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Summary: Widow's Walk
Review: "Widow's Walk" is the 29th Spenser novel by Robert B. Parker. I look forward to getting his Spenser novels each Spring. Mary Smith is charged with the murder of her rich husband, Nathan Smith who was murdered in his bed. It appears that the only other person in the house was Mary. Mary claims that she was watching TV at the time. Parker does a great job with her character; Mary isn't very intelligent to say the least. Spenser begins to investigate and finds that someone doesn't want him on the case at all. He is followed, then someone tries to kill him. Then, other people involved in the case are found dead. Spenser is stumped until the very end. Spenser is back in Boston for this one after being in Georgia and Arizona for the last 2 books. I think this is an excellent addition to this long-running PI series.
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Summary: Beantown banker goes down...
Review: ... but will the widow walk? Spenser gets hired by the widow's defense attorney to help clear her of murder. She's about as young and dumb as Anna Nicole, and obviously lies when Spenser questions her. Meanwhile, another bank employee, a broker, and a hitman go down in a hail of bullets, and Spenser is being watched by a couple of fat guys in bad suits driving big black cars. Spenser enlists the help of faithful sidekicks Hawk and Vinnie, to protect himself and shadow the numerous suspects in this twisted tale of immorality. This one is packed with solid action, and Spenser's wry humor.
Rating: 
Summary: Decent, but,,,,
Review: Confusing. I don't like trying to twist my brain around a complicated bank fraud/murder mystery when reading a Spenser novel. Dialougue is still great.
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Summary: The Boston Red Sox of Private Cops
Review: Decades ago with his GODWULF MANUSCRIPT, Robert B. Parker largely reinvented the mystery sub-genre of the tough-guy private eye novel. He showed us all how to update this traditional American prototypical character for today's sensibilities, and Parker's Spenser has earned a place among the most popular of our age's PIs.As does his beloved Red Sox, Parker sends a fresh Spenser mystery onto the field of play every year. Each spring, Spenser seems like a championship creation. Every novel is consistently thrilling, witty, unpredictable, and, in the end, a bit heartbreaking. This series is obviously written by a Red Sox fan. One knows when they begin that in the end all will not be idyllic. WIDOW'S WALK fits this Spenser mold perfectly. Parker is amazingly consistent. In this novel, Spenser is hired by Rita Fiore (an series semi-regular)to help build her defense for her client Mary Smith. Mary's husband, Nathan, of Mayflower lineage, is murdered. Mary, his much younger and terribly unfaithful, widow is everyone's, including Rita's, favorite suspect. Spenser springs into action. Pearl the Wonder Dog is on hand. Susan is here, and, of course, so is Hawk. WIDOW'S WALK has all we have grown to expect from Parker's series. The witty dialog snaps rapidly throughout. Parker's social observations are astute. The true origin of the crime rests with a real estate scam. As one reads WIDOW'S WALK, one has to hope that this year the Red Sox will actually find a way to win the World Series in October. The last time Parker's team won it, the Series was played in September. WIDOW'S WALK is an excellent novel.
Rating: 
Summary: Save your time and money
Review: Ho hum. There was a time when Spenser novels were fun and a little bit interesting. That was when Parker cared to find an original plot and to inject just a bit of suspense or make us care about his hero. Not so any more. Each Spenser book becomes a bit more of a self-parody. Parker likes to have Spenser trade black jokes with Hawk (safe because Hawk is black); then he trades gay jokes with a gay guy; women jokes with women; etc. Parker can't think of any new jokes, and this is tired...very tired. To be interesting, Spenser needs to be less cute and more dangerous. The plot doesn't hang together, nobody we care about is in any real danger, there's nothing new here--even Boston is kind of "sketched in" like the characters. Want to read somebody good? Read Block or Connelly. Parker's problem is all summed up neatly in the new picture on the back of the book. For years, Parker used a picture of him trying to look tough with shades, a doberman, a baseball jacket and hat. We knew he wasn't tough, but at least he was trying. Now they have a new jacket picture--he loooks like your old fat uncle...the one who used to play tricks on you at family reunions. This new book is like that: old, tired, unfunny, a bit obnoxious. Save your money, save your time.
Rating:
Summary: A bit tired, but still worthwhile
Review: I agree with those that feel that the Spenser series has seen its best days. Maybe Parker realizes that also, and is using the dog Pearl's aging as a plot device hinting that time is catching up with all the characters. Yeah, Spenser must be about 70...Hawk too, and Susan not far behind. Quirk and Belsen must be ready to retire from the police department, and is that a transistor radio Vinnie Morris is always listening to, or a hearing aid? Still this isn't a bad book and spending two or three hours with it is more enjoyable than most of what you'll find on TV. Maybe some of Spenser's readers are tiring also. I saw a couple of reviews written by those who seemed to have lost out on who killed Nathan, and others who didn't see the significance of Susan's client who commits suicide compared to the possibility of Nathan's suicide, or her feeling of failure because of her client's suicide compared to Spenser's failure to protect a character who came to him for protection. All of the above shows that Parker hasn't lost it yet, but I fear he's tiring. This Spenser book does have a surplus of characters, even after a larger than usual number of them get killed. So what am I saying? I'm saying that this is a must for Spenser addicts, but only because it is Spenser. However, it is rather pedestrian and it may be that your strongest emotion in reading the book is regret that Pearl is indeed getting pretty old.
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Summary: Unfortunately, not a great introduction to Robert Parker
Review: I picked up Widow's Walk from the library, to listen to while I commuted to work. This was my introduction to Robert B. Parker and as such, also to Spenser. Joe Mantegna reads very well for the characters and manages to convey very believable characters. As I listened, my imagination played some film noir soundtrack in the background. There are a great many characters in the storyline. At one point I almost lost track of who was whom. And golly, everyone but the main characters seemed to die. It was as if they were all cursed with a Red Uniform from the original Star Trek days. And I think Parker seemed to concentrate more on having them dead than fleshing out the reasons or the writing behind the reasons for their deaths. The reasons just didn't seem to want to stick in my head. That felt unsatisfying. All else considered, Widow's Walk was good for light reading, or listening, as the case was for me, but it wasn't exactly material that made me enthused about returning for another dose of Parker. I don't dislike his writing; it was just.. okay. It wasn't until I read the other Amazon readers' reviews for Widow's Walk that I figured I ought to give the earlier Spensers a go.
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Summary: Mr Parker Needs a Technical Consultant
Review: I've never met a Spenser I didn't like and this one's no different. They're always a fun read and I don't try to analyze them too deeply. I am however, a bit of a stickler for technical accuracy, especially when it breaks the case wide open. In this instance, it was the discovery of the .40 calibre pistol and how it was retrieved. Mr Parker erred twice, rather seriously. His first error was stating that the .40 caliber is a rare caliber. This is no longer the case. The .40 is quite popular and can be found in the holsters of many police departments. His second error was in stating that semi-auto pistols must have the hammer cocked in order to fire. Most modern semi-autos are either double-action or double-action-only pistols neither of which require that the hammer be cocked to fire. In fact one of the most popular .40 caliber pistols on the market is the Glock and it doesn't even have an external hammer. Normally this sort of technical error would not be that important but in this case it was a major plot point and as such brought down my rating of the book overall. Next time, Mr Parker needs to do a little bit of research on firearms.
Rating:
Summary: Widow's Walk
Review: Our well known private eye Spenser is back on the case in this one, trying to untangle a complex case involving a not-very-bright widow suspected by Boston's Finest of murdering her homosexual husband. Or was it a suicide? In the process, Spenser runs across a bank and real estate scam involving a host of characters who may or may not be involved in the original case. This is vintage Spenser, with all of the sharp dialogue and clear, beautifully simple descriptive passages we've come to expect from Mr. Parker and his detective hero. It all makes for another fine read. Pay no attention to carping critics. If they didn't criticize, who would think they were important? Buy the novel - and enjoy yourself once again in Spenser's Boston.
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Summary: Old Story
Review: Parker is such a good writer, it's a shame he is so hung up on the winey, self-centered Susan Silverman character. The story was a little too twisted this time. Not really enough focus on the plot. Not his best!
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