Rating: 
Summary: Potshot
Review: It is always a pleasure to read a Spenser novel by Robert B. Parker. He has written another winner with his new novel, "Potshot". Mary Lou Buckman hires Spenser to find out who killed her husband, Steve. Spenser must go to Potshot, Arizona where the Buckmans lived and where the murder took place. As he investigates, he finds that many people believe that someone in the Dell killed him. The Dell is a group of thugs who collect "protection" money from businesses in Potshot. Their leader is known as The Preacher. Then a group of Potshot VIP's hire Spenser to rid Potshot of the Dell. Spenser can solve the murder alone, but will need a small army to take on the Dell. He hires Hawk and Vinnie Morris from Boston, Tedy Sapp, a bouncer from Georgia, 2 Los Angeles thugs, and Bernard J. Fortunato, a tough guy from Las Vegas. Things are never what they seem in Potshot. This is an excellent addition to a long-running series, one of the best in American crime fiction.
Rating: 
Summary: Not great, but still good, Spenser
Review: Spenser is an ageless smart aleck ... decidedly un-PC in how he talks to his hired thugs/friends and most definitely still a rebel. And, in an ending that genuinely surprised me, still very much a romantic. So in all, there's nothing in this book that tells us anything about Spense that those familiar with the series don't already know. And I agree with the reviewers who have noted that while Pearl is aging, Susan and Hawk and most of all Spenser are still in their primes. It's an annoying distraction. When we hear Spenser mention Korea, it forces us to do the math and realize that all this derring do is being done by a man of (at least) 65. Parker should borrow from the Kinsey Milhone series and set his protagonist in a very definite time and keep him there. STILL, I enjoyed the book. Time spent with Spenser is alway time well spent. This just isn't one of the best.
Rating: 
Summary: Spenser's Wild West adventure
Review: "Potshot", Robert Parker's latest Spenser novel, gets back on familiar ground, if not a familiar location. After the tersely unmysterious "Hugger Mugger", Parker has Spenser cracking wise and being tough in Potshot, Arizona, where he's investigating the death of a high school football coach turned outfitter at the request of the deceased's pretty blond wife. All fingers are pointing towards the Preacher, who heads a gang of thugs who have been terrorizing Potshot (and driving down property values in the bargain), but Spenser has his doubts. Hired by Potshot's city council to clear out the thugs, Spenser heads back to Boston to recruit the ever-ready Hawk, then travels around to complete his posse with bad guys from previous books (including gay club-owner/tough guy Tedy Sapp from "Hugger Mugger", who's a dead ringer for Spike in Parker's Sunny Randall novels). Twists and turns abound, but Spenser, in his usual Renaissance Thug style, comes out the winner as always."Potshot" is a much better book than "Hugger Mugger," mainly because it has Spenser doing what he does best--busting heads, enjoying good food, and romancing Susan Silverman. He hasn't slowed down a whit, considering that if Parker's timeline is correct, Spenser is approaching seventy (Parker briefly mentions Spenser's time in Korea--do the math). Parker's prose is at once spare and elegant, with the usual great dialogue. Parker fans should enjoy it; newcomers, however, may want to start with an earlier novel.
Rating:
Summary: Spenser For Hire
Review: Actually, I would like to classify the book as 3.5 stars, as this was a seemingly different type of Spenser novel. However, it is Robert Parker, and he gets the benefit of the doubt with the fourth star. Private Eye Spenser is back when Mary Lou Buckman hires him to find out who killed her husband, Steven, in the town of Potshot, Arizona. In working on the case, he is further employed by some of the higher members of the city to eliminate the seedy outlaws that make up the Dell. Led by a older man named The Preacher, this group of ruffians run the town, collecting money and instilling fear in all of the citizens. Spenser recruits a lot of his old friends, including the ever-popular Hawk, that have made appearances in several other books. There are a few turns, but not as many twists as usual in other Spenser books. The one thing that Parker books all have in common is that they are loaded with dialogue. It makes up most of this novel, and it is meshed quite nicely with his clear writing style. POTSHOT is a good effort, and has a decent enough storyline to make for entertaining reading, but it is not quite up to the usual Spenser standards. First time Spenser readers should start with one of his earlier books.
Rating:
Summary: Potshot
Review: Not as compelling as his previous books - especially Perish Twice. Enjoyable throughout although the ending itself was not clear. It could have had a much clearer--and satisfying--ending.
Rating: 
Summary: Poor Spenser
Review: Reading the latest Spenser novel, Potshot, by Robert Parker was a depressing event. It seems another of my favorite authors has lost sight of the creative standards that made earlier writings captivate me. Mr. Parker falls back on repetitions of past works, inane dialogue and lukewarm narrative in this story. I read through the book, hoping that eventually I would come across the elegant writing that made so many of the earlier Spenser novels so readable. I never found it. Mr. Parker would be wiser to retire Parker, Susan and Pearl to a small cottage in Concord and move on.
Rating:
Summary: Parker's Potshot Hits the Mark
Review: I've read a lot of private eye books. Six hundred would be a conservative estimate. Many are better plotted than Robert B. Parker's books. Few are better written. None are more fun to read. I started reading Spenser when I was 18. I'm 39 now and both of us are still going. I read Parker for the dialogue. For the spareness of his prose and for the unflagging honor of his protagonist. Yes, I sometimes tire of Pearl the Wonder dog. There are days I could live without Susan Silverman. But taken as a whole, the Spenser series stands head and shoulders above most crime fiction. Potshot has a fairly lightweight plot even for Parker, but the dialogue zips along and I really enjoyed the reunion with the various tough guys that Spenser recruits. Parker uses the world views of the members of the group to again show what separates Spenser from his peers. As Parker once noted in an interview, Spenser is a killer of men, but when he won't kill is perhaps more important than when he will. Sure it's a western, but many, if not most of the Spenser novels are updated westerns. If you're looking for a whodunit you're in the wrong place. Go read Ruth Rendell or P.D. James. They are terrific. But if you want to spend some time with a master of minimalist prose and the great bunch of guys he brings with him, give Potshot a try. And when you're done, go back and read Early Autumn. It remains my favorite of the Spenser series.
Rating: 
Summary: M.S. Means More of the Same
Review: There's an old college joke that B.S. means exactly what it says, M.S. means more of the same, and Ph.D. means piled high and deep. My four-word review for this book: "More of the same." That means: 1) Spenser lives by an unbreakable code of conduct. 2) He knows a lot of tough guys who are willing to shoot first and ask later, but have their own codes. 3) All women everywhere think he's the hottest thing since sliced bread. 4) But he has a deep and everlasting commitment to Susan Silverman. What I'd give to see Spenser break out of his mold a little. Maybe he needs to find a new hottie who'll tempt him to leave Susan (or maybe Susan will bite the dust). Maybe he could run into an enemy who's too much for him to handle. Or how about putting some stress into the Hawk-Spenser relationship? How about just finding some new ways to describe the main characters? Two other notes and I'll knock off. First, I would like to see some reference to aging - other series authors have characters who don't age, but they also don't refer to their own histories. It's now been 50 years since Spenser fought in Korea. Second, I know Parker loves Westerns and the Western mythology, so this was a great opportunity for him. Why couldn't he have made more of it?
Rating:
Summary: A Different type of Spenser
Review: As an avid Spenser fan for the past 15 years, I bought this book the day it came out. After devouring it in one sitting - my son went to bed early that night! - I am left with very mixed emotions. The story itself is good, but not great. Mary Lou Buckman hires Spenser to find out what happened to her husband in the half tourist trap/half backwater town of Potshot, AZ. As always, the beautiful blonde client is honesty-challenged, the wife of the local real estate broker is after him, and the head cop is involved (think Walking Shadow). This is not one of his better plot lines - see Sudden Mischief or Ceremony for a true mystery/whodunnit type book. Reading Parker, however, always involves much more than the plot. His clean, elegant writing style and story pacing is without par, and no one delivers the dry humor the way Parker does. If Potshot were simply another in the Spenser series, I would be inclined to rate it three stars and chalk it up as a solid but not terrificaly distinguished entry. I have read some of the other reviews of this book, and a few people seemed to catch on to the fact that something is changing in the world of Spenser. This book has the feel of a farewell, and speaking as someone who has read this series since my teen years, that really bothers me. The clues are there: Spenser rounded up EVERYONE of distinction from his previous novels (he even included a brief reference to Mei Ling, the Chinese student who served as a translator and Hawk's girlfriend in Walking Shadow), he mentions that the beloved Pearl is getting old, and even Susan contributes to the feeling by giving up shopping (!) to take a long drive with Spenser. Minor details, I realize, but it definitely gives the book a different flavor from all the previous entries. If you are new to Spenser, I'd really recommend that you start with a different book. The Godwulf Manuscript is the first, but if you aren't interested in starting that early (the time frame is early 70's), try starting at Ceremony or Valediction. These offer great writing without the angst of Susan's midlife crisis, which is interesting but better understood if you are a Parker fan. Even Hugger Mugger - the book just prior to Potshot - would introduce you to standard Parker stories. If you are a fan, get ready to start mourning the loss of Spenser. While he may do one more Spenser book, Parker has expanded his writings, and the new series seems to be replacing Spenser (although retaining a few of the same characters).
Rating:
Summary: Far from Parker's best
Review: This clever riff on The Seven Samurai/Magnificent Seven has Spenser rounding up six of his tough-guy acquaintances from previous books to help rid an Arizona town of a gang of outlaws that is terrorizing it. You can can always count on Parker for neat characterization and snappy dialogue, but this book is undone by its by-the-numbers plot (containing a gigantic hole) and by Spenser's constant raving and moaning about girlfriend Susan Silverman, which is getting really monotonous. The book feels like a first draft, with 4-page chapters filled mostly with clipped dialogue. Still, there are worse characters to spend a couple of hours with than Spenser. But if you're new to the series, start with one of the other books.
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