New Releases by Robert B. Parker

"What did it matter where you lay once you were dead? In a dirty sump or in a marble tower on a top of a high hill. You were dead, you were sleeping the big sleep..." Raymond Chandler wrote those immortal words on the final page of his first Marlowe thriller in 1939. Today, The Big Sleep is considered the all-time masterpiece of hard-boiled suspense. Now detective Philip Marlowe has returned--in this electrifying sequel by Chandler''s acclaimed successor, Robert B. Parker, author of the bestselling Spenser mysteries...

Boston PI Spenser investigates the perfect murder in this New York Times bestselling mystery in Robert B. Parker’s acclaimed series. She was a model wife and mother, bludgeoned with a hammer on the streets of Beacon Hill. Spenser''s searching for a motive and a murderer—and finding more secrets than meet the eye... “Among the best Spensers...Parker''s at the top of his game!”—Boston Globe

Spenser is forced by loyalty into an alien world where violence is a way of lie and outsiders enter at a lethal risk. When Spenser''s cohort, Hawk, is hired by the tenants of a gang-plagued Boston housing project known as "Double Deuce", he enlists his friend''s aid. A friend''s girl and her infant daughter have been gunned down. Though the act at first appears to be an accidental drive-by shooting, it soon becomes clear that it was premeditated murder. Before they can solve the crime, Spenser and Hawk must take on an adolescent band of hardened urban warriors. As bullets fly and the brutality escalates, Spenser learns more than he ever dreamed about a generation imprisoned in a hell of poverty and hopelessness where muscle is the ticket to survival, and the surest way out is in a body bag. Pulsing with moral complexity, Double Deuce is the kind of no-holds-barred action thriller only Robert B. Parker can create.

TV reporter Candy Sloan has eyes the color of cornflowers and legs that stretch all the way to heaven. She also has somebody threatening to rearrange her lovely face if she keeps on snooping into charges of Hollywood racketeering. Spenser''s job is to keep Candy healthy until she breaks the biggest story of her career. But her star witness has just bowed out with three bullets in his chest, two tough guys have doubled up to test Spenser''s skill with his fists, and Candy is about to use her own sweet body as live bait in a deadly romantic game--a game that may cost Spenser his life.

The house looked right. And the neighborhood was perfect. And everything else was wrong. So Spenser took the parents'' money and went after a runaway girl. Unfortunately, April Kyle had already traveled two lifetimes from her suburban home. Now she was caught up in a web of pinps, criminals, and exploiters—the kinf of people who won''t listen to anything but money, or a gun. . . . Praise for Ceremony “Sizzling.”—The Pittsburgh Press “Pick of the crop, this one. Genuinely involving.”—The Cleveland Plain Dealer

The most dangerous man to cross is one who isn''t afraid to die. But the most deadly is one who doesn''t want to live. And Spenser has just lost the woman who made life his #1 priority. So when a religious sect kidnaps a pretty young dancer, no death threat can make Spenser cut and run. Now a hit man''s bullet is wearing Spenser''s name. But Boston''s big boys don''t know Spenser''s ready and willing to meet death more than halfway.

“There is no halt to the breathless action!”—The New York Times Book Review Spenser has gone to London—and not to see the Queen. He''s gone to track down a bunch of bombers who''ve blown away his client''s wife and kids. His job is to catch them. Or kill them. His client isn''t choosy. But there are nine killers to one Spenser—long odds. Hawk helps balance the equation. The rest depends on a wild plan. Spenser will get one of the terrorists to play Judas Goat—to lead him to others. Trouble is, he hasn''t counted on her being very blond, very beautiful and very dangerous.

“[Robert B.] Parker''s brilliance is in his simple dialogue, and in Spenser.”—The Philadelphia Inquirer A bitter divorce is only the beginning. First the father hires thugs to kidnap his son. Then the mother hires Spenser to get the boy back. But as soon as Spenser senses the lay of the land, he decides to do some kidnapping of his own. With a contract out on his life, he heads for the Maine woods, determined to give a puny 15 year old a crash course in survival and to beat his dangerous opponents at their own brutal game.

The most personal and revealing Spenser thriller of all, Pastime is Robert B. Parker''s electrifying masterpeice of crime fiction--a startling game of memory, desire, and danger that forces Spenser to face his own past. Ten years ago, he saved a teenage boy from a father''s rage. Now, on the brink of manhood, the boy seeks answers to his mother''s sudden disapearance. Spenser is the only man he can turn to. This time, it''s more than a routine search for a missing person--Spenser must search his own soul...

PI Spenser investigates his most glamorous case yet in this New York Times bestselling series. Spenser''s never had a client like Jill Joyce, the star of TV''s Fifty Minutes. She''s beautiful, bitchy, sexy—and someone is stalking her. Spenser can hardly blame the would-be assassin ... until Jill learns the true meaning of "stage fright." Soon, Spenser finds himself at the center of a murder plot with a twist he never saw coming.

Spenser goes back to school--to investigate corruption in college town. Taft University''s hottest basketball star is shaving points for quick cash. And if Spenser doesn''t watch his own footwork, the guilty parties will shave a few years off his life...

A serial killer is on the loose in Beantown and the cops can''t catch him. But when the killer leaves his red rose calling card for Spenser''s own Susan Silverman, he gets all the attention that Spenser and Hawk can give. Spenser plays against time while he tracks the Red Rose killer from Boston''s Combat Zone to the suburbs. His trap is both daring and brave, and gives the story a satisfying climax.

Everybody loves a winner, and the Rabbs are major league. Marty is the Red Sox star pitcher, Linda the loving wife. She loves everyone except the blackmailer out to wreck her life. Is Marty throwing fast balls or throwing games? It doesn''t take long for Spenser to link Marty''s performance with Linda''s past...or to find himself trapped between a crazed racketeer and an enforcer toting an M-16. America''s favorite pastime has suddenly become a very dangerous sport, and one wrong move means strike three, with Spenser out for good!

New York Times bestselling author of the Spenser series of crime thrillers - Book 2 in the series - Appie Knoll is the kind of suburb where kids grow up right. But something is wrong. Fourteen-year-old Kevin Bartlett disappears. Everyone thinks he''s run away -- until the comic strip ransom note arrives. It doesn''t take Spenser long to get the picture -- an affluent family seething with rage, a desperate boy making strange friends...friends like Vic Harroway, body builder. Mr. Muscle is Spenser''s only lead and he isn''t talking...except with his fists. But when push comes to shove, when a boy''s life is on the line, Spenser can speak that language too. "A brillant, and cynical, comic tragedy or tragic comedy of manners. Long may Parker wave." -- Los Angeles Times