[.ca] Bad Business (ISBN 1842431234)

Parker's writing in his sleep!:
I didn't think it was possible for Parker to give us even MORE of the incredibly irritating Susan Silverman, but when you team that up with very little Hawk and even more banal "banter" between Susan and Spenser, this book is a loser. Give it up Mr. Parker...you've lost it!

love all spencer-parker stories:
wonderful, and entertaining. couldn't put the book down. can't wait for the next book

Joe Mantegna makes this CD shine:
I loved this book, almost entirely due to Joe Mantegna's reading and characterization. Parker does a good job of telling us yet another Spenser story -- most of us don't read Spenser novels for the plot but for just how Parker write Spenser -- funny, sarcastic, wonderful. Mantegna does a fabulous job of bringing all of these characters to life. Go listen to it. It's wonderful.

Getting Old:
Parker has been doing these characters so long that he's begun giving them all the same pat lines. I hate doing a negative, but they're getting boring. How many times do we have to see the line "We'd be fools not to." Not only Spenser, but Susan, Hawk, the cops, Jesse Stone and at least two characters in the Sunny Randall series. This particular book...and I have copies of virtually all the others.. is wooden and uncreative. I guess the style became so successful that it seems smart to just continue. However, I got no sense of creativity or caring in this one.

Back in the groove:
This Parker/Spenser stays on the same solid, predictable, but entertaining track as BACK STORY. Spenser is his familiar, wonderful old self -- doing all the right things for his own reasons, living up to his personal code of ethics, and appalled when the world doesn't do the same. The plot is more "Law and Order/ripped from today's headlines" than many of Parker's other efforts, but it doesn't suffer from it and doesn't seem like exploitation. Susan appears in the story for no particular reason, but at least she doesn't annoy me so much my teeth hurt this time. It's not thought provoking Spenser, like MORTAL STAKES or RACHEL WALLACE, but it's solid, welcome time spent with old friends.