When I was in junior high, I ran out of things to read. I'd finished reading kids' books - no more Oz or Hardy Boys books for me - and I'd also finished reading all of the Sherlock Holmes tales, all of the James Bond books, everything by Dashiell Hammett, and all of the Star Trek episode novelizations by James Blish (which I'd read dozens of times). Sometime during one summer after I'd just finished Raymond Chandler's final novel, "Playback," and I couldn't figure out what to read next, my mother said, "Read Spenser ... you'll like Spenser."
So, when I was 13 or 14 years old, I started reading Spenser. Not Edmund Spenser, the English Poet, though, but Spenser, the Boston detective - "Spelled with an 'S,' like the English poet." Without realizing it, I also started doing something I'd never done before. I started reading books by an author who wasn't dead.
In the 30 years that have passed since then, there have been about 30 new Spenser books by Robert B. Parker. I've gotten older, but Spenser, Susan and Hawk have stayed relatively the same age. I think if he had aged, Spenser would be pushing 80 by now. I've also gotten to know Sunny Randall and Jesse Stone - main characters in two other series that Parker created - but Spenser has remained my favorite and it's been Parker's most popular series.
Reading a Spenser book always has a familiar formula and feel to it. A client will hire Spenser to discreetly handle a problem that can't be handled discreetly by anyone else. Spenser will ask Hawk for the kind of help that only Hawk can render. And throughout the story, Spenser will discuss the case with Susan, his perennial love interest, while making gourmet dinners for her and drinking excellent microbrews and fine wines. Susan, of course, will give him sage advice (as well as lots of good loving) and the two will profess their lifelong, undying love for each other despite remaining convinced that living together or getting married would be a complete disaster.
But don't get me wrong. The fact that these books are formulaic is one of the things I like about them. For me, reading a Spenser book is like sitting down in my favorite chair to watch an episode of "New Yankee Workshop." I know that when it's over, Norm will have created a nice piece of furniture and I know tools and flannel shirts will figure in its construction, but just because I know these things doesn't mean I'm going to be disappointed. There's a comfort in knowing the lay of the land, so to speak.
However, when I read Robert B. Parker's new Spenser book, "Painted Ladies," which was just released Oct. 5 (I will probably have already finished it by the time this column is published), I won't be reading a book by a living author. Robert B. Parker died last January and, even though this book won't be his last Spenser book ("Sixkill" is due out May 2011), I feel a sense of loss knowing that I'm running out of Robert B. Parker books to read. As with all popular literary series, there is talk of having someone else write new Spenser books, but, like John Gardner's James Bond books or even Robert B. Parker's two Philip Marlowe books, I doubt it would be the same. I'm sure I'll enjoy "Painted Ladies" and "Sixkill," and I'm sure I'll miss Robert B. Parker. I just wish he hadn't been relegated to that long list of dead authors I enjoy reading quite yet. George Williams is the access services manager for the Latah County Library District
