[.ca] High Profile (ISBN 0425206092)

The Bonds of Matrimony:
Pick up a Robert Parker book and you expect a mystery, some action, and witty dialogue. Sometimes the order of importance changes among those three elements. In the background, there will be rumblings about the nature of friendship, love, and commitment. HIGH PROFILE adds a new dimension to the primary mix: relationships. HIGH PROFILE could be best characterized as relationships, dialogue, mystery, and action. For those who will like this book, only the first element, relationships, will count. Those who won't like the book will be annoyed that there's not enough mystery, action, and witty dialogue. When most people marry in the United States, they promise to stay together "until death do us part." With the current divorce rate, a more accurate statement would be to promise to remain wedded "until divorce or death do us part." Robert B. Parker has decided to take the original oaths seriously in this novel: What if we remain connected primarily to those we marry until we die . . . even if we become separated or divorced? Those connections might be based in part on our vows, our understanding of one another's needs, mutual sympathy, and an interpersonal dynamic that helps one another get through life. In this story, that question is examined from the perspective of every once-married character in the book. I found it to be fascinating. If you like serious novels about relationships, I think you'll find HIGH PROFILE to be rewarding whether or not you agree with the point that Mr. Parker has to make. Here's the surface story. Jesse Stone has been seeing Sunny Randall (see BLUE SCREEN if you want to know the background). Jesse's ex-wife, Jenn, has gone off to pursue her career, one bedroom at a time. Into that seemingly quiet circumstance, Paradise is rocked by finding two dead bodies . . . killed by the same gun. The first body belongs to media personality, Walton Weeks, and draws a media crowd due to his celebrity and the public way that his murdered body was hoisted up to hang in a tree. Jesse puts Molly in charge of talking to the press and is trying to focus on the murders when Jenn shows up for help with a rapist-stalker. Not having any choice, Jesse asks Sunny to take care of Jenn while Jesse works the homicides. As you can imagine, this is a situation ripe with conflict. Much of the murder investigation is done in police procedural style which strings out the mystery until near the end of the book. A parallel story runs concerning Jenn's problem, and the relationships that the triangle of lovers have with one another. More than in the other Jesse Stone books, HIGH PROFILE also develops Jesse's relationships with the rest of the police force. Molly and Suitcase play major roles in the story. I suspect that Mr. Parker plans to involve these characters more in future stories. The plots design is an especially intricate one because Mr. Parker has to use the characters and action to solve the mystery while developing his major points about marital relationships. With so many burdens to carry, necessarily the book doesn't move as fast as the best of the Spenser novels. I thought that the slower development was mostly worth the price. May you enjoy a healthier love in your marriage than Mr. Parker's characters do in and after their marriages.

Triangles, Bad Chices:
Jesse Stone's personal life comes to a crux with Jenn and Sunny brought together all the while a high profile double murder investigation takes place. Some nice plotting with the murder and great repartee with Molly and Suitcase - the running "detective" gag is well played out. Now, pers opinion but, what really is there to like about Jenn? More and more she's written out as a round-heeled airhead careerist. Enough to drive a strong man to drink! Also, guessing that the next Sunny Randall tale will (should?) go back and explore Richie...