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Spenser #39
Sixkill
On location in Boston, bad-boy actor Jumbo Nelson is accused of the rape and murder of a young woman. From the start the case seems fishy, so the Boston PD calls on Spenser to investigate. Things don't look so good for Jumbo, whose appetites for food, booze, and sex are as outsized as his name. He was the studio's biggest star, but he's become its biggest liability.
In the course of the investigation, Spenser encounters Jumbo's bodyguard: a young, former football-playing Native American named Zebulon Sixkill. He acts tough, but Spenser sees something more within the young man. Despite the odd circumstances, the two forge an unlikely alliance, with Spenser serving as mentor for Sixkill. As the case grows darker and secrets about both Jumbo and the dead woman come to light, it's Spenser-with Sixkill at his side-who must put things right.
In the course of the investigation, Spenser encounters Jumbo's bodyguard: a young, former football-playing Native American named Zebulon Sixkill. He acts tough, but Spenser sees something more within the young man. Despite the odd circumstances, the two forge an unlikely alliance, with Spenser serving as mentor for Sixkill. As the case grows darker and secrets about both Jumbo and the dead woman come to light, it's Spenser-with Sixkill at his side-who must put things right.
293 pages, Hardcover
First published May 3, 2011
1286 people are currently reading
1950 people want to read
About the author
Robert B. Parker
489 books2,289 followersLibrarian Note: There is more than one author in the Goodreads database named Robert B. Parker.
Robert Brown Parker was an American writer, primarily of fiction within the mystery/detective genre. His most famous works were the 40 novels written about the fictional private detective Spenser. ABC television network developed the television series Spenser: For Hire based on the character in the mid-1980s; a series of TV movies was also produced based on the character. His works incorporate encyclopedic knowledge of the Boston metropolitan area. The Spenser novels have been cited as reviving and changing the detective genre by critics and bestselling authors including Robert Crais, Harlan Coben, and Dennis Lehane.
Parker also wrote nine novels featuring the fictional character Jesse Stone, a Los Angeles police officer who moves to a small New England town; six novels with the fictional character Sunny Randall, a female private investigator; and four Westerns starring the duo Virgil Cole and Everett Hitch. The first was Appaloosa, made into a film starring Ed Harris and Viggo Mortensen.
Robert Brown Parker was an American writer, primarily of fiction within the mystery/detective genre. His most famous works were the 40 novels written about the fictional private detective Spenser. ABC television network developed the television series Spenser: For Hire based on the character in the mid-1980s; a series of TV movies was also produced based on the character. His works incorporate encyclopedic knowledge of the Boston metropolitan area. The Spenser novels have been cited as reviving and changing the detective genre by critics and bestselling authors including Robert Crais, Harlan Coben, and Dennis Lehane.
Parker also wrote nine novels featuring the fictional character Jesse Stone, a Los Angeles police officer who moves to a small New England town; six novels with the fictional character Sunny Randall, a female private investigator; and four Westerns starring the duo Virgil Cole and Everett Hitch. The first was Appaloosa, made into a film starring Ed Harris and Viggo Mortensen.
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 850 reviews
June 26, 2022
Here is what I wrote almost eight years ago, when I first read the last Spenser novel that Robert Parker wrote:
So sad, reading the last Spenser novel, realizing I'll never have the pleasure of spending time with these characters again. For years, I've wanted Susan Silverman to die, but I wanted Parker to kill her off himself, to improve the series. I never, never wanted it to be like this, never wanted Susan, Spenser, and Parker to go together. And it was all too soon--too soon.
Unfortunately, this isn't a particularly good Spenser. The plot is sort of a half-hearted update of the old Fatty Arbuckle scandal--starring "Jumbo" Nelson, an asshole version of Chris Farley--and there really isn't any mystery to speak of. The real interest here is Parker's introduction of yet another Parker ally and foil: Zebulon Sixkill, a Native American bodyguard and failed football player, who taking Spenser as his guide, finally becomes a man. Spenser is often at his best as a father-figure ("Early Autumn," "Ceremony," Playmates"), and "Sixkill" is very good when it focuses on the education of Zebulon. Unfortunately, Zebulon suffers from Hawk's irritating tendency to make ironic, self-referential racist remarks, and Parker all too often uses these throwaway lines as an easy way to end a chapter. Plus Zebulon's back story, delivered in almost random passages by an omniscient narrator is both unnecessary and unnecessarily intrusive.
But I'm being picky. Much of the book--the Spenser-Quirk dialogue, the mentoring of Sixkill, the climactic fight with the four assassins, and the concluding page--where Spenser uses the ritual of workout and shower to cleanse himself of this case, gets in his car and "heads west"--are first-rate Parker. And none of us will ever see their like again.
I've been thinking about this series a lot lately. I am seventy years old now, and, seeing as I've just re-read each of Spenser's adventures for the second time, I will probably never read a Spenser novel again. (If it's not written by Parker, I say the hell with it. I am stupidly loyal in matters such as this.)
I have realized only lately that I quarrel intimately with every single one of these novels because I love Spenser and all the things he stands for, and because I wish every novel were as perfect (though limited) expression of manhood as is the character himself.
So what if his relationship with Susan is a frozen projection of non-marital bliss, a idealized distortion of his own marital reality? So what if the ethnic banter sometimes gets old, the literary references occasionally stale. Who cares if the plots are mere excuses for heroics and for the summoning of a diverse troupe of allies? And who cares --although this is the worst of all the failings--if Spenser and Susan talk altogether too damn much about what makes him such an admirable man?
I don't care. Not really. Not when all is said and done.
For Spenser--squarely in the Philip Marlowe/ Lew Archer tradition--is an admirable man. He pledges to do a job and then works diligently until it is done, he strives to save the innocent and to call the selfish, the vicious and the corrupt to account, and he does so in a world that is morally complicated, a world that looks more than a little like our own, full of incomplete and unsatisfying endings.
April 21, 2017
The last Spenser book written by Robert B. Parker. In it, Spenser adds another member to his growing Rainbow Coalition of Thugs ©: a Native American. If he lived, what would the next addition to the Rainbow Coalition of Thugs © have been - an Albanian dwarf, an albino Eskimo, a Centaur with anger issues...?
Who knows?
As far as the passages with the insufferable, food-challenged Susan Silverman, I employed my long dormant speed reading ability through those pages. A skill rarely, if ever, I had a need for, until now. Thank you 7th grade reading teacher whose name escapes me.
The above-average plot is typical Spenser fare, with requisite banter (Native-Amercian centered) inserted. Sadly, no Hawk in this one.
Who knows?
As far as the passages with the insufferable, food-challenged Susan Silverman, I employed my long dormant speed reading ability through those pages. A skill rarely, if ever, I had a need for, until now. Thank you 7th grade reading teacher whose name escapes me.
The above-average plot is typical Spenser fare, with requisite banter (Native-Amercian centered) inserted. Sadly, no Hawk in this one.
September 26, 2012
“Have you wanted to become a professional tough guy but lacked the experience to make your dream come true? Thanks to the Spenser Training Academy you can be trading punches and bullets with thugs in no time.
Mr. Spenser is a private investigator with almost 40 years of experience. His personal classes include:
* Weight training
* Boxing lessons
* Firearms instruction
* Gourmet cooking
* Smart ass quip improvisation
* Angering dangerous criminals
* Making others ill by engaging in smug lovey-dovey conversation with your significant other
In addition to preparing you for an exciting life of adventure and violence, Mr. Spenser will also allow trainees to shadow him as he works on his cases. Potential candidates should be physically fit and preferably had their hearts broken by a woman unworthy of their love. Sign up now and receive a free blackjack!”
************************************************
So here we are at the last Spenser book written by Robert B. Parker before his death. RBP’s family has already hired another author to carry on the series, but reading this did sadden me. I’ve been a fan of this series since I was a teenager in the ‘80s and while I’ve done more than my share of complaining about most of the later books, I still always eventually read them. This is the series that led me to Raymond Chandler and Dashiell Hammett and became the yardstick by which I measured any other detective fiction.
I wish I could say that Spenser went out on a high note, but…. Well, it’s a cut above many of the later books, but RBP couldn’t stay away from the same old song-and-dance.
Jumbo Nelson is a Chris Farley-style Hollywood star whose enormous appetite for food, booze, drugs and sex are only tolerated because of his big box office grosses. Jumbo is in Boston filming a movie and a young girl is found dead in his bed under suspicious circumstances. The media wants to burn Jumbo at the stake and since he’s a world class asshole, no one is rushing to his defense. Police captain Quirk has a suspicion that Jumbo is being railroaded but he can’t actively work to clear him because the public is baying for celebrity blood and politics won’t allow him to dig too deeply.
Quirk asks Spenser to check into it, and the private detective soon clashes with Jumbo’s bodyguard, a former college football star and Native American named Zebulon (Z) Sixkill. After Spenser handily defeats Z, Jumbo fires the bodyguard. Z later finds Spenser and asks for his help in learning how to really fight. Spenser takes Z under his wing and is soon showing the budding tough guy the ins-and-outs of the detective business. It’s a good thing that Z is a quick learner because Spenser uncovers mob connections to Jumbo’s movie deals, and he'll need help to fight off the thugs they send after him.
We’ve seen Spenser play mentor before in Early Autumn when he helped young Paul gain confidence and independence, but this was an interesting twist on that premise. Spenser has a long history of meeting and befriending a variety of professional tough guys ranging from Hawk, Vinnie Morris, Chollo, Bobby Horse, Quirk, Belson, Lee Farrell and Teddy Sapp. RBP loved writing about the macho code that these types recognized in each other whether they were cops, criminals or something in between. With Z Sixkill, RBP took a stab at showing us the creation of one of these guys. Z has the raw materials, but he hasn’t had a role model.
Unfortunately, the rest of the book is less interesting and all of it seems like rehashed Spenser. We’ve had plenty of books with Spenser trying to get to the truth despite his client being a douche bag. There are long discussions with Susan about the nature of Spenser’s character, which has been done about a bazillion times. Plus, the Susan and Spenser interactions in this one are once again smug and self-satisfied in their awesomeness as a couple
Worst of all, there’s no Hawk who is still supposed to be in Central Asia where he's been since the last book, the much better Painted Ladies. No Hawk in the final two RBP Spenser novels is a cruel joke.
Still, there’s some enjoyment to be had in this one with some good smart ass dialogue and some quality dust-ups with the bad guys. The last brief scene in the book also acts as a nice final word from RBP’s Spenser.
Next up: Ace Atkins takes over the Spenser novels in Lullaby. I wish him the best of luck.
Mr. Spenser is a private investigator with almost 40 years of experience. His personal classes include:
* Weight training
* Boxing lessons
* Firearms instruction
* Gourmet cooking
* Smart ass quip improvisation
* Angering dangerous criminals
* Making others ill by engaging in smug lovey-dovey conversation with your significant other
In addition to preparing you for an exciting life of adventure and violence, Mr. Spenser will also allow trainees to shadow him as he works on his cases. Potential candidates should be physically fit and preferably had their hearts broken by a woman unworthy of their love. Sign up now and receive a free blackjack!”
************************************************
So here we are at the last Spenser book written by Robert B. Parker before his death. RBP’s family has already hired another author to carry on the series, but reading this did sadden me. I’ve been a fan of this series since I was a teenager in the ‘80s and while I’ve done more than my share of complaining about most of the later books, I still always eventually read them. This is the series that led me to Raymond Chandler and Dashiell Hammett and became the yardstick by which I measured any other detective fiction.
I wish I could say that Spenser went out on a high note, but…. Well, it’s a cut above many of the later books, but RBP couldn’t stay away from the same old song-and-dance.
Jumbo Nelson is a Chris Farley-style Hollywood star whose enormous appetite for food, booze, drugs and sex are only tolerated because of his big box office grosses. Jumbo is in Boston filming a movie and a young girl is found dead in his bed under suspicious circumstances. The media wants to burn Jumbo at the stake and since he’s a world class asshole, no one is rushing to his defense. Police captain Quirk has a suspicion that Jumbo is being railroaded but he can’t actively work to clear him because the public is baying for celebrity blood and politics won’t allow him to dig too deeply.
Quirk asks Spenser to check into it, and the private detective soon clashes with Jumbo’s bodyguard, a former college football star and Native American named Zebulon (Z) Sixkill. After Spenser handily defeats Z, Jumbo fires the bodyguard. Z later finds Spenser and asks for his help in learning how to really fight. Spenser takes Z under his wing and is soon showing the budding tough guy the ins-and-outs of the detective business. It’s a good thing that Z is a quick learner because Spenser uncovers mob connections to Jumbo’s movie deals, and he'll need help to fight off the thugs they send after him.
We’ve seen Spenser play mentor before in Early Autumn when he helped young Paul gain confidence and independence, but this was an interesting twist on that premise. Spenser has a long history of meeting and befriending a variety of professional tough guys ranging from Hawk, Vinnie Morris, Chollo, Bobby Horse, Quirk, Belson, Lee Farrell and Teddy Sapp. RBP loved writing about the macho code that these types recognized in each other whether they were cops, criminals or something in between. With Z Sixkill, RBP took a stab at showing us the creation of one of these guys. Z has the raw materials, but he hasn’t had a role model.
Unfortunately, the rest of the book is less interesting and all of it seems like rehashed Spenser. We’ve had plenty of books with Spenser trying to get to the truth despite his client being a douche bag. There are long discussions with Susan about the nature of Spenser’s character, which has been done about a bazillion times. Plus, the Susan and Spenser interactions in this one are once again smug and self-satisfied in their awesomeness as a couple
Worst of all, there’s no Hawk who is still supposed to be in Central Asia where he's been since the last book, the much better Painted Ladies. No Hawk in the final two RBP Spenser novels is a cruel joke.
Still, there’s some enjoyment to be had in this one with some good smart ass dialogue and some quality dust-ups with the bad guys. The last brief scene in the book also acts as a nice final word from RBP’s Spenser.
Next up: Ace Atkins takes over the Spenser novels in Lullaby. I wish him the best of luck.
May 13, 2013
Forty years ago, in The Godwulf Manuscript, Robert B. Parker introduced his first and most popular protagonist, Spenser, a tough, witty Boston P.I. Sixkill is the fortieth and last entry in the series (at least the last written by Parker himself), and the series, like its lead character, has had its ups and downs.
The early books were terrific. Spenser was a very engaging character and his early cases were often complex and thought-provoking in addition to being a helluva lot of fun. Later, though, Parker began to coast and wrote a number of books that did not live up to the promise of the early novels and that were often little more than an excuse for Spenser and his sidekicks to exchange snappy dialogue for three hundred pages or so.
In particular, the series seemed to wander off the track when Spenser, who had enjoyed relationships with a number of women in the early books, settled down into a monogamous relationship with Susan Silverman, a Harvard-educated psychologist. Increasingly, the relationship between Spenser and Susan became as much of a focal point of the books as the crime or other mystery that Spenser was investigating at the time. And, to be honest, reading about the two of them became extremely tiresome in a pretty big hurry.
As someone who has read the entire series, I really would have hoped that Parker’s Spenser would go out on a high note, in a book that recalled the glory days of the series. Sadly, though, Sixkill is not such a book. In fairness to Parker, though, I assume that he did not expect to die suddenly at his desk without having the opportunity to give Spenser a proper sendoff.
That is not to say that Sixkill is a bad book. Like most of the later entries in the series, it’s a fun read, and certainly a quick one. Spenser’s long-time sidekick, Hawk, is traveling somewhere in Asia and so, unfortunately, is MIA for this last book. Unhappily, Susan Silverman is not traveling in Asia or anywhere else, and so a fair amount of the book consists of Spenser and Susan having world-class sex and telling each other how wonderful they are. (This, in spite of the fact that Spenser is a veteran of the Korean War, which would mean that he’s pushing eighty by the time he gets to this adventure.)
The case itself is patterned after the scandalous 1921 murder trial of Roscoe “Fatty” Arbuckle. At the time, Arbuckle was a huge Hollywood sensation, and in this case, the term refers both to his popularity and to his size. “Fatty,” as one might gather, was not a small man. The victim, a young starlet, died after partying with Arbuckle and others over several days in a San Francisco hotel room. Though there was little evidence to support the charge, the more sensational newspaper accounts insisted that Arbuckle had raped the woman and, in the process of doing so, had squashed her. In the end, Arbuckle was tried and acquitted, but his reputation was ruined.
In Sixkill, a huge movie star named Jumbo Nelson (again, “huge” in both senses of the word), invites a young woman names Dawn Lopata up to his hotel room. She dies there after having sex with Jumbo. Though the evidence is far from clear, many in the media insist that Nelson, a particularly unappealing character in person, is guilty of murder and should be tried and put away.
Such an outcome would be very bad, both for Jumbo and for the studio and others who have a great deal riding on his career. They would not like to see him prosecuted. Captain Martin Quirk of the Boston P.D. is in charge of the case and isn’t sure that the evidence supports arresting Jumbo. But the public is demanding Nelson’s head on a platter and Quirk apparently feels that he’s not in a position to stand in front of the oncoming train. He’d prefer that Spenser do so. (One might think that the job of the Police Department in this or any other case, would be to pursue justice irrespective of what the larger public might want. But if that were the case, there would be no book, so never mind.)
Spenser takes the case and, as is his habit, he will pursue it to the end, no matter where it takes him and no matter the danger. The real fun of the book lies in the character of Zebulon Sixkill, a Cree Indian who, when the book opens, is serving as Jumbo Nelson’s bodyguard. Sixkill is a behemoth and, naturally, has never been bested by any mortal man. When Spenser annoys Jumbo, Jumbo orders Sixkill to get rid of Spenser. As any reader would expect, Spenser, of course, mops up the floor with Sixkill.
Jumbo fires Sixkill for this gross incompetence and Spenser takes him on as a substitute Hawk, teaching him the ways of the world. The character is one of Parker’s best inventions, smart and funny and a joy to watch in action. It would have been nice to see him appear in later books.
Unhappily, that won’t be the case, at least not for this reader. And as much as I have enjoyed this series through the years, it’s really sad to imagine that there will never again be a fresh Spenser adventure. Susan Silverman, I can happily do without. But Spenser, Hawk, Rita Fiore, Belson, Quirk and all the other characters who have populated these books have become part of my crime fiction universe and I will sorely miss them. The Parker Estate has commissioned Ace Atkins to continue the series, and while I greatly admire Atkins’ own books, I have never liked the idea of another author taking over a series that I really enjoyed once the original writer has gone to Crime Fiction Heaven. So in the future, I will content myself with re-reading the best books of this series and for me, that will suffice.
R.I.P., Mr. Parker, and thanks for all the great books.
The early books were terrific. Spenser was a very engaging character and his early cases were often complex and thought-provoking in addition to being a helluva lot of fun. Later, though, Parker began to coast and wrote a number of books that did not live up to the promise of the early novels and that were often little more than an excuse for Spenser and his sidekicks to exchange snappy dialogue for three hundred pages or so.
In particular, the series seemed to wander off the track when Spenser, who had enjoyed relationships with a number of women in the early books, settled down into a monogamous relationship with Susan Silverman, a Harvard-educated psychologist. Increasingly, the relationship between Spenser and Susan became as much of a focal point of the books as the crime or other mystery that Spenser was investigating at the time. And, to be honest, reading about the two of them became extremely tiresome in a pretty big hurry.
As someone who has read the entire series, I really would have hoped that Parker’s Spenser would go out on a high note, in a book that recalled the glory days of the series. Sadly, though, Sixkill is not such a book. In fairness to Parker, though, I assume that he did not expect to die suddenly at his desk without having the opportunity to give Spenser a proper sendoff.
That is not to say that Sixkill is a bad book. Like most of the later entries in the series, it’s a fun read, and certainly a quick one. Spenser’s long-time sidekick, Hawk, is traveling somewhere in Asia and so, unfortunately, is MIA for this last book. Unhappily, Susan Silverman is not traveling in Asia or anywhere else, and so a fair amount of the book consists of Spenser and Susan having world-class sex and telling each other how wonderful they are. (This, in spite of the fact that Spenser is a veteran of the Korean War, which would mean that he’s pushing eighty by the time he gets to this adventure.)
The case itself is patterned after the scandalous 1921 murder trial of Roscoe “Fatty” Arbuckle. At the time, Arbuckle was a huge Hollywood sensation, and in this case, the term refers both to his popularity and to his size. “Fatty,” as one might gather, was not a small man. The victim, a young starlet, died after partying with Arbuckle and others over several days in a San Francisco hotel room. Though there was little evidence to support the charge, the more sensational newspaper accounts insisted that Arbuckle had raped the woman and, in the process of doing so, had squashed her. In the end, Arbuckle was tried and acquitted, but his reputation was ruined.
In Sixkill, a huge movie star named Jumbo Nelson (again, “huge” in both senses of the word), invites a young woman names Dawn Lopata up to his hotel room. She dies there after having sex with Jumbo. Though the evidence is far from clear, many in the media insist that Nelson, a particularly unappealing character in person, is guilty of murder and should be tried and put away.
Such an outcome would be very bad, both for Jumbo and for the studio and others who have a great deal riding on his career. They would not like to see him prosecuted. Captain Martin Quirk of the Boston P.D. is in charge of the case and isn’t sure that the evidence supports arresting Jumbo. But the public is demanding Nelson’s head on a platter and Quirk apparently feels that he’s not in a position to stand in front of the oncoming train. He’d prefer that Spenser do so. (One might think that the job of the Police Department in this or any other case, would be to pursue justice irrespective of what the larger public might want. But if that were the case, there would be no book, so never mind.)
Spenser takes the case and, as is his habit, he will pursue it to the end, no matter where it takes him and no matter the danger. The real fun of the book lies in the character of Zebulon Sixkill, a Cree Indian who, when the book opens, is serving as Jumbo Nelson’s bodyguard. Sixkill is a behemoth and, naturally, has never been bested by any mortal man. When Spenser annoys Jumbo, Jumbo orders Sixkill to get rid of Spenser. As any reader would expect, Spenser, of course, mops up the floor with Sixkill.
Jumbo fires Sixkill for this gross incompetence and Spenser takes him on as a substitute Hawk, teaching him the ways of the world. The character is one of Parker’s best inventions, smart and funny and a joy to watch in action. It would have been nice to see him appear in later books.
Unhappily, that won’t be the case, at least not for this reader. And as much as I have enjoyed this series through the years, it’s really sad to imagine that there will never again be a fresh Spenser adventure. Susan Silverman, I can happily do without. But Spenser, Hawk, Rita Fiore, Belson, Quirk and all the other characters who have populated these books have become part of my crime fiction universe and I will sorely miss them. The Parker Estate has commissioned Ace Atkins to continue the series, and while I greatly admire Atkins’ own books, I have never liked the idea of another author taking over a series that I really enjoyed once the original writer has gone to Crime Fiction Heaven. So in the future, I will content myself with re-reading the best books of this series and for me, that will suffice.
R.I.P., Mr. Parker, and thanks for all the great books.
September 6, 2024
Parker’s last Spenser novel. Not the best but still a very satisfying read. Also, the introduction of a great new character, Zebulon Sixkill, who Spenser takes under his wing as an apprentice.
December 2, 2025
So I’ve reached the end of my journey with Spenser, at least as he was written by Robert B. Parker. I’m not sure yet if or when I’ll read any of the post-Parker series penned by Ace Atkins. Probably, at some point. Meanwhile, I enjoyed Sixkill as much as most others in the series, although the story is less a mystery than a morality play.
Spenser is hired by Rita Fiore to conduct an investigation on behalf of her client, movie star Jumbo Nelson. Jumbo is a pig of a man in just about every sense of the word. He has a propensity for having sex with as many young women as possible. Young men, too. Now, with Jumbo in Boston for a film shoot, 22-year-old Dawn Lopata has been found dead in his hotel room. It’s clear that she died during or after sex with Jumbo, but the exact circumstances are uncertain. Dawn’s death is a big scandal, of course, and everyone thinks Jumbo murdered her. Homicide captain Martin Quirk isn’t sure, though, and he wants Spenser to look into it. So he asks Rita to hire him.
Spenser, being Spenser, intends to find the truth and report it whichever way it comes out. If Jumbo’s not responsible, he’ll say so. But if he did kill Dawn, he won’t whitewash it. Jumbo doesn’t, shall we say, appreciate Spenser’s integrity. Things quickly go sideways. Jumbo has some powerful and unsavory people behind him, and soon Spenser finds himself in danger. It’s ironic, since Spenser’s investigation may very well exonerate Jumbo in the end. But Jumbo’s people know Jumbo and, like everyone else, they assume he’s guilty.
The focus of the book, and the best thing about it, is Spenser’s mentoring of a new protegé, Zebulon “Z” Sixkill, a Cree Indian, who had been working as Jumbo’s bodyguard. With Hawk away in Central Asia (or, as Henry Cimoli suggests, “East Bumfuck”), Z takes his place at Spenser’s side and soon proves his worth. He’s almost as skillful as Hawk in the things that matter: being confident, fighting well, and keeping up with Spenser in the bantering department. Maybe Parker just got tired of writing witty, buddy-buddy repartée between Spenser and a Black man and wanted to change it up a little, substituting an American Indian for the Black man. Whatever the reason, I still missed Hawk, but Z is a pretty good character in his own right. I think that he reappears in at least one of the Atkins books, but I wonder what Parker’s plans were for the character.
And then, of course, there’s Susan Silverman. Spenser’s relationship with Susan is the only downside of these books for me. (Well, not quite the only one—Pearl the Wonder Dog doesn’t do much for me, either.) Susan is more annoying in some books than in others. In Sixkill, I’d give her an 8 on a scale of 10. Although she does give Spenser some insights that are fairly helpful to his investigation, she is more often seeking affirmation from Spencer about her beauty, sex appeal, or intelligence—or all three at once. For God’s sake, how many times does she have to hear how no one is as gorgeous or sexy as she is (and how many times does her Ph.D. from Harvard have to be brought into the conversation)?
Even worse, it’s kind of a two-way street: Spenser is always looking for assurance that Susan loves him despite his dangerous work, that they’re perfect together, and on and on. “‘You care about other people, but they don’t dissuade you, or distract you.’ ‘Except you,’ I said. ‘Except me,’ Susan said. ‘You continue to be who and what you are, and you continue to do what you set out to do.’” They have these talks about why they do what they do, and how good they are at it, ad nauseam. Well, I guess, as Socrates reportedly said, the unexamined life is not worth living.
Despite the Susan factor, though, I still love Parker’s Spenser books. Parker had, to be sure, a way with words. Crisp dialogue between Spenser and friends and foes alike, often funny, sometimes literate. Memorable characters. Some interesting crimes to solve. Good action sequences that usually go into just the right amount of detail. Some beautiful descriptive passages. A true master of the detective genre.
Spenser is hired by Rita Fiore to conduct an investigation on behalf of her client, movie star Jumbo Nelson. Jumbo is a pig of a man in just about every sense of the word. He has a propensity for having sex with as many young women as possible. Young men, too. Now, with Jumbo in Boston for a film shoot, 22-year-old Dawn Lopata has been found dead in his hotel room. It’s clear that she died during or after sex with Jumbo, but the exact circumstances are uncertain. Dawn’s death is a big scandal, of course, and everyone thinks Jumbo murdered her. Homicide captain Martin Quirk isn’t sure, though, and he wants Spenser to look into it. So he asks Rita to hire him.
Spenser, being Spenser, intends to find the truth and report it whichever way it comes out. If Jumbo’s not responsible, he’ll say so. But if he did kill Dawn, he won’t whitewash it. Jumbo doesn’t, shall we say, appreciate Spenser’s integrity. Things quickly go sideways. Jumbo has some powerful and unsavory people behind him, and soon Spenser finds himself in danger. It’s ironic, since Spenser’s investigation may very well exonerate Jumbo in the end. But Jumbo’s people know Jumbo and, like everyone else, they assume he’s guilty.
The focus of the book, and the best thing about it, is Spenser’s mentoring of a new protegé, Zebulon “Z” Sixkill, a Cree Indian, who had been working as Jumbo’s bodyguard. With Hawk away in Central Asia (or, as Henry Cimoli suggests, “East Bumfuck”), Z takes his place at Spenser’s side and soon proves his worth. He’s almost as skillful as Hawk in the things that matter: being confident, fighting well, and keeping up with Spenser in the bantering department. Maybe Parker just got tired of writing witty, buddy-buddy repartée between Spenser and a Black man and wanted to change it up a little, substituting an American Indian for the Black man. Whatever the reason, I still missed Hawk, but Z is a pretty good character in his own right. I think that he reappears in at least one of the Atkins books, but I wonder what Parker’s plans were for the character.
And then, of course, there’s Susan Silverman. Spenser’s relationship with Susan is the only downside of these books for me. (Well, not quite the only one—Pearl the Wonder Dog doesn’t do much for me, either.) Susan is more annoying in some books than in others. In Sixkill, I’d give her an 8 on a scale of 10. Although she does give Spenser some insights that are fairly helpful to his investigation, she is more often seeking affirmation from Spencer about her beauty, sex appeal, or intelligence—or all three at once. For God’s sake, how many times does she have to hear how no one is as gorgeous or sexy as she is (and how many times does her Ph.D. from Harvard have to be brought into the conversation)?
Even worse, it’s kind of a two-way street: Spenser is always looking for assurance that Susan loves him despite his dangerous work, that they’re perfect together, and on and on. “‘You care about other people, but they don’t dissuade you, or distract you.’ ‘Except you,’ I said. ‘Except me,’ Susan said. ‘You continue to be who and what you are, and you continue to do what you set out to do.’” They have these talks about why they do what they do, and how good they are at it, ad nauseam. Well, I guess, as Socrates reportedly said, the unexamined life is not worth living.
Despite the Susan factor, though, I still love Parker’s Spenser books. Parker had, to be sure, a way with words. Crisp dialogue between Spenser and friends and foes alike, often funny, sometimes literate. Memorable characters. Some interesting crimes to solve. Good action sequences that usually go into just the right amount of detail. Some beautiful descriptive passages. A true master of the detective genre.
November 29, 2019
(The word "maroon" appears 3 times in this book)
What can I say... the very last of Parker's Spenser. The Spenser that appeared when I did in Boston, the Spenser that grew as I did, that found the love of his life, that found his purpose if not his mission. The Parker that wrote himself into Spenser, that wrote his Joan into Susan, that struggled with growing up and growing old, and learning to live with joy.
In this book, I can feel Parker's age and yet his determination to invest again in Spenser and Susan, just as in real life. Parker once again explores the nature of his connection to Joan, this time through Sixkill and his Lucy. We are Old men now. We do this, we look into our pasts for clues to who we are, and why.
Like Sixkill and Lucy, I was once invested this way in a girl; my first intense, deep love. It took me a year to recover after two breakups with her. I was very lucky not to enjoy booze that much. There but for the grace...
This is not a great Spenser book, but it does have shadows of brilliance, echoes of sharp dialogue, and for me, sad memories of lost powers.
So I read the last page, the last of Parker, 38 years of Spenser, my time machine back to the Boston of my salad days, to my vigour and swagger and my faith in my future.
What can I say... the very last of Parker's Spenser. The Spenser that appeared when I did in Boston, the Spenser that grew as I did, that found the love of his life, that found his purpose if not his mission. The Parker that wrote himself into Spenser, that wrote his Joan into Susan, that struggled with growing up and growing old, and learning to live with joy.
In this book, I can feel Parker's age and yet his determination to invest again in Spenser and Susan, just as in real life. Parker once again explores the nature of his connection to Joan, this time through Sixkill and his Lucy. We are Old men now. We do this, we look into our pasts for clues to who we are, and why.
Like Sixkill and Lucy, I was once invested this way in a girl; my first intense, deep love. It took me a year to recover after two breakups with her. I was very lucky not to enjoy booze that much. There but for the grace...
This is not a great Spenser book, but it does have shadows of brilliance, echoes of sharp dialogue, and for me, sad memories of lost powers.
So I read the last page, the last of Parker, 38 years of Spenser, my time machine back to the Boston of my salad days, to my vigour and swagger and my faith in my future.
June 1, 2017
Spenser is called in on the murder of a young woman found strangled in her bathtub. Gruesome! She’s found in Jumbo Nelson’s suite, he’s a megastar and does not want this kind of publicity. He makes his point pretty clear.
Spenser hooks up with Jumbo’s bouncer, Zebulon Sixkill, who is treated in an unsavoury way by Jumbo and is prime to change his luck so when he’s fired, it seems like a natural step. Spenser works on Z and by the end of the book, he’s a pretty good sidekick though they do fight Jumbo and his organization every step of the way.
This is a charming story, the last in the Spenser series written by Robert Parker. I’ve enjoyed the Spenser ride and in time will probably read the pretenders. Not the best but not the worst of any description.
Spenser hooks up with Jumbo’s bouncer, Zebulon Sixkill, who is treated in an unsavoury way by Jumbo and is prime to change his luck so when he’s fired, it seems like a natural step. Spenser works on Z and by the end of the book, he’s a pretty good sidekick though they do fight Jumbo and his organization every step of the way.
This is a charming story, the last in the Spenser series written by Robert Parker. I’ve enjoyed the Spenser ride and in time will probably read the pretenders. Not the best but not the worst of any description.
September 12, 2022
This is the last “Spenser for hire” book written by Robert Parker before his death. Spenser is the first person, “I” in the book. Ace Atkins wrote the last 2 books in the series, #40 Lulaby & #41 Wonderland. The TV series “Spenser for hire” had 3 seasons.
Spenser & Dr. Susan Silverman (girlfriend), find leads to solve the crime. A key character, Zebulon Sixkill, that helps him is “Z”, a Cree warrior. As usual Spenser makes a nice statement, “If there were no death, how valuable would life be?” And he’s off to solve “Six-kill”. The “Six-inch barrel gun with 6 rounds in the cylinder” with Z (the character).
A lot of “short” sentences made it different but nice to read.
Spenser & Dr. Susan Silverman (girlfriend), find leads to solve the crime. A key character, Zebulon Sixkill, that helps him is “Z”, a Cree warrior. As usual Spenser makes a nice statement, “If there were no death, how valuable would life be?” And he’s off to solve “Six-kill”. The “Six-inch barrel gun with 6 rounds in the cylinder” with Z (the character).
A lot of “short” sentences made it different but nice to read.
December 11, 2016
This book was a 4 star, but having a chance to say goodbye to the characters in this last book from Robert Parker, it was elevated. The plot wasn't his strongest, the murders were pretty high, but it was a good fare well.
Read
September 22, 2019Dnf
July 3, 2015
Here we have the last completed novel as written by Robert B Parker about his favorite sleuth. And I really wanted to see him go out with a bang. That said had the man continued writing this book would probably be considered average.
This book is about a famous fat obnoxious actor who is found in a room of a dead girl (Fatty Arbunckle immediately sprung to my mind, but there were no obvious comparisons) and he is a shoe in for murder. Only Spensers' friend the policeman Quirke does not want to jump to conclusions and asks his PI buddy to have a look into the matter.
Spenser soon gets fired along with his Rita lawyer-friend but anybody knowing Spenser will expect him to continue to sleuth away.
The Sixkill character starts as a big former American footballing Cree Indian fellow who seems to have lost his footing as life happened and ends up being the bodyguard of the popular actor and gets fired from that role after he finds out that Spenser does not like being pushed around.. For some Spenserinesque reason our favorite PI, at least in this novel, wants to help Sixkill to become part of life again. Which is process that happens in the novel.
In the story we find out the sad story behind the victim, the Resurrection of one Sixkill, Hollywood is all mafia and how these fellas do not like obnoxious detectives that refuse to be beat up or shot.
No Hawk around who is usually half the fun.
Not a great book but it has some entertainment value.
This book is about a famous fat obnoxious actor who is found in a room of a dead girl (Fatty Arbunckle immediately sprung to my mind, but there were no obvious comparisons) and he is a shoe in for murder. Only Spensers' friend the policeman Quirke does not want to jump to conclusions and asks his PI buddy to have a look into the matter.
Spenser soon gets fired along with his Rita lawyer-friend but anybody knowing Spenser will expect him to continue to sleuth away.
The Sixkill character starts as a big former American footballing Cree Indian fellow who seems to have lost his footing as life happened and ends up being the bodyguard of the popular actor and gets fired from that role after he finds out that Spenser does not like being pushed around.. For some Spenserinesque reason our favorite PI, at least in this novel, wants to help Sixkill to become part of life again. Which is process that happens in the novel.
In the story we find out the sad story behind the victim, the Resurrection of one Sixkill, Hollywood is all mafia and how these fellas do not like obnoxious detectives that refuse to be beat up or shot.
No Hawk around who is usually half the fun.
Not a great book but it has some entertainment value.
October 28, 2024
It makes me sad the last Spenser book written by RBP had no Hawk in it. He introduced a new character named Z though.
This book was pretty introspective.
Jumbo was a bad guy and you really wanted him to be guilty of something. Spenser is hired to find out how guilty he was…that’s how he meets Zebulon Sixkill. He was a pretty interesting character.
One of the more light moments was Tony Marcus and Susan at a brunch with Spenser. 🤣🤣🤣
I enjoyed this Spenser installment more than I have in awhile for the longevity of the series. The fact that it’s the last one written by Parker is bittersweet.
This book was pretty introspective.
Jumbo was a bad guy and you really wanted him to be guilty of something. Spenser is hired to find out how guilty he was…that’s how he meets Zebulon Sixkill. He was a pretty interesting character.
One of the more light moments was Tony Marcus and Susan at a brunch with Spenser. 🤣🤣🤣
I enjoyed this Spenser installment more than I have in awhile for the longevity of the series. The fact that it’s the last one written by Parker is bittersweet.
December 18, 2023
Entertaining mystery listening 🎶🔰
This was a kindle e-book novel from my local library book 39 in the series.
I read or listened 🎶 to the first book in the series in 2018. Three more that I have not listening 🎶 to in the library.
Spenser is hired by a lawyer to investigate the death of a young lady 🚺 in the present of an actor. He takes an Cree Indian under his wing and together they carry on with the investigation. They come under pressure from the California mob which are using the movie shoot to laundry money. They clear the actor of murder.
I would recommend this series and various authors to readers of romantic, friends relationships adventure murder mystery novels 👍🔰. 2023 😀👒😡😮🏡
This was a kindle e-book novel from my local library book 39 in the series.
I read or listened 🎶 to the first book in the series in 2018. Three more that I have not listening 🎶 to in the library.
Spenser is hired by a lawyer to investigate the death of a young lady 🚺 in the present of an actor. He takes an Cree Indian under his wing and together they carry on with the investigation. They come under pressure from the California mob which are using the movie shoot to laundry money. They clear the actor of murder.
I would recommend this series and various authors to readers of romantic, friends relationships adventure murder mystery novels 👍🔰. 2023 😀👒😡😮🏡
June 15, 2011
Parker's final Spenser novel. I will miss the occasional Spenser fix. This was a quick read, not one of my favorites, with too much time spent watching Susan nibble tiny bits of food. Her role in this particular piece seemed a bit overdone. The investigation itself features the usual good guy/bad guy routines and much of what one comes to expect and want from Parker.
I understand there will be more Spenser novels written by another. That seems so odd. I'll have to withhold judgment on that for now.
I understand there will be more Spenser novels written by another. That seems so odd. I'll have to withhold judgment on that for now.
March 13, 2018
Sixkill (Spenser #39) by Robert B. Parker.
This was a story within a story. Spencer is asked by the Boston PD to investigate the rape & murder of a woman. It turns out that the accused is more of whom Spencer is asked to investigate for. Jumbo Nelson is a star that the studios want to remain at the top, but now that he;s accused of this crime ...if found guilty that will come to a screeching halt.
At the beginning of the investigation spencer meets Jumbo's bodyguard. Zebulon Sixkill is a native American Indian from the Cree tribe. Another rising star but in the NFL who has lost his motivation to star in the spotlight. Sixkill has recently been let go and is in free fall into nothingness. That's where Spencer finds him when they first meet and decides he's worth the effort. Spencer begins his own make shift rehab for Sixkill and they both find they have more in common then first believed.
My first choice from R.B.P. has always been Jesse Stone. That does not put Spencer at 2nd rate in the least. Spencer's sense of humor bordering on satire gives depth to this situation and to my reading and a good chuckle.
This was a story within a story. Spencer is asked by the Boston PD to investigate the rape & murder of a woman. It turns out that the accused is more of whom Spencer is asked to investigate for. Jumbo Nelson is a star that the studios want to remain at the top, but now that he;s accused of this crime ...if found guilty that will come to a screeching halt.
At the beginning of the investigation spencer meets Jumbo's bodyguard. Zebulon Sixkill is a native American Indian from the Cree tribe. Another rising star but in the NFL who has lost his motivation to star in the spotlight. Sixkill has recently been let go and is in free fall into nothingness. That's where Spencer finds him when they first meet and decides he's worth the effort. Spencer begins his own make shift rehab for Sixkill and they both find they have more in common then first believed.
My first choice from R.B.P. has always been Jesse Stone. That does not put Spencer at 2nd rate in the least. Spencer's sense of humor bordering on satire gives depth to this situation and to my reading and a good chuckle.
April 13, 2017
I must have read this really fast the first time around. I didn't remember it until the ending. Great book anyway. No Hawk...I miss Hawk!
April 16, 2017
I fell in love with Spenser when I was 17.
It was June, and I was trapped in summer school making up a gym credit that I should have taken my freshman year but had instead left so late that it threatened to keep me from graduating. To call summer school monotonous is to insult monotony. To call summer school gym class monotonous is the equivalent of slapping monotony in the face, Three Stooges style, and then giving it a noogie. I spent all my endless hours walking the school track in sweaty repetitive loops, biding my time until I could sneak off to sit in the bleachers with Spenser, whose wisecracking tales made me forget the heat and indignity.
Spenser – he never told me (or anyone) his first name – was everything I looked for in a man. Older. Erudite. A lover of food and the finer things who didn’t hesitate to stand up for what was right or, when it came down to it, get his hands a little dirty. A knight errant with a smart mouth and a heart like the sea.
Too bad for me that, as written, he’s in love with Susan Silverman, and has been ever since Robert B. Parker’s second novel, God Save the Child, was published in 1974. Perhaps if I’d managed to catch Spenser in his freewheeling single-days debut, The Godwulf Manuscript, we could have had something. Alas, it was not to be.
Parker, who died in January 2010 at the age of 77, authored 39 Spenser novels (plus one adventure written for young adults), as well as the popular Jesse Stone and Sunny Randall series and a handful of Westerns – almost seventy books, all told. Some of those adventures made the leap from page to screen, and Spenser – who looked a lot like Robert Urich back in the day – had his own series on ABC from 1985-1988. Ed Harris directed Parker’s western Appaloosa in 2008. Tom Selleck still takes turns as Jesse Stone for CBS. And Sunny Randall (though the idea has long since stalled in Hollywood development hell) was originally written at the behest of Helen Hunt so she could have something of Parker’s to star in, too.
The first and most famous of Parker’s creations, Boston P.I. Spenser, the author based loosely on himself. Spenser’s romantic relationship with longtime lover Susan was based less loosely on Parker’s relationship with his own wife, Joan. Theirs was a famously – one is tempted to say infamously – complicated affair. Parker and his wife married in 1956, but separated in 1982. The first year they reunited, they lived in separate towns. The second year, in separate buildings. Finally, they bought a 14 room Victorian home in Cambridge, Mass., and moved back in together – but lived on separate floors. Most of their drama played itself out in the pages of Parker’s novels, which feature - whatever the series- deeply felt but conflicted emotions between characters who love their independence as much, or occasionally more, than each other.
It’s worth noting that almost everything Parker ever wrote, he dedicated to Joan. “Joan has been the central factor in my life since I was a child,” he once said. “You wouldn’t understand me unless you understand me and her.” Similarly, there’s no understanding Spenser unless you understand Spenser and Susan. She’s the emotional touchstone that separates Spenser from his literary forebears, the perennially isolated Sam Spade and Phillip Marlowe. By the time G.P. Putnam posthumously published Sixkill, Parker’s last novel, he and Joan and Spenser and Susan had long come to terms with one another and the necessary intricacies of their relationships.
Sixkill is not perhaps the book Parker would have chosen to end with, could he have chosen. The story – wherein Spenser investigates the rape and murder of a young woman linked with a movie star - is too clearly a set-up for more things to come. Parker spends so much time on the introduction of the titular Zebulon Sixkill, a Cree Indian Hawk-stand-in whom Spenser takes under his wing, that one can almost see a new series spinning off the page. Sadly, at this first (and last) meeting, “Z” doesn’t seem worth the effort, nor does the near non-mystery he finds himself in.
Painted Ladies, the 38th Spenser novel published last October, would perhaps have made a kinder period to the series. It is, frankly, a better book, with broader issues and snappier dialogue, and offers the kind of character self-summation only a thinker’s thug like Spenser could provide: “{S}ometimes I won. Sometimes I slew the dragon and galloped away with the maiden. Sometimes I didn’t. Sometimes the dragon survived. Sometimes I lost the maiden. But so far the dragon hadn’t slain me… And I was with Susan.”
Yet there’s poetry to the end Parker did give us, something he with his Ph.D. in Literature could hardly fail to appreciate, if we’d just let it stand. Sadly, the publisher and Parker’s estate have come to an agreement that will allow writer Ace Atkins (Infamous, The Ranger) to continue the series, with the first new installment to drop in the spring of 2012. (Michael Brandman, producer and screenwriter of the television movies starring Tom Selleck, takes over writing the Jesse Stone novels. Robert B. Parker’s Killing the Blues comes out September 13th.)
But for me, it ends as Parker wrote it. Having slain the dragons in Sixkill – to the best of his ability – Spenser looks out across a rain-fresh Boston and, observing that “life is mostly metaphor anyway,” gets in his car and drives west. Towards Susan, and the sunset of a series none of us who loved him will ever forget.
It was June, and I was trapped in summer school making up a gym credit that I should have taken my freshman year but had instead left so late that it threatened to keep me from graduating. To call summer school monotonous is to insult monotony. To call summer school gym class monotonous is the equivalent of slapping monotony in the face, Three Stooges style, and then giving it a noogie. I spent all my endless hours walking the school track in sweaty repetitive loops, biding my time until I could sneak off to sit in the bleachers with Spenser, whose wisecracking tales made me forget the heat and indignity.
Spenser – he never told me (or anyone) his first name – was everything I looked for in a man. Older. Erudite. A lover of food and the finer things who didn’t hesitate to stand up for what was right or, when it came down to it, get his hands a little dirty. A knight errant with a smart mouth and a heart like the sea.
Too bad for me that, as written, he’s in love with Susan Silverman, and has been ever since Robert B. Parker’s second novel, God Save the Child, was published in 1974. Perhaps if I’d managed to catch Spenser in his freewheeling single-days debut, The Godwulf Manuscript, we could have had something. Alas, it was not to be.
Parker, who died in January 2010 at the age of 77, authored 39 Spenser novels (plus one adventure written for young adults), as well as the popular Jesse Stone and Sunny Randall series and a handful of Westerns – almost seventy books, all told. Some of those adventures made the leap from page to screen, and Spenser – who looked a lot like Robert Urich back in the day – had his own series on ABC from 1985-1988. Ed Harris directed Parker’s western Appaloosa in 2008. Tom Selleck still takes turns as Jesse Stone for CBS. And Sunny Randall (though the idea has long since stalled in Hollywood development hell) was originally written at the behest of Helen Hunt so she could have something of Parker’s to star in, too.
The first and most famous of Parker’s creations, Boston P.I. Spenser, the author based loosely on himself. Spenser’s romantic relationship with longtime lover Susan was based less loosely on Parker’s relationship with his own wife, Joan. Theirs was a famously – one is tempted to say infamously – complicated affair. Parker and his wife married in 1956, but separated in 1982. The first year they reunited, they lived in separate towns. The second year, in separate buildings. Finally, they bought a 14 room Victorian home in Cambridge, Mass., and moved back in together – but lived on separate floors. Most of their drama played itself out in the pages of Parker’s novels, which feature - whatever the series- deeply felt but conflicted emotions between characters who love their independence as much, or occasionally more, than each other.
It’s worth noting that almost everything Parker ever wrote, he dedicated to Joan. “Joan has been the central factor in my life since I was a child,” he once said. “You wouldn’t understand me unless you understand me and her.” Similarly, there’s no understanding Spenser unless you understand Spenser and Susan. She’s the emotional touchstone that separates Spenser from his literary forebears, the perennially isolated Sam Spade and Phillip Marlowe. By the time G.P. Putnam posthumously published Sixkill, Parker’s last novel, he and Joan and Spenser and Susan had long come to terms with one another and the necessary intricacies of their relationships.
Sixkill is not perhaps the book Parker would have chosen to end with, could he have chosen. The story – wherein Spenser investigates the rape and murder of a young woman linked with a movie star - is too clearly a set-up for more things to come. Parker spends so much time on the introduction of the titular Zebulon Sixkill, a Cree Indian Hawk-stand-in whom Spenser takes under his wing, that one can almost see a new series spinning off the page. Sadly, at this first (and last) meeting, “Z” doesn’t seem worth the effort, nor does the near non-mystery he finds himself in.
Painted Ladies, the 38th Spenser novel published last October, would perhaps have made a kinder period to the series. It is, frankly, a better book, with broader issues and snappier dialogue, and offers the kind of character self-summation only a thinker’s thug like Spenser could provide: “{S}ometimes I won. Sometimes I slew the dragon and galloped away with the maiden. Sometimes I didn’t. Sometimes the dragon survived. Sometimes I lost the maiden. But so far the dragon hadn’t slain me… And I was with Susan.”
Yet there’s poetry to the end Parker did give us, something he with his Ph.D. in Literature could hardly fail to appreciate, if we’d just let it stand. Sadly, the publisher and Parker’s estate have come to an agreement that will allow writer Ace Atkins (Infamous, The Ranger) to continue the series, with the first new installment to drop in the spring of 2012. (Michael Brandman, producer and screenwriter of the television movies starring Tom Selleck, takes over writing the Jesse Stone novels. Robert B. Parker’s Killing the Blues comes out September 13th.)
But for me, it ends as Parker wrote it. Having slain the dragons in Sixkill – to the best of his ability – Spenser looks out across a rain-fresh Boston and, observing that “life is mostly metaphor anyway,” gets in his car and drives west. Towards Susan, and the sunset of a series none of us who loved him will ever forget.
February 20, 2018
Getting a little like Travis Magee, always fixing hurt people, with a bad guy who keeps popping up, but the end comes quickly. Still, the characters are better.
March 19, 2012
SIXKILLER is the last Spenser novel Parker completed before his death. He uses the real life story of Fatty Arbuckle, the silent film star accused of raping and accidentally killing a drunk young actress as the springboard for this story.
Jumbo Nelson is a giant in the film industry whose new movie is filming in Boston. A grossly overweight comedian, he gets caught up in a mess when a young woman dies while in his bedroom.
Spenser is asked by Martin Quirk, the captain in charge of the investigation, to look into it. Prosecutors are ready to file murder charges even though they have no concrete proof it's other than Nelson says, an accidental death while he was puking in the bathroom. Quirk thinks it's to easy, but there's nothing he can do.
Spenser promises to find the truth whatever it might be. If Nelson did kill her, he won't cover it up.
Which gets him into hot water as he's soon visited by a lawyer and a security expert who "advise" him to drop it, soon followed by Nelson's agent with the same advice.
Of course Spenser was never one to take advice of that sort.
The Sixkiller of the title is a young Cree Indian named Zebulon Sixkiller, who prefers to be called Z. He's Nelson's bodyguard and when told to throw Spenser out by the abrasive comedian, learns there's a difference between being a hulking young man and knowing how to fight. He'd always gotten by on his fearsome appearance.
After Nelson fires Z because he can't handle Spenser, our hero takes him in and begins to mentor him, teaching him the rudiments of hand combat. Z is already an expert with the Bowie knife he carries and a fair hand with a long weapon. Spenser also works with him on handgun skills.
It all comes in handy when the attempts start on their lives and a stone cold killer comes from L.A. to kill Spenser.
I rather enjoyed this last Spenser, all of them for that matter. I recognize that these novels weren't as complex or tightly written as the earlier ones in the series.
Still, old friends, you know.
Spenser has always had a large group of skilled fighters, besides his best friend Hawk, that help him off and on on cases. I think Parker meant for the young Kree warrior to be another. Another writer is to continue the Spenser novels and I'm not sure what his plans might be.
Not sure whether I will be reading them either.
Jumbo Nelson is a giant in the film industry whose new movie is filming in Boston. A grossly overweight comedian, he gets caught up in a mess when a young woman dies while in his bedroom.
Spenser is asked by Martin Quirk, the captain in charge of the investigation, to look into it. Prosecutors are ready to file murder charges even though they have no concrete proof it's other than Nelson says, an accidental death while he was puking in the bathroom. Quirk thinks it's to easy, but there's nothing he can do.
Spenser promises to find the truth whatever it might be. If Nelson did kill her, he won't cover it up.
Which gets him into hot water as he's soon visited by a lawyer and a security expert who "advise" him to drop it, soon followed by Nelson's agent with the same advice.
Of course Spenser was never one to take advice of that sort.
The Sixkiller of the title is a young Cree Indian named Zebulon Sixkiller, who prefers to be called Z. He's Nelson's bodyguard and when told to throw Spenser out by the abrasive comedian, learns there's a difference between being a hulking young man and knowing how to fight. He'd always gotten by on his fearsome appearance.
After Nelson fires Z because he can't handle Spenser, our hero takes him in and begins to mentor him, teaching him the rudiments of hand combat. Z is already an expert with the Bowie knife he carries and a fair hand with a long weapon. Spenser also works with him on handgun skills.
It all comes in handy when the attempts start on their lives and a stone cold killer comes from L.A. to kill Spenser.
I rather enjoyed this last Spenser, all of them for that matter. I recognize that these novels weren't as complex or tightly written as the earlier ones in the series.
Still, old friends, you know.
Spenser has always had a large group of skilled fighters, besides his best friend Hawk, that help him off and on on cases. I think Parker meant for the young Kree warrior to be another. Another writer is to continue the Spenser novels and I'm not sure what his plans might be.
Not sure whether I will be reading them either.
June 12, 2011
Dead fourteen months and he has two books on the NYTimes best seller lists. I really enjoyed this book. I don't know if it was because I knew there would be no more following or if I just liked the story more. It felt like the book was a bit fresher than a lot of his recent Spenser novels, even though it reminded me of his best novel, Early Autumn, in how he mentors Zebulon Sixkill in teaching him how to be a man and how to face his demons.
There were a lot of references to several favorite characters that have appeared a few times in his books. Obviously Hawk, Vinnie Morris, Lieutenant Quirk and Sargent Belson, but lesser known characters like Teddy Sapp (the gay body-builder/enforcer), Chollo (the Mexican gunman/enforcer), Ty-Bop (the jittery doped-up shooter) and Bobby Horse.
According to a radio interview with Joan Parker, the introduction of Zebulon Sixkill was a way to bring Spenser back to either movies or tv. Apparently, a studio has the rights to Hawk, so any new shows/movies cannot include him. https://www.facebook.com/video/video....
There were a lot of references to several favorite characters that have appeared a few times in his books. Obviously Hawk, Vinnie Morris, Lieutenant Quirk and Sargent Belson, but lesser known characters like Teddy Sapp (the gay body-builder/enforcer), Chollo (the Mexican gunman/enforcer), Ty-Bop (the jittery doped-up shooter) and Bobby Horse.
According to a radio interview with Joan Parker, the introduction of Zebulon Sixkill was a way to bring Spenser back to either movies or tv. Apparently, a studio has the rights to Hawk, so any new shows/movies cannot include him. https://www.facebook.com/video/video....
May 25, 2016
Lately when I'm reading Spenser I keep seeing Jeffrey Dean Morgan as Spenser.
June 3, 2017
I think that I've found my new series....even though I'm having a hard time locating book one of the series. This story was slightly annoying and riveting at the same time. Each time the conversation was taking place, it was repetitive concerning he said or I said (ex: I said: "So what do you wish for me to do?"). Annoying.
Spenser is selected to find out what happen to a young, star-crossed female that ends up dead in the movie star's hotel room. Everyone wants Jumbo Nelson to take the blame but there is more than meets the eye.
The story starts at a moderate pace and sometimes the conversations or thought process of Spenser is a little over the top but overall, the book was okay.
Spenser is selected to find out what happen to a young, star-crossed female that ends up dead in the movie star's hotel room. Everyone wants Jumbo Nelson to take the blame but there is more than meets the eye.
The story starts at a moderate pace and sometimes the conversations or thought process of Spenser is a little over the top but overall, the book was okay.
July 17, 2024
Thirty-nine down, and only eleven more to go!!!
May 9, 2011
Sixkill rules! I want to take a different tact with this, as I am huge fan of the author‘s work. Okay he passed away, this is his last work, yes, I am sad. But instead let’s celebrate this last work for the fun and frolic that it is. No Hawk, total bummer, but he seems to have had a plan with that, maybe the new author will take it to new heights, a new resurgence with a fresh approach and set of eyes on the characters. I have read every Spenser novel , yes every one, and have enjoyed each one immensely. What exactly is Sixkill about? Here is what is between the covers:
“On location in Boston, bad-boy actor Jumbo Nelson is accused of the rape and murder of a young woman. From the start the case seems fishy, so the Boston PD calls on Spenser to investigate. The situation doesn't look good for Jumbo, whose appetites for food, booze, and sex are as outsized as his name. He was the studio's biggest star, but he's become their biggest liability.
In the course of the investigation, Spenser encounters Jumbo's bodyguard: a young, former football-playing Native American named Zebulon Sixkill. Sixkill acts tough, but Spenser sees something more within the young man. Despite the odd circumstances, the two forge an unlikely alliance, with Spenser serving as mentor for Sixkill. As the case grows darker and secrets about both Jumbo and the dead girl come to light, it's Spenser-with Sixkill at his side-who must put things right.”
The thing about the novel I enjoyed most was the simplicity of it: the dialogue, the plotline, and characters. And yet it wasn’t boring, held my interest till the last page and left me wanting more, looking for that next installment in the series. I love the Spenser universe, and all it stands for. Even the “bad” guys Spenser counts as friends have his back and his best interests at heart. The novel is a quick read, I devoured it at one time, pages were turning like crazy, and in the back of my head, this little voice was telling me to slow down, this is the last one, savor it, chill and slow down, but I couldn’t, I didn’t care. I wanted to enjoy this one just as much as I had the others without that sadness, that remorse, tainting the read. My suggestion is to read this the right way for the right reasons, whether this is the first time you have read his work or you have them all like me. An excellent new addition to the Spenser universe has been born. Enjoy it for everything it is worth.
What are you reading today? Have you checked out our new blogtalk radio show The G-ZONE? Check us out and become our friend on Shelfari, The Novel Spot &Twitter. Go to Goodreads and become our friend there and suggest books for us to read and post on. Did you know you can shop directly on Amazon by clicking the Amazon Banner on our blog? Thanks for stopping by today; We will see you tomorrow. Have a great day. http://www.gelatisscoop.blogspot.com
“On location in Boston, bad-boy actor Jumbo Nelson is accused of the rape and murder of a young woman. From the start the case seems fishy, so the Boston PD calls on Spenser to investigate. The situation doesn't look good for Jumbo, whose appetites for food, booze, and sex are as outsized as his name. He was the studio's biggest star, but he's become their biggest liability.
In the course of the investigation, Spenser encounters Jumbo's bodyguard: a young, former football-playing Native American named Zebulon Sixkill. Sixkill acts tough, but Spenser sees something more within the young man. Despite the odd circumstances, the two forge an unlikely alliance, with Spenser serving as mentor for Sixkill. As the case grows darker and secrets about both Jumbo and the dead girl come to light, it's Spenser-with Sixkill at his side-who must put things right.”
The thing about the novel I enjoyed most was the simplicity of it: the dialogue, the plotline, and characters. And yet it wasn’t boring, held my interest till the last page and left me wanting more, looking for that next installment in the series. I love the Spenser universe, and all it stands for. Even the “bad” guys Spenser counts as friends have his back and his best interests at heart. The novel is a quick read, I devoured it at one time, pages were turning like crazy, and in the back of my head, this little voice was telling me to slow down, this is the last one, savor it, chill and slow down, but I couldn’t, I didn’t care. I wanted to enjoy this one just as much as I had the others without that sadness, that remorse, tainting the read. My suggestion is to read this the right way for the right reasons, whether this is the first time you have read his work or you have them all like me. An excellent new addition to the Spenser universe has been born. Enjoy it for everything it is worth.
What are you reading today? Have you checked out our new blogtalk radio show The G-ZONE? Check us out and become our friend on Shelfari, The Novel Spot &Twitter. Go to Goodreads and become our friend there and suggest books for us to read and post on. Did you know you can shop directly on Amazon by clicking the Amazon Banner on our blog? Thanks for stopping by today; We will see you tomorrow. Have a great day. http://www.gelatisscoop.blogspot.com
August 17, 2011
Was this the best Robert Parker I ever read? No. That would be The Godwulf Manuscript. When Mr. Parker died in January of last year, I genuinely mourned the loss. Robert Parker books were, for me, a mixed love affair. I would usually finish his books within an hour. He was famous for his large spacing and wide margins, the snappy patter which grew formulaic over time. If only life were that witty and sharp.
I've read the other reviews. It's interesting how many people were sick of Susan, and I would have to agree. Her anorexic eating habits, which seemed to be applauded as highly feminine. Her sexuality. Really? Bunnies in heat after ALL of these years? Harvard. My Gahd, Harvard. I could do without her. The one I've truly been missing? Hawk. Everyone misses Hawk. And to think he probably wasn't being written about because of some contractual issue.
What I truly miss is someone living in the city he wrote about: a home town author, and his love for Boston (and Cambridge and Massachusetts.) I knew the street where Spenser lived and have my own heartbreak attached to that street. I ate in the same restaurants (and it was interesting how those would change over time--closings, openings, what's in, what's out.)
When I picked up this novel, and it said on the inner sleeve, "The last Spenser novel completed by Robert B. Parker," I felt that pang again. Knowing there won't be anymore. When Parker died, another Massachusetts writer died around the same time--Phillip R. Craig. I didn't even like his writing. Laughing. But I did love reading about Martha's Vineyard.
I hoped Parker's family wouldn't try to pick up the characters and keep writing the series. Apparently this is going to be the case. God forbid the cash cow should die with the author. Dick Francis' son has done that, and not successfully I would add. I love that Parker and his wife had this quirky relationship. He really did have dogs named Pearl. He died at his desk--writing. I wish he had left one last Spenser book in the vaults that would have tied up everything. Susan could have moved to Manhattan and suck on an olive for five hours. Hawk would have Spenser's back. Rita Fiore would finally get a shot, and Quirk would be pouring another cup of coffee in Spenser's office on a rainy spring day, reaching for a donut. Obviously Dunkin' Donut.
I've read the other reviews. It's interesting how many people were sick of Susan, and I would have to agree. Her anorexic eating habits, which seemed to be applauded as highly feminine. Her sexuality. Really? Bunnies in heat after ALL of these years? Harvard. My Gahd, Harvard. I could do without her. The one I've truly been missing? Hawk. Everyone misses Hawk. And to think he probably wasn't being written about because of some contractual issue.
What I truly miss is someone living in the city he wrote about: a home town author, and his love for Boston (and Cambridge and Massachusetts.) I knew the street where Spenser lived and have my own heartbreak attached to that street. I ate in the same restaurants (and it was interesting how those would change over time--closings, openings, what's in, what's out.)
When I picked up this novel, and it said on the inner sleeve, "The last Spenser novel completed by Robert B. Parker," I felt that pang again. Knowing there won't be anymore. When Parker died, another Massachusetts writer died around the same time--Phillip R. Craig. I didn't even like his writing. Laughing. But I did love reading about Martha's Vineyard.
I hoped Parker's family wouldn't try to pick up the characters and keep writing the series. Apparently this is going to be the case. God forbid the cash cow should die with the author. Dick Francis' son has done that, and not successfully I would add. I love that Parker and his wife had this quirky relationship. He really did have dogs named Pearl. He died at his desk--writing. I wish he had left one last Spenser book in the vaults that would have tied up everything. Susan could have moved to Manhattan and suck on an olive for five hours. Hawk would have Spenser's back. Rita Fiore would finally get a shot, and Quirk would be pouring another cup of coffee in Spenser's office on a rainy spring day, reaching for a donut. Obviously Dunkin' Donut.
January 24, 2017
The late Parker’s virtues as writer of the gumshoe series about Spenser have been extolled by many others and by far better than I. But still—this is the shit. The last Spenser novel Parker penned, this has the wisecracking gumshoe from Boston up to his usual high jinks. In a way, it’s the perfect Spenser novel, because the stakes aren’t unrealistically high (like Potshot, a sort of Magnificent Seven) and relationships don’t get too terribly psychologically tense (like in A Catskill Eagle). It’s Goldilocks just-right. This installment finds Spenser trying to determine the truth about the death of a woman at the hands of a clown from Hollywood in the city to shoot a movie. Spenser, who put the “wise” in “wiseass,” sees an unhealthy situation here, one that repeats itself to the detriment of innocents. As in many cases, Spenser goes from PI-for-hire to pro bono do-gooder, determined to bust this nasty little system apart so that it can’t happen again. It’s this altruistic streak that sets Spenser apart from everybody and everything else, a facet of him that comes to the fore when he takes on a young bodyguard fired by the clown, a Native American Cree named Zebulon Sixkill. Spenser helps Z evolve from a mere meathead muscleman to something like a Galahad-esque protégée. By molding Sixkill after himself, Spenser takes the character from an adrift kid on a bridge to nowhere to a man on a mission. The two of them bust up the shit ring—good. Better—they create the space for Sixkill to evolve and live his life like a man—a Spenserman! VERDICT If you want a funny, snappy detective tale, try this—get it for a penny anyplace online!
Find reviews of books for men at Books for Dudes, Books for Dudes, the online reader's advisory column for men from Library Journal. Copyright Library Journal.
Find reviews of books for men at Books for Dudes, Books for Dudes, the online reader's advisory column for men from Library Journal. Copyright Library Journal.
February 10, 2017
This is the final Spenser book written by Robert B. Parker. There are more written by Ace Atkins that I plan on reading but it is a little sad that there will be no more written by Parker. Many readers seem to use this book to write Parker's eulogy and proclaim their thoughts on the series as a whole. I too will do that but first a quick Sixkill review.
Sixkill is the Native American sidekick who really replaces Hawk who is still on assignment in Eastern Asia. Sixkill begins the book as Jumbo Nelson's security till Jumbo gets fed up with him and fires him. Jumbo is a large comedic actor who is accused of killing a young groupie while having sex with her. She is strangled in some manner. Spenser is hired to help get Jumbo off. Jumbo isn't a nice guy. Crude, rude, obnoxious are descriptive words that come to mind. There really isn't much to the story. Really just Spenser's relationship with Sixkill.
As for the Spenser series which I started reading this past summer, I really enjoyed it. Although many of his Spenser books I only gave 3 stars to they were like a small piece of candy for my reading appetite. Not a great meal you brag about but tasty enough where you want to pop another one in your mouth. The best things of the series is the banter between the characters, memorable secondary characters, Hawk and the macho persona of Spenser. The negatives are really just the whole Susan/Spenser relationship. Made me want to gag at times. Parker uses the same foibles of the couple again and again. Harvard, eating little, sexing lot, Harvard and oh yeah....Harvard.
Nevertheless I enjoyed the series as a whole and I hope Atkins can come close to being able to bring the characters to life again like Parker did.
Sixkill is the Native American sidekick who really replaces Hawk who is still on assignment in Eastern Asia. Sixkill begins the book as Jumbo Nelson's security till Jumbo gets fed up with him and fires him. Jumbo is a large comedic actor who is accused of killing a young groupie while having sex with her. She is strangled in some manner. Spenser is hired to help get Jumbo off. Jumbo isn't a nice guy. Crude, rude, obnoxious are descriptive words that come to mind. There really isn't much to the story. Really just Spenser's relationship with Sixkill.
As for the Spenser series which I started reading this past summer, I really enjoyed it. Although many of his Spenser books I only gave 3 stars to they were like a small piece of candy for my reading appetite. Not a great meal you brag about but tasty enough where you want to pop another one in your mouth. The best things of the series is the banter between the characters, memorable secondary characters, Hawk and the macho persona of Spenser. The negatives are really just the whole Susan/Spenser relationship. Made me want to gag at times. Parker uses the same foibles of the couple again and again. Harvard, eating little, sexing lot, Harvard and oh yeah....Harvard.
Nevertheless I enjoyed the series as a whole and I hope Atkins can come close to being able to bring the characters to life again like Parker did.
June 11, 2011
This is the culmination of Parker's Spenser, despite my previous beliefs that I had already read the last book since his death in January, 2010. He must have left many manuscripts with his publishers, which should not be surprising considering that over his lifetime he was extremely productive. Apparently they have nominated a replacement author to take over Parker's unique series. Can the writer capture Parker's essence? It does not seem likely to me.
As always, this mystery is light, witty and entertaining. While reading, I continued to enjoy envisioning strolling or riding through the streets of Boston and environs which are so familiar to me and which he described so well. It was good to see his colorful characters again which I have come to know and like, or dislike.
One annoyance which I have is the characterization of Spenser's long-time lover, Susan. He is portrayed as a risk-taking, tough and clever detective. It seems clear that this relationship is designed to represent a softer, loving and considerate part of his personality. In this novel, she appears more prissy and proper, eating like an anorectic, which Spenser thinks is "cute" and frequently flaunting her Harvard education. Her redeeming qualities appear to be her beauty and sexual performance. Granted, she loves Spenser and is kind to their dog, so that merits some credit for this character.
I was tempted to rate this with 3 stars because it lacked in some measure of the suspense seen in previous books, but based on its own, perhaps a 3.5 would be more fitting.
As always, this mystery is light, witty and entertaining. While reading, I continued to enjoy envisioning strolling or riding through the streets of Boston and environs which are so familiar to me and which he described so well. It was good to see his colorful characters again which I have come to know and like, or dislike.
One annoyance which I have is the characterization of Spenser's long-time lover, Susan. He is portrayed as a risk-taking, tough and clever detective. It seems clear that this relationship is designed to represent a softer, loving and considerate part of his personality. In this novel, she appears more prissy and proper, eating like an anorectic, which Spenser thinks is "cute" and frequently flaunting her Harvard education. Her redeeming qualities appear to be her beauty and sexual performance. Granted, she loves Spenser and is kind to their dog, so that merits some credit for this character.
I was tempted to rate this with 3 stars because it lacked in some measure of the suspense seen in previous books, but based on its own, perhaps a 3.5 would be more fitting.
October 27, 2011
The very last Spenser written by Robert B Parker - it's enough to make me weep! I have loved Spenser's cool, witty self most of my life, and have read and re-read each novel repeatedly. This one, sadly, has no Hawk in it all - Hawk is off doing his mercenary thing in the dessert lands of the middle east. In his absence, Spenser takes on a young Cree bodyguard, Zebulon Sixkill, or Z, as he is known. When Spenser and Z meet, they are on opposing sides, and Z is surprised to be easily defeated by Spenser's boxing skills.
Z seeks Spenser out to ask him how he did it, and Spenser takes him on as student - very similar to the old story line about Paul, except that Paul was just a kid when he went through the Spenser school of manhood, and Paul's ambition was to be a dancer. Z isn't just a kid, though, and he is much more cut from the same bolt as Spenser and Hawk than Paul ever was. Makes for an intriguing relationship, and one that held a lot of promise - I can imagine the depth of trouble that might cause Spenser to reach out to Hawk, Z, Tedy Sapp, Chollo, Bobby Horse, Junior and Ty-Bop - just another of the good guys!
I'm a little concerned by the announcements that Robert B Parker's estate plans to continue the Spenser series with a new writer or writers - I just don't much approve of that, and worry that they will get it incredibly wrong (kind of like the movies have so far gotten Spenser incredibly wrong). I guess I will have to wait and see . . . RIP Robert B Parker.
Z seeks Spenser out to ask him how he did it, and Spenser takes him on as student - very similar to the old story line about Paul, except that Paul was just a kid when he went through the Spenser school of manhood, and Paul's ambition was to be a dancer. Z isn't just a kid, though, and he is much more cut from the same bolt as Spenser and Hawk than Paul ever was. Makes for an intriguing relationship, and one that held a lot of promise - I can imagine the depth of trouble that might cause Spenser to reach out to Hawk, Z, Tedy Sapp, Chollo, Bobby Horse, Junior and Ty-Bop - just another of the good guys!
I'm a little concerned by the announcements that Robert B Parker's estate plans to continue the Spenser series with a new writer or writers - I just don't much approve of that, and worry that they will get it incredibly wrong (kind of like the movies have so far gotten Spenser incredibly wrong). I guess I will have to wait and see . . . RIP Robert B Parker.
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