Selection
* Parker's newest hardcover, Night Passages, will be on sale from G.P. Putnam's Sons September 22nd.

Customer Reviews:

This is a must-read in the Spenser series!.......2007-08-13

When Spenser's old friend Rita Fiore hires him to investigate a case where she believes her client was framed, he pokes a hornet's nest. The man in jail is a career criminal and no one wants to see him out; the young woman who was killed was dating a young up-and-coming tennis star who is the adopted son of a very wealthy man and there are two eyewitnesses who swear that they saw the murdered woman being pulled into a car by the suspect.

To make matters worse, an assassin is called in who is good enough to get a drop on Spenser and puts Spenser into a coma. When Spenser wakes up, he finds that his friends have put out the word he is dead and he, Hawk and Susan head to California where he spends almost a year rehabilitating himself before he returns to Boston; first to take out the Gray Man, then to finish the case he had started.

Confronted with his own mortality, Spenser and Susan have to come to terms with the fact that this is his life and that it is not going to change.

I strongly recommend this book - it was one of the best in the series so far.

Satanic Voice of The Gray Blues. A Good Man is the child to nurture. He saves us from Evil physical and deadly........2007-05-23

This may be the pinnacle (or nadir) Spenser novel dramatizing an ultimate personification of Evil. An investigation of that concept seems to be Spenser's underlying and ongoing pursuit. SMALL VICES, # 24 Spenser, deals with the primary issues of Life, as individuals within the human species are struggling to get through it, comprehend it, and relish it (as often as possible), in the transition into The Third Millennium.

Hawk's analysis of a dichotomy of desires between Spenser and Susan deserves a Grand Prize for capturing the core of conflict here. Of course any fan of the series would know that Hawk's conclusion would be drawn in a couple short statements including the perfect phrases in blue. It was amazing how refreshing it could be to have precise differences stated in such dry, clear terms.

A scene with an apparent Shirley Temple type child took the show for humor, even though no one could one-up The Highest Dark Child of The Species (who was neither young nor female, in this case). The Gray Man was possibly Parker's most complexly captivating character. The battles between Good and Evil in SMALL VICES were of the best I've read in Literature. FYI, an equal (yet different) exposure of the essence of Evil Incarnate was in the film, Suspect Zero (Widescreen Edition) (See my review), in which the dank presence reduced itself to boneless worm jelly. The difference is that Parker's evil character was given solid strength and deadly substance (in varied shades of gray).

Dealing with the issues of types of parenting and the heartbreaking, absolute lack of it in all types of ghettos, a cop named Jackson voiced the lack of awareness of "Do Gooders" without a clue about how impoverished families live. A small sample of Jackson's "right on" diatribe: "Like there's a bunch of white Anglo kids in the inner city, walking around looking for the f...ing malt shop. So I say, you people simply have got to stop talking `bout f...ing inner city when you mean black."

In reality, a quintessential Malt Shop did exist in a small town in Colorado, a light in a desert of dark styles of poverty, with a single Mom who was a parent, see the Amazon Short, Coal & Coca-Cola.

As is the case with each Spenser novel, many excellent quotes could be listed from this # 24 in the series. I couldn't help but notice a change in mood here, in the dedication (quoted below) to Joan, Parker's wife. Of course I wondered how Parker evaluated and passed through the road forks in his life, in contrast to what Spenser chose in SMALL VICES, in the issues brought forth between Spenser and Susan. It's obvious that the Parkers are parents with full presence, and that they love their children. This # 24 in series is worth reading for Spenser's takes on these issues alone.

In contrast to the always flowery dedications to Joan in Parker's novels, the dedication in SMALL VICES read: >> For Joan: You may have been a headache, but you've never been a bore. <<

A scene of Hawk washing his hands in Spenser's office was very telling of the above quote: >> He (Hawk) dried himself on a white towel that hung beside the sink. The towel said "Holiday Inn" on it, in green letters. It was one of my (Spenser's) favorites. I had picked it up in Jackson, Mississippi once, when I was driving back from Texas, with Pear the Wonder Dog. Whenever Susan came in she replaced the Holiday Inn towel with a small pink one that had a pale pink fringe, and a pink and green rosebud embroidered in one corner. As soon as she left, I put out the Holiday Inn towel again. <<

During a conversation with Susan, Spenser narrated to himself: >> The way I loved her never varied. But how I liked her could go up and down, and it went down most when she was being professional. <<

After the long days and months were done here, Spenser and Susan were again at one: >> "I'm not criticizing you, in all of this," Susan said. "I know you're not." I said. "The confusion of guilt and innocence just looks a little starker in this case and it interests you."

I believe that Spenser's comment there explains one of the reasons many readers, including me, retain a high degree of curiosity in how this series separates good and bad guys, good and bad acts. Stand-up-and-cheer support surfaced in SMALL VICES from various bad guys, in ways and in dialogues which added warmth, and continued discriminations between what's admirable and what's disgusting in examples of our species.

Once again, the author prevailed and the tale fell deep and rose high,
Linda Shelnutt

Bravo!.......2006-01-16

Robert Parker writes like a skater on ice who floats effortlessly. He may put a lot of work into his writing, but he does not groan and grunt for our benefit. He presents the reader with polished pieces. This is elegance.

I have read a dozen of Parker's books, and enjoyed every one. However, I would say Small Vices is the most heroic, in that this book deals with grand themes. Academics may sneer at mystery novels, or come slumming, but these are our myths for the modern world.

If you haven't read the book, please stop reading this review here, because I wouldn't want to spoil anybody's enjoyment. The book has the classic Spenser scenes: the Threat, Displaying the Weapons, Pearl the Wonder Dog, great dialogue, vivid character sketches, and so forth. Spenser is careless, though. He shouldn't have been out running alone with the Grey Man on his trail.

Curious. In the end, everybody gets off. Spenser gets off with wounds, the Grey Man gets off without jail, the parents get off, the murderer gets off, the wronged prisoner gets off, and Hawk gets off with no pay for ten months' TLC. The only person who really loses is the victim, and she died happy.

One of the best books in the Spenser series........2005-12-09

This is my second reading of 'Small Vices'. I'd read it before, years ago, and all I remembered was that this is the one in which Spenser gets himself shot and very nearly killed. (The beauty, I guess, of having so many Spenser novels is that it is hard to keep them all straight so I can go back and re-read them like they're new every few years).

If you are familiar with Spenser, most of your favorites see some action. If not, this may be a good one to start with, although I would recommend some of the older ones to begin.

The never-aging Spenser lives through an entire year of his life in this one, but don't worry, he still doesn't age. Neither do Hawk or Susan. They're like James Bond in that respect. It used to bug me but I know that I don't want to read about Hawk and Spenser's adventures in a nursing home.

Reminiscent of Philip Marlowe, Spenser beats death to get (both) his men!.......2005-09-19

Advance the clock forty years from Chandler's Philip Marlowe series, and voila, we have Spenser! (Actually Parker is an admitted Chandler fan and even finished one of his books {"Poodle Springs"} for him and authored a sequel of Chandler's first novel, "The Big Sleep.") Like Marlowe, Spenser's tough-guy, private-eye work is his definition, and without it, he is nothing - a lesson that alternatively threatens then rejuvenates his relationship with lover Susan.

This was our first Spenser story, so we have no background on the characters nor does "Vices" offer much. But the plot sizzled, the relationship with Susan provided interesting byplay, and in the end, things worked out in a satisfying fashion, with the exception of the man freed from jail, who was a total ingrate. The premise is that an innocent man was framed for a co-ed's murder, and a law firm hires Spenser to double check the outcome some four years later. That all the witnesses are lying, and that Spenser starts to get pushed around for his snooping, makes it seem likely right off the bat that something is awry. When a mysterious contract killer, the "Grey Man", nearly offs our hero, Susan, Hawk, and Spenser take a year in hiding to rehab (probably the least plausible portion of the story in terms of careers, money, etc.). Spenser then turns the tables by hunting the Grey Man while continuing to work the original crime to an entertaining conclusion. Suspense builds all the way to the end, keeping those pages turning briskly!

We can see why Spenser and Parker enjoy considerable success. The writing is fine, the plot amuses, and some stuff on the side provides a thought provoking moment or two. Our only quibble is that we didn't particularly care for how the women in the book threw themselves at our leading man; while allegedly he's a "hunk", women tossing their clothes or thrusting their assets at him so readily seemed unseemly, though possibly that was a ploy to prove his fidelity to Susan. All-in-all, a good mystery -- good enough to encourage us to seek out more of Parker's lengthy bibliography.

Average customer rating:

BURT
Hard to believe
Mr. Action
Fire and desire
I love me

My Life
Burt Reynolds
Manufacturer: Walberg Publishing
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Audio Cassette

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My Life in High Heels

ASIN: 1886392005

Customer Reviews:

BURT.......2007-07-27

This book was pretty good but I gave it 4 stars because Burt did not talk about his relationship with Tammy Wynette I read in Tammy's book about it and wanted to hear Burt's side.
He does tell us a lot about the women that have passed through his life it was pretty interesting. I never would have thought Sally was so petty.
and Loni was after money. I think the only woman who really loved Burt was Dinah Shore. I think maybe that was the only woman Burt really loved too.
He tells us the age difference got in the way.
He let other people put doubts in his head about Dinah he should of not listened to others but followed his heart.

Hard to believe.......2006-01-21

I really liked this book, but some of it was hard to believe. Case in point, Chapter 56, Burt says that as late as 1994 he was on the short list to be be archbishop for the Rochester, NY archdiose. Is he even Catholic? Further Burt says in the 70s he was in separate fistfights with former president Jimmy Carter and TV superstar Nell Carter ... and that he broke his nose and her clavicle. That can't be true, can it? And this is the one I had the most diffcult time swallowing -- Burt refuses to recognize Guam as a Commonwealth of the United States all because in a review a newspaper critic in Agana called "Evening Shade" -- "awful."

Mr. Action.......2002-11-11

This book started out good with all the excitement of his early career.Some of it is hard to believe though.Towards the end of the book it started dragging.I think Burt's life in the late 80's and early 90's must have been real boring or he just ran out of good stories to tell us.I was basically done with the book around the middle and had to labor to finish it.I am still a Burt Reynolds Fan cannot deny that.It now sits on the shelf next to Loni's book.That is where the real comedy comes in.If you notice Loni's book is larger and Burt wrote his after her? So I guess Burt is the small man next to her now

Fire and desire.......2002-03-02

MY LIFE, the autobiography of actor Burt Reynolds, was published just a year or two too soon. The book came out shortly after Reynolds' public battle with former wife Loni Anderson, when people were talking more about his love life than his movies. Had Reynolds published this after his work in the film BOOGIE NIGHTS put him back on top, it would have been a more satisfying conclusion to the story.

When illness and gossip threatened an end to Burt Reynolds' acting career, he recalled the words of his former girlfriend Dinah Shore, who had assured him that sooner or later his talent would win back what he had lost. As BOOGIE NIGHTS earned Reynolds an Oscar nomination, how right the late Ms. Shore proved to be. (As I write this, 3/1/02, it would have been Dinah's 85th birthday.)

If you like movies, Burt Reynolds, or both, you can't miss with MY LIFE. The fire in the man's soul and his desire for life's finer things (including the finest women) have made for some incredible ups and downs. And when you're Burt Reynolds, you have a thousand tales of the fantasy life to tell.

Other MY LIFE reviews question the actor's willingness to take a swing at those who upset him. In Reynolds' defense, he never ran from a fight even when he knew he was outmatched. That's the difference between a coward and a man's man: the will to fight with no guarantee you will win. While Reynolds admits passing on man-handling an ex-football player who was in a group of acting students he was throwing out of a class, he also tells about the time he took on Tony "Two Ton" Galento with no hope of winning. That's a tough guy.

Read MY LIFE - or Burt'll come after you!

I love me.......2001-07-27

this guy is totally in love with himself. I understand the books supposed to be about him but the one time he steers onto the subject of Loni, all he does is belittle her. Hey Burt, we read the papers back then ya know. What about the time she saved your life when you were nothing but a druggie laying in bed all day popping percosets? Nah. We don't here any of the good things she did for him. Just the negative. Cos he's selfish. Me, Me, Me. Don't bother with this book. I know why its out of print now. It stinks!

The Worst Case Scenario Survival Handbook (Worst-Case Scenario Survival Handbooks)

Average customer rating:

The book works...
Laughter and Skills You Hope You Never Need
Entertaining
Really good
Three Reasons To Buy This Book

The Worst Case Scenario Survival Handbook (Worst-Case Scenario Survival Handbooks)
Joshua Piven , and David Borgenicht
Manufacturer: Listen & Live Audio
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Audio CD

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ASIN: 1885408706

Amazon.com

How to Wrestle Free from an Alligator: 4. If its jaws are closed on something you want to remove (for example, a limb), tap or punch it on the snout.

Though it's being marketed as a humorous title--after all, it's unlikely you'll be called upon to land a plane, jump from a motorcycle to a moving car, or win a swordfight--the information contained in The Worst-Case Scenario Survival Handbook is all quite sound. Authors Joshua Piven and David Borgenicht consulted numerous experts in their fields (they're cited at the end of the book) to discover how to survive various and sundry awful events. Parachute doesn't open? Your best bet for survival is to hook your arms through the straps of a fellow jumper's chute--and even then you're likely to dislocate both shoulders and break both legs. Car sinking in water? Open the window immediately to equalize pressure, then open the car door and swim to the surface. Buried in an avalanche? Spit on the snow--it will tell you which direction is really up. Then dig as fast as you can.

Each survival skill is explained in simple steps with helpful illustrations. Most stress the need to be prepared--both mentally and physically. For example, to escape from quicksand, you will need to lay a pole on the surface of the quicksand, flop on your back atop the pole, and pull your legs out one by one. No pole? No luck. "When walking in quicksand country, carry a stout pole--it will help you get out should you need to."

Hopefully you'll never need to know how to build a fire without matches, perform a tracheotomy, or treat a bullet wound. But in the words of survival evasion resistance escape instructor "Mountain" Mel Deweese, "You never know." --Sunny Delaney

Book Description

Danger! It lurks at every corner. Volcanoes. Sharks. Mountain lions. Quicksand. Terrorists. The pilot of the plane blacks out and it's up to you to land the jet. What do you do? The Worst-Case Scenario Survival Handbook is here to help survive the most harrowing predicaments: jam-packed with how-to, hands-on, step-by-step, instructions on everything you need to know fast--from detecting a bomb to delivering a baby in the back of a cab.

Providing frightening and funny real information, this indispensable guide is the definitive handbook for those times when life takes a sudden turn for the worse. The essential companion for a perilous age.

Because you never know...

The authors have appeared on 20/20, Today, National Enquirer TV, as well as in Time, USA Today, The New Yorker, People, Forbes, The Washington Post, Glamour and Entertainment Weekly.

#1 Los Angeles Times Nonfiction Paperback Bestseller #1 Amazon.com Nonfiction Paperback Bestseller New York Times Best-seller Publishers Weekly Best-Seller USA Today Best-seller

Download Description

Danger! It lurks at every corner. Volcanoes. Sharks. Quicksand. Terrorists. The pilot of the plane blacks out and it's up to you to land the jet. What do you do? The Worst-Case Scenario Survival Handbook is here to help: jampacked with how-to, hands-on, step-by-step, illustrated instructions on everything you need to know FAST -- from defusing a bomb to delivering a baby in the back of a cab. Providing frightening and funny real information in the best-selling tradition of the Paranoid's Pocket Guide and Hypochondriac's Handbook, this indispensable, indestructible pocket-sized guide is the definitive handbook for those times when life takes a sudden turn for the worse. The essential companion for a perilous age. Because you never know...

Customer Reviews:

The book works..........2007-07-13

I read the book. I saw a car accident. I can't go into further details because it is illegal to perform medical procedures without a degree in medicine. The boy didn't survive (he was brain dead immediately (happens when your head takes a cars bumper)) but his body did and was used to keep two other kids alive.

Laughter and Skills You Hope You Never Need.......2007-04-10

The odds may not be very good that you'll end up in some of these situations, but if you ever do, you'll be glad you read this book. If you never need these skills, then it's great for a laugh.

Entertaining.......2007-02-22

Extreme and extremely funny. Some are more plausible than others but all are thought provoking.

Really good.......2007-01-31

When I bought this book, my girlfrind and some friend where making fun of me, but as soon as one of them started reading it, he couldn't let it down and everybody was reading it. It contains information that I hope I'll never need. It's funny, but at the same time the information provided was well researched.

Great for having at your coffee table, since everyone will comment on it.

I belive it might be useful also for actual surviving....

Three Reasons To Buy This Book.......2007-01-20

One: You just might learn how to save your own life.

Two: You just might learn how to save someone else's life.

Three: You just might impress the hell out of your next date.

I like this book. It's like one of the Dummies titles devoted only to survival skills. It makes you feel like you're just a leetle bit superior to everybody else. The basics are here, but so are some of the coolest factoids, techniques, and tricks I've ever read. If someday you're in a falling elevator/locked in some pervert's trunk/facing an oncoming flash flood/freezing your epidermis off in a snow-covered SUV while driving home from a ski resort where you had a fight with your significant other who was wrong, not you, you'll be glad you bought this book and spent a day reading it. It's cool, it's fun, it's empowering, and it reminds me of someone I knew in college. (Yes, that last detail won't make you rush out and buy it, I know, but...)

Read The Worst-Case Scenario Survival Handbook and you'll feel like you're ready for anything life might throw at you!

Average customer rating:

Taut mystery
Disappointing
Racial politics and murder in LA
CONNELLY EXAMINES RACE RELATIONS IN LA
Pretty close to perfect...

Angels Flight (Harry Bosch)
Michael Connelly
Manufacturer: Hachette Audio
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Audio Cassette

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ASIN: 1570426457

Amazon.com

Michael Connelly, whose novel The Poet won the 1997 Anthony Award for Best Mystery, is already recognized as one of the smartest and most vivid scribes of the hard-boiled police procedural. Now, with his much-anticipated sixth Harry Bosch novel, Angels Flight, Connelly offers one of the finest pieces of mystery writing to appear in 1998. Bosch is awakened in the middle of the night and, out of rotation, he is assigned to the murder investigation of the high-profile African American attorney Howard Elias. When Bosch arrives at the scene, it seems that almost the entire LAPD is present, including the IAD (the Internal Affairs Division). Elias, who made a career out of suing the police, was sadistically gunned down on the Angels Flight tram just as he was beginning a case that would have struck the core of the department; not surprisingly, L.A.'s men and women in blue become the center of the investigation. Haunted by the ghost of the L.A. riots, plagued by incessant media attention, and facing turmoil at home, Bosch suddenly finds himself questioning friends and associates while working side by side with some longtime enemies.

Angels Flight is a detective's nightmare scenario and is disturbingly relevant to the racially tense last decade of the 20th century. Amidst the twists and turns of his complex narrative, Connelly affirms his rightful place among the masters of contemporary mystery fiction. --Patrick O'Kelley

Book Description

Michael Connelly, whose novel The Poet won the 1997 Anthony Award for Best Mystery, is already recognized as one of the smartest and most vivid scribes of the hard-boiled police procedural. Now, with his much-anticipated sixth Harry Bosch novel, Angels Flight, Connelly offers one of the finest pieces of mystery writing to appear in 1998. Bosch is awakened in the middle of the night and, out of rotation, he is assigned to the murder investigation of the high-profile African American attorney Howard Elias.When Bosch arrives at the scene, it seems that almost the entire LAPD is present, including the IAD (the Internal Affairs Division). Elias, who made a career out of suing the police, was sadistically gunned down on the Angels Flight tram just as he was beginning a case that would have struck the core of the department; not surprisingly, L.A.'s men and women in blue become the center of the investigation.Haunted by the ghost of the L.A. riots, plagued by incessant media attention, and facing turmoil at home, Bosch suddenly finds himself questioning friends and associates while working side by side with some longtime enemies. Angels Flight is a detective's nightmare scenario and is disturbingly relevant to the racially tense last decade of the 20th century. Amidst the twists and turns of his complex narrative, Connelly affirms his rightful place among the masters of contemporary mystery fiction. --Patrick O'Kelley

Download Description

The man most hated by the LAPD--a black lawyer who has made his name by bringing lawsuits alleging racism and brutality by police officers--has been found murdered on the eve of a high-profile trial. The list of suspects includes half the police force. And Harry Bosch is the detective chosen to head the investigation The political dangers of the case are huge. If it's not investigated fairly, the public outcry could make the Rodney King riots look tame. But a full investigation will take Bosch into the ugliest corners of law enforcement. To make matters worse, Bosch's wife Elizabeth has disappeared overnight. Bosch fears she has left him--or succumbed further to her gambling addiction. He's not sure which is worse. Angels Flight reads in a white heat. It continues to up the ante of the series that is "raising the hard-boiled detective novel to a new level . . . adding substance and depth to modern crime fiction." (Boston Globe)

Customer Reviews:

Taut mystery.......2007-09-12

This novel is the latest in the "Harry Bosch" mysteries. Mr. Bosch is a hard boiled Los Angeles detective, whose life is far from perfect. His detective skills though, are wonderful.

I loved this book. The police procedures were entirely believable, and as an Angeleno, I enjoyed the accuracy of Mr. Connelly's descriptions of L.A.

I highly recommend this great read. It will not disappoint!

Disappointing.......2007-08-05

pros:
usual Harry Bosch character

cons:
opening crime not very interesting.
tension between Harry's crew and IAD not very engaging.
plot moves ahead sluggishly.

I had to give up reading this at p. 170 of 454.

As usual, minimal character development. Emphasis is merely on plot. I saw little of Harry's personal life, except for his occasional attempts to call his wife. (But this is true of ALL Michael Connelly books. And I usually put up with it.)

Racial politics and murder in LA.......2007-07-27

Edgar and Anthony award-winner Connelly takes a high dive right into the turbulent currents of Los Angeles' racial tensions in this Detective Harry Bosch appearance.

On the eve of a major lawsuit against the LAPD, high-profile civil-rights lawyer Howard Elias is shot. "Bosch thought about all the suspects there would be, many of them standing around outside at that very moment, watching." The obvious suspects are the police; and the black populace, on the brink of rioting, demands action.

Suing the police for beating a confession out of a (black) suspected (white) child murderer, since acquitted, Elias has polarized the city. But Bosch soon discovers that the lawyer had more going for him than racial politics; he had evidence - evidence that the accused child killer, still presumed guilty, was truly innocent. Elias was confident of victory, but his big secret died with him.

Find the secret, find Elias' killer, Bosch realizes. But retracing Elias' steps proves difficult, especially with the police stonewalling, the black community clamoring, and Elias' files off-limits. With adroit compassion, Connelly ("Blood Work," "The Black Echo") explores the complexities of racial politics, using the hidden passions and public maneuvering to heighten suspense.

Meanwhile, his wife's gambling habit is draining their marriage and city anger is nearing explosion. Bosch steps on toes and strains friendships as he pursues the sordid human mystery, unrelated but now at the core of all this political fury.

Thoughtful, suspenseful, masterfully plotted and well written - as readers have come to expect from Connelly.

CONNELLY EXAMINES RACE RELATIONS IN LA.......2006-09-02

Bosch is back. A high-profile, black, civil right attorney is slain and Harry Bosch is given the assignment to find the murderer. To those unfamiliar with Detective Bosch, he is not a "go along to get along" guy. He tells it like he sees it even if it rankles the Chief of Police, the FBI or other police officers. That is much of the fun in reading a Harry Bosch novel. And I use the word "novel" in its literary sense; Mr. Connelly has written a novel in ANGEL'S FLIGHT, not a police procedural, although it is a wonderful example of that as well. ANGEL's FLIGHT is really about race relations in Los Angeles and about police-minority relations in particular. The murder mystery in ANGEL'S FLIGHT is just the hat tree on which to hang the fedora of political and racial insights. This is the sixth in the Bosch series and the best-written so far (I am reading them in the order published); Mr. Connelly keeps growing as a writer. For me, the ending was just a little two pat in terms of poetic as well as legal justice being served to make this a five-star book, but one reads Mr. Connelly to learn about Harry Bosch and see him in action more than anything else. At least I do.

Pretty close to perfect..........2006-08-24

Angels Flight was the first Michael Connelly/Harry Bosch book that I read and when I picked it up four years ago, I realized that Connelly was no ordinary mystery writer. It took three more years to finally read the rest of this series, and since finishing them all, I wanted to go back and reread Angels Flight as I didn't remember much of what happened. Not only did I enjoy it just as much the second time around, but it remains one of my very favorite Bosch mysteries.

Howard Elias in a black civil rights lawyer who has made a name for himself suing the LAPD (this is a post Rodney King/OJ Los Angeles). One of his clients is Michael Harris, a man who was acquitted of kidnapping and murdering a young girl, Stacey Kincaid. He is now suing 15 members of the LAPD's Robbery and Homicide Division (RHD) for torturing him in trying to obtain a confession. Two days before the trial is to open, Elias is murdered. There are a whole bunch of cops who would like to see Elias dead and the citizens of LA believe a man in blue did the killing. They expect that the LAPD will close ranks and engage in a cover-up to protect their own. Tempers are raging and the city is on the verge of riots. Normally, this high profile case would fall to RHD. But since they're all suspects, it is given to Harry Bosch and his partners, Kiz Rider and Jerry Edgar. IAD and the FBI are also put on the case, which makes things more interesting and more complicated.

Bosch discovers that during the Michael Harris trial, Elias was planning to expose the real killer in the Stacey Kincaid murder. He decides to go back to square one in the Kincaid murder, believing that the killer of Kincaid and Elias are the same person. In the course of the investigation, Bosch is shocked at what he discovers--from a child pornography ring to the bad judgment of those he thought he knew and trusted. Through it all, the LAPD is trying to whitewash anything detrimental to the force.

Connelly writes with true feeling and with the knowledge of one who has lived in LA and written the crime beat there. When Kiz Rider picks up on Bosch's personal problems, Bosch muses "Her having picked up on his personal turmoil was a testament to her skill as a detective--reading people was always more important than reading clues." Also, a black lawyer attempts to explain to Bosch the reasons for the rioting in LA: "It's about hope, detective...The minority communities of Los Angeles have no power, have no money, have no voice...When you take hope away, it leaves a void. Some people fill that up with anger and violence."

The Angels Flight case does not quite play out so that all the issues are resolved. Then again, we don't live in a perfect world. But Connelly comes pretty close to perfect in writing this book.

Average customer rating:

Too many cooks and all that . . .
The Bare Facts!
Don't buy it, don't even get it at the library!
Multiple Authors Make an Interesting Read
Rough around the edges

Naked Came the Manatee
Carl Hiaasen , Elmore Leonard , Dave Barry , James W. Hall , Edna Buchanan , Edna Standiford , Paul Levine , Brian Antoni , Tananarive Due , John Dufresne , Vicki Hendricks , Carolina Hospital , and Evelyn Mayerson
Manufacturer: DH Audio
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Audio Cassette

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ASIN: 0886464315

Amazon.com

Dave Barry starts the madness in Naked Came the Manatee, introducing a 102-year-old environmentalist named Coconut Grove and a manatee saddled with one of Barry's favorite monikers, Booger. Carl Hiaasen closes down the party, and in between, 11 of Florida's literati, including Elmore Leonard, John Dufresne, and Edna Buchanan, make twisted offerings to the affair: three severed heads, all bearing a remarkable resemblance to Fidel Castro; four murders; some sex; some espionage; even an appearance by Jimmy Carter and one by Castro himself.

Originally published as a serial novel in the Miami Herald's Tropic magazine, Naked Came the Manatee resembles a literary game of telephone, with each writer contributing a chapter and passing it on to the next, who then makes the most of what he or she is given. The result is a novel with wildly fluctuating styles and more crazy plot curves than a daytime drama, but thanks to these 13 masters of the craft this roller coaster of a book is almost as much fun to read as it obviously was to write.

Book Description

In South Florida, everyone wants to get a head. But not just any head. A very famous human head--severed and snugged away in a cryonic container. A head that could spark a revolution and change the course of history.

Everybody wants a piece of the noggin: rotund gangster Big Joey G., a 102-year-old environmentalist, hard-boiled Miami reporter Britt Montero, lawyer Jake Lassiter, and a would-be dictator in exile--with ex-president Jimmy Carter and a lovable manatee named Booger thrown in for good measure.

With bodies piling up it's anybody's guess what will happen from one chapter to the next, as an all-star line-up of Florida's finest writers take turns at taking this outrageously original novel to the limit--and beyond.

Customer Reviews:

Too many cooks and all that . . . .......2007-08-15

If you are a fan of any of these authors, do yourself the favor of sticking with their individual efforts. Hiaasen's chapter (the final one) cracks broadly at the missteps of several previous authors. I enjoyed only 3 chapters (Berry, Hall, & Hiaasen), and I put up with the rest to see how Mr. Hiaasen would tie it up. Even his talents could not salvage this - and here, I strongly agree with other reviewers - MESS.

The Bare Facts!.......2007-05-12

I found Naked Came The Manatee to be an enjoyable read. I liked the different writing styles that wove the storyline together. I borrowed the book from our local library and liked it enough to buy my own copy. It was interersting and entertaining. The reason I gave it four stars was because I thought Dave Barry's first chapter, though good, was a little too chock full of detail. Although I have read Carl Hiaasen's Flush and Hoot among others and have enjoyed reading Dave Barry for years, I was not familiar with some of the other writers. Naked Came The Manatee has whetted my interest in reading books they have penned. All in all, a pleasant way to spend an afternoon reading. ~ Mrs. B.

Don't buy it, don't even get it at the library!.......2006-08-17

First, I'd like to tell the authors that after reading this book, each of you owe me a few hours of my time which disappeared, worthlessly, from my life.

What starts out as a great idea - a gaggle of writers each crafting a chapter of a novel - quickly crashes into a confusing, poorly played game of "telephone."

You know "telephone" - the kids' game where one whispers something to the person next to him or her and the words circle the room, ending in an incomprehensible string of gibberish?

Naked Came the Manatee is a hobo stew of styles, with each writer leading us through silly plot moves and adding their own characters.

While reading each of these authors might be fun, their collective sum only reveals a bookfull of defective parts.

Multiple Authors Make an Interesting Read.......2006-07-19

Back in the primary school days you probably partook in the exercise of everyone in the class writing a paragraph then passing the paper to the person sitting next to them who wrote the next paragraph, passed it to the next person and so on until everyone in the class had contributed to each of the 30 or so stories. Well that is exactly what the publishers of Naked Came the Manatee have done, with thirteen Florida authors, just on a bigger scale.

The quality of each chapter obviously varies with the quality of each author but that adds to the fun. Even though Hiaasen is on the spine also doesn't mean that all the authors are surreal humorous type writers either with some chapters being very crime thriller in style and even one, chapter 11 being poetic philosophy (must admit didn't really enjoy this one.) The story flowed on quite well (except from chapter 10 to 11) from author to author in most parts but you could definitely pick up the difference in style with each transition. The story overall lacked the high quality that many of these authors such as Carl Hiaasen and Dave Barry have achieved in their own novels but it was still a very good and enjoyable read.

The basic plot of Naked Came the Manatee revolves around a Manatee, called Booger by the locals who is either part of or around the main action. Throw in a 102 year old woman, Fidel Castro, shiny steel boxes, dim-witted criminals, lawyers and politicians as well as the locals of Coconut Grove and you've got a pretty fun storyline.

If you like the multiple author novel and want to read another one that Dave Barry is in grab a copy of The Putt at the End of the World. Barry teams up with Lee K Abbott, Richard Bausch, James Crumley, James W Hall, Tami Hoag, Tim O'Brien, Ridley Pearson and Les Standiford in this surreal golfing adventure that golf related is to the world of novels what Happy Gilmore is to the world of movies.

Rough around the edges .......2006-03-22

Perhaps it was my surroundings at the time I first read this delightful book that makes me like it so much,
(first visit to a naturist resort)
but, after several reads I've developed quite a thing for it.
It alternates for the top spot on my list with Edmond Rostand's Cyrano de Bergerac and Beryl Markham's West with the Night depending on my mood...
I picked it up off the shelf at Barnes and Noble because I'm a Carl Hiassen fan and enjoyed his other colabrotive effort, A Death in China with Bill Montalbano.
(I have since purchaced many other new and used copies for friends)
I also needed something to read while burning parts of my body that have not seen the sun in decades to an unattractive crispy bright red.
(something naturist resorts don't alert novices to in the brochure...)
the shifts in style from chapter to chapter make it that much more interesting, just when you start to think it's too masculine, a touch of the femenine intervines to round it out.

To sum it up I guess,
if your tastes in literature twist towards nature,
international intrigue,
or the simple pleasures of nudity,
this book is quite the enjoyable romp.

(SPF 30+ is recommended if you read it on the beach, trust me.)

Average customer rating:

A beautifully photographed collection of private moments

Burt Reynolds
Lisa Smith
Manufacturer: Magic Light Productions
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Hardcover

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ASIN: 096338080X

Customer Reviews:

A beautifully photographed collection of private moments.......1998-03-11

If you're researching Burt Reynolds, this book is a must-have. Since I was, it was of great help to me. The photography of Lisa Smith is great. I found out she recently passed away and all the proceeds of the book now go to a charity she contributed to. A great behind-the scenes biography.

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Chance would be a fine thing . . .
Spenser series flagging
Spencer Takes On Organized Crime
Casting Diamonds to Devils: Shattering A Child's Crystalline Dreams.
Spenser and Hawk get involved in potential crime turf battles

Chance
Robert B. Parker
Manufacturer: Audio Literature
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Audio Cassette

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ASIN: 0787107123

Customer Reviews:

Chance would be a fine thing . . ........2007-08-08

In this VERY amusing (although bloody) chapter in the Spenser library, Spenser and Hawk travel to Las Vegas to find Anthony Meeker, the husband of Shirley Meeker, the daughter of crime boss Julius Ventura. No one admits to knowing why he ran - according to Shirley he worshiped the ground she walked on - and Ventura is not keen to have Spenser digging around trying to find out why Anthony ran, he just wants Spenser to find Anthony. When Spenser says that to find Anthony he might have to discover why he ran, Ventura backs down with ill grace and warns that anything learned better not be blabbed.

The trouble with Anthony, as it turns out, is that he gambles a lot and loses consistently. Badly. All the time. And Vegas is no exception.

This was a very entertaining chapter in the Spenser series - kept my mind off the fact I been stuck in the hospital, anyway! Don't miss it!

Spenser series flagging.......2007-03-01

I first became aware of the Spenser (detective) character from the TV show Spenser for Hire (1985-1988.)

The series was adapted from Robert Parker's, Spenser novels. It was the Hawk character - brilliantly brought to life by Avery Brooks that I liked best.

I soon started reading the novels - and have read most of them.

To sum up the Spenser character - He is a middle aged, Boston,detective with good street credit. The cops and the hoodlums respect him. He is not trying to save the world - just make a small difference.

Parker has been prospering from the Spenser series for more than 20 years - a nice meal ticket.

Lately I have noticed the dialogue becoming predictable - dare I say boring. The plot lines are less imaginative and the final chapters try to sum up a story where clues have been sparse.

Chance is an exercise in trying to ring the Spenser series register just a few more times.

In this adventure our heroes travel to Las Vegas to investigate the disappearance of a mob figure (Julius Ventura)'s son in law (Anthony Meeker.)

The supportive cast includes a brutal mob enforcer - Marty Anaheim and his battered wife Bibi, Julius Ventura's emotionally challenged daughter, a double dealing Las Vegas gumshoe and a host of unpleasant underworld figures.

Only Bibi is marginally fleshed but comes off as a lack luster stereotype.

When the mystery is finally resolved - you will find yourself caring - not at all.

The best Spenser novels rely on fast action and witty dialogue.

Chance's action is not fast and the dialogue is labored and time worn.

The characters that we have to come to love so well (Spenser, Hawk and Susan Silverman) have not evolved. They have no hobbies, they ignore advances in electronic technology, have no problems with their plumbing, and never comment on current Boston's politics.

If you are new to the Spenser series - spend your money and time on the earlier novels - you won't be disappointed.

Robert Parker is an elegant, witty writer who is exploring new territory.

As the Spenser series has declined - Parker introduced two new leading characters that now have their own series; Jesse Stone and Sunny Randall.

Both of the those new series are a lot of fun.

Is it possible that the next Spenser novel will be a phoenix? - I think the chances are unlikely.

"Hey, Robert Parker!" Prove me wrong!

Caslo

Spencer Takes On Organized Crime .......2006-09-19

Spencer and Hawk agree to take on a job for the daughter of a local Mafia kingpin. She wants them to find her husband who has gone missing. Seems simple enough, but things soon become complicated as they are wont to do in a Spencer novel. Hawk and Susan each have a significant role in this one and the snappy dialog, for which Parker is so well known, is here in abundance. The plot moves along at a good pace and then changes course about half way through the book and begins to wander quite a bit. Loose ends are tied up and questions finally answered at the conclusion. A fairly good read, but the second half was a bit of a struggle.

Casting Diamonds to Devils: Shattering A Child's Crystalline Dreams. .......2006-07-07

The prologue of CHANCE was a haunting literary coup. Opening with the ethereal elegance of crystal goblets and white linen dreams, it descended quickly into the darkened schemes of beating bands and backed up screams:

>> It was all to come. The cocktails, the crystal, the starched white napkins, and the soft Sunday mornings with orange juice and floral print coverlets. Apple trees in spring blossom.... dense racket of the band and the crowd... booze and the sweet pungent marijuana smoke. <<

The scene appeared to be set-in-retro a few decades from the ongoing plot time, to a feel of the 70's:

Blackjack chewing gum, be-ribboned pony tails, dark loafers worn with no sox.

The effect reminded me of Sue Grafton's first chapter of "S is for Silence" with Violet portrayed in the 50's era, decades earlier than the 80's plot setting. (See my review on S, which I cut to 1/4 its original length to halt a blitzkrieg of No. Please ignore the bullet holes. Swiss Cheese is good.)

Later in the plot, Spenser made a few touching gestures, after the reader identified the red-haired woman in the 70's-retro, Cinderella prologue (with the antique-lace headed to the blinking-neon-light) and realized what befell the girlish schemes of a hopeful rescue from a brutal father.

During a lunch scene with the prologue gal (who easily received my sympathy), Spenser narrated:

I was quiet. She sat thinking back, looking past me at the lush artifice of the Las Vegas restaurant and probably not seeing it....
"You can't stop him. He'll find me and do what he's going to do and no one will stop him. Nobody can."
"I might stop him," I said.

A dialogue between Spenser and Hawk:

"She hasn't hired us. But I sort of told her I wouldn't let ... get her."
"Sure you did," Hawk said. "She's probably good looking and sad and you do four or five back flips and say we gonna eat Marty's lunch for him, he comes near her."
"I didn't do that many back flips."

Later, a few clips here and there from a scene in an MGM Grand motel room:

While I waited I patted her knee. My father used to do that, give me a pat once in a while, without comment....
"You all right in this?"
"No," she said. "All I can do is sit here and wait for the men to do whatever they'll do. How all right is that?"....
"I patted (her) knee again and headed for the door."

In a sense, this novel seemed to be dealing with vulnerability, sensitivity, and the idealized life brutalized, as much as with gambling and the death of romantic compulsions.

>> I walked with Susan through the brief wedge of dry heat into the air-conditioned terminal.... Watching her I felt the little knot in my stomach that I always felt when I left her.... I still stood for a moment, looking at the last place I had seen her, being careful not to be routine, while I became the other guy again, the one I was without her. It took a couple of minutes. And then I was him. He wasn't a bad guy; in fact sometimes I thought he had strengths that the other guy didn't have. Certainly he wasn't worse. But he was no one I wanted to be all the time. I turned back and headed for Lester and the Lincoln. <<

Parker painted the ambiance artifice of Vegas, the varied moods of its sunlight's unrelenting lack of relief:

>> ... live pirate show where one ship sinks another in the Treasure Island Lagoon, while the mist machines on the perimeter cooled us down. The rest of the hotels on our part of the strip looked like big, ugly hotels, a fifth-grader's dream of luxury, and nighttime excess, shopworn in the unblinking Nevada sunlight. <<

Describing a dead woman:

>> ... her white body dimpled and pudgy in the comfortless sunlight ... It was late morning and the dry heat lay and flat over everything. <<

The above type of Vegas detail is contrasted cleanly to Boston's climate, "Hawk and I went out, adequately armed, at least by our standards, and walked along the waterfront through a raw wind blowing off the harbor."

I'm beginning to notice some of what the addictive appeal is for me with the Spenser series, in addition to the above type of poetic prose in which the First Person Narrator sketches setting into life. The appeal is that I've been nicely set up to look for Spenser's unique brand of quips, quotes, and answers which slip to the reader those "keys" (or clues) on "How to Win the Boxing Matches of Life" (without feeling you've slimed your soul).

I don't know if Spenser's style is a melancholy-blues song, or poetry gone crisp with edges of truth. Maybe Parker's voice is the synergy of both, surged to the level of An Icon within The Cultural Conversation. When I read any Spenser novel now, I expect diamonds to glisten among the garbage of the "way we were" the way we are, the ...

"What I am to be I am now becoming."

I don't recall who said that. I just remember that it was quoted by a Girl Scout leader from my long gone youth.

While I enjoy Hawk's references of Spenser being an Eagle Scout, I was never fond of what I learned in Girl Scout camp (other than the above quote), what with the rats keeping me awake chewing on my shoes beside my cot, the wake up calls in the frigid frost of dawn, the choice of either shivering or sweating my terror of mountain lions and bears. The horrifying, bone-marrow-tapping Cold of the Nights in the mountains and woods were the worst, with the campfire always glowing too hard, too late, too small, too far away from my nightmares.

Working the summer as an assistant cook at a Girl's Scout camp designed (horribly poorly; what a horrendous choice that was!) my transition from home to college, at the end of my high school reign, during which I was class president and Co-Valedictorian.

All for what?

What a maze we go through to get from youth to adult, a maze which never seems to truly end with the Brass Ring called Actualization, a maize in which spirit bruises reign and rain.

Who doesn't at times feel like a losing gambler in life.

Returning to the Life of Spenser and the dry-heat, Nevada ambiance in this plot...

I noticed a pause in the middle of the book, in which questions like the above moved mood to melancholy, as Spenser wallowed within an absolute lack of success of his mission; an inability to take satisfaction in his pay (which he gave away) at the end of The Day. When I realized the book was only half finished at that seemingly moot point, I wondered how Parker would heat the rhythm enough to make the second half feel more than an extended tack-on. I was surprised that while Spenser, Hawk, and Susan were moaning the emptiness of dead ends in the case at hand, I didn't feel those dreaded spaces of reader boredom which sometimes overwhelm (underwhelm?) me if characters endure depressing lulls of dissatisfaction.

What kept me away from ennui at that half-way plot point of "Is this all there is?"

Possibly what kept me involved in the story was that I knew Parker would leave clues I could use for "me"; I wanted those more than I wanted completion to Parker's clients' questions and needs. They were there. Both. All. But, they weren't etched in glowing script on Silver Plates. Diamonds buried in mud, they were. I had to dig. I did.

See my tiara? Not a princess in a fairytale, I'm The Queen of my Dreams. Wherever they are, my dreams are mine. Who can steal something I keep in my mind while dining on time?

Maybe the secret is to know what might be attainable with sweat and finesse, and what is likely pie in the sky to save for sleep.

Onward. To more culinary cozies carefully contrasted by Parker, Rand, Woods, McGarrity, Grafton, Myers, Workinger, O'Loughlin ... The list goes on.

Diamonds before devils, and angels have wings. These are a few of my favorite things.

Speaking somewhat of choirs of dashing devils and soprano angels, I enjoy seeing voices of reviewers develop on Amazon, the only venue I've discovered which allows, in a way encourages this development, with its relatively open gift of space for individual songs to strike a rhythm and tone. If you want to identify more clearly what they mean by a writer's voice this is a good place to study that. Click on any "See all my reviews" and read a few from the beginning of the list, a few from current posts. Maybe you'll hear a song growing, which is more than a style.

Amazon has its very own music of the spheres. (For clear-voice reviews on opera and mystery, see the list of my Amazon Friend, L.E. Cantrell.)

Parker's dedication to his wife, Joan: "Every town is Paris; every month is May."

Linda G. Shelnutt

Spenser and Hawk get involved in potential crime turf battles.......2006-02-06

This story is one of the most convoluted Spenser novels. One of the major figures of organized crime in the Boston area hires Spenser to locate the husband of his only daughter, but only after Hawk turned him down. While Spenser agrees to take the job, it is clear that he is not hearing the entire story. The missing man is Anthony Meeker, and once Spenser starts his probe, he learns that Anthony, "is as dumb as a rake handle." People who have encountered Anthony refer to him as "phony Tony", and it doesn't take long for Spenser to realize that Anthony was a bag man who carried out money transfers between crime groups. It is also obvious that Tony skimmed some of the money, as he announced that he had a system to beat Las Vegas and when he got back he would be worth a fortune.
Spenser and Hawk then depart for Vegas and learn that there is a lot of genetic material being exchanged between various wives and husbands. They also learn that there is a budding turf war about to erupt among the various leaders of the organized crime groups in the Boston area. Joe Broz, an old adversary of Spenser's and the major crime boss, is retiring and he has no worthy heir. Therefore, many of the players are running duplicitous ploys against each other, jockeying for position. Spenser even has a frank discussion with Joe Broz about what is going on.
Of course, Spenser and Hawk finally determine what is actually going on and Spenser finds a way to make sure the guilty parties are punished. The story is a little bit difficult to follow at times, simply because there are so many persons and groups of interest. The dialog is not as crisp or humorous as it is in the best Spenser novels, but it is quite good. This is also the book that introduces Bernard J. Fortunato, a Vegas private investigator who reappears as a Spenser ally in a later story.

Aesop's Fables: Traditional Tales (Children's Classics (Dove Audio))

Average customer rating:

Star-Studded
If you like straight Aesop's fables, this is ok

Aesop's Fables: Traditional Tales (Children's Classics (Dove Audio))

Manufacturer: Audio Literature
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Audio CD

General | Books on CD | Audiobooks | Formats | Books
ASIN: 0787110108

Customer Reviews:

Star-Studded.......2005-07-08

Performers:
Eddie Albert, Stephanie Beacham, Harvey Fierstein, Elliott Gould, Joel Grey, Gregory Hines, Kevin McCarthy, Vanessa Redgrave, Jean Stapleton, Ernie Hudson, Glenda Jackson, Cheryl Ladd, Kevin McCarthy, Cathy Moriarty, Sharon Stone, Burt Reynolds, Rod Steiger, Alfred Woodard, Michael York, Ephram Zimbalist, Jr.
Original poems and introduction written by Judith Cummings.

If you like straight Aesop's fables, this is ok.......1998-08-05

This is a CD of straight Aesop's fables followed by the narrator trying to turn the moral into common language. Aesop's read better than they listen - at least for me. My kids really didn't like it because the stories are short (only about 1 minute) and the "real life applications" didn't make sense to them or me. Overall, I wouldn't recommend it unless you just want somebody to read the stories to you.

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