Robert B. Parker’s Lullaby
By Ace Atkins
(G.P. Putnam’s Sons,
310 pages, $26.95)
In Pursuit of Spenser:
Mystery Writers on Robert B. Parker and the Creation of an American
Hero
Edited by Otto Penzler
(BenBella Books,
257 pages, $14.95 paper)
The reviewer’s first job is to say if a book is any good and
should be read or not. Not so easy in the case of Lullaby,
the first Spenser novel written by Ace Atkins after the death in
2010 of Bob Parker. The book is a more than passable entry in the
private investigator genre. But the bar on this one is set
impossibly high by Putnam’s, by the Parker family, and most of all
by the expectations of the legions of Spenser fans.
Countless contemporary crime writers have tried to imitate
Parker’s lean and brightly humorous style, usually without
attribution or success. But Atkins was chosen by Parker’s family
and his publishers to be Bob Parker, and to keep Spenser
and his considerable book sales alive.
On the evidence of Atkins’ first effort, it’s almost certainly a
bridge too far. The history of writers chosen to continue to work
and characters of other writers is, to put it charitably, uneven.
There are both artistic and marketing reasons why Parker’s name is
at the top of this book and several times larger than Atkins’,
though Parker had nothing to do with the writing.
Lullaby is better than I expected it would be, and the
master’s voice is often heard in its pages. Atkins knows and
respects his Parker. And some readers familiar with the tough but
literate Boston P.I. and his world will enjoy the book. But Spenser
purists — there are oh so many of these — will be brought up
short by instances where Atkins tries hard to be Parkeresque but
renders false notes. There are too many disappointments in this
otherwise skilled literary impersonation for me to give the buy
sign.
It’s an easier call with In Pursuit of Spenser. Any
Spenser fan, I count myself one, will enjoy these 13 entertaining
and often insightful essays about Parker and his taller alter ego.
The first entry in the collection is a splendid piece by Atkins
himself, a Spenser enthusiast since his sophomore year in college.
Other household name contributors, household at least for the fans
of detective fiction, include Dennis Lehane, Lawrence Block,
Jeremiah Healy, and Loren D. Estleman. Writers who knew and
understood Parker and were influenced by him.
It has been difficult for writers of crime fiction in the last
decades of the 20th century and beyond not to be influenced by
Parker. His voice and style were that distinctive and appealing.
His book sales that impressive.
Readers are liable to encounter a Spenseresque line in almost
any contemporary crime novel. Popular crime writer Harlan Coben
spoke for the many when he said that 90 percent of current writers
of detective fiction admit Parker has had an influence on their
work while “the rest of us lie about it.” By way of full
disclosure, I abandoned my own last attempt at fiction writing,
featuring a Tampa PI, after re-reading the chapters I had put
together and concluding they were just Spenser with palm trees. And
not good Spenser at that.
In 39 very entertaining novels, beginning in 1973 with The
Godwulf Manuscript, Parker gave us the tough, smart, and
literate private investigator named Spenser (no first name is ever
given). It was not Parker’s plots, but his ever-engaging
characters, animated by Parker’s distinct voice and style, brimming
with intelligence and humor, that enabled Parker to sell tens of
millions of copies of novels featuring Spenser and, later,
Paradise (Massachusetts) Police Chief Jesse Stone. (Yes, he of the
Tom Selleck made-for-TV movies.)
The reason Spenser is of interest to a conservative audience
like TAS readers is his personification of the manly
virtues, basic decency, and the honorable life built around work
and personal responsibility. No moral relativist is our Spenser.
For those who see shades of gray in the choices we face, Spenser
counsels keep looking. The black and white will emerge. As will the
understanding that justice and the law are often different things.
Spenser’s brand of tolerance is much more attractive than the
preachy variety we get from the cultural Left, a tolerance that’s
not tolerant at all.
Spenser is neither an idealist nor a cynic (as so many of the
better known literary detectives are — See Sam Spade, Philip
Marlowe). Like any good conservative, whether or not he cottons to
the label, as Cambridge resident Parker may well not have, Spenser
is a realist. He deals with the world as it is. He may be a knight
errant. But he’s a knight with his feet firmly on the ground.
Parker through Spenser also deals intelligently with such
matters as integrity, courage, friendship, and what it means to be
a man or woman in our gender-fluid society. He takes women, even
feminists, seriously, though not the geek-branch variety. He never
for a moment buys into the fashionable nonsense that men and women
are, in all important ways, pretty much the same, just products of
our conditioning.
When I’ve reviewed Parker books for TAS I usually get
some blow back from readers who insist that Spenser and his
creators are liberals. I demur. I suppose readers could cherry-pick
from the novels to come up with the right-wing bad guy here, or
places there where Parker is trying a little too hard with a black
or gay character to show his heart is in the right place. And he
takes shrinks and psychotherapy more seriously than they deserve to
be (Parker’s wife is in some branch of the head trade).
But Spenser’s approach, taken whole cloth, reflects a kind of
autonomy and individualism that most conservatives will find
attractive. He takes the properly dismissive view of authority when
that authority is abused or is just being exercised to control
others. (No beef from conservatives here.) And the novels are
certainly non-partisan. I’ve read most of the 39. Perhaps the words
Republican or Democrat appear somewhere, but I don’t recall
tripping over either.
If PI writers had their own Mt. Rushmore, the four carved
figures would be Dashiell Hammett, Raymond Chandler, Ross
Macdonald, and Robert B. Parker. (OK, OK, John D. MacDonald might
get some write-in votes too.) Parker is more amusing than the lot,
and entertains us with a world view that most conservatives will
find simpatico. Ace Atkins is an able writer with a back list of
books, some of which feature his own series character. But, as most
readers of Lullaby will likely conclude, he is not Bob
Parker, and should probably not try to be.
Parker’s 39 Spenser novels are still in print. I raise them up
as a better use of time than Atkins’ faux Spenser. As style is the
most important element in detective fiction, and Parker the
ultimate stylist, his books are imminently re-readable. It’s not
even a serious drawback if you remember who done it. You don’t read
Spenser novels to see who done it. By a few pages in, readers will
be laughing, and beguiled enough by the trip not to care who done
it. You know Spenser will find out anyway.
