Double Play [Unabridged] [Audio Cassette]

Robert B. Parker (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: June 2004

Every new Parker sells 150,000 hbs in the US and is a "NY Times" top 10 bestseller. This crossover novel will appeal to crime fiction, sports and historical fiction fans. It has an excellent new title and stock sales from all new Parker titles. It is 1947, the year Jackie Robinson breaks major-league baseball's colour barrier by playing for the Brooklyn Dodgers - and changes the world. This is the story of that season, as told through the eyes of a difficult, brooding, and wounded man named Joseph Burke. Burke, a veteran of World War II and a survivor of Guadalcanal, is hired by Brooklyn Dodgers manager Branch Rickey to guard Robinson. While Burke shadows Robinson, a man of tremendous strength and character suddenly thrust into the media spotlight, the bodyguard must also face some hard truths of his own, in a world where the wrong associations can prove fatal. Parker fans will recognize many of the author's lifelong themes (honour and the redemptive power of love), and in Burke there are very real echoes of Parker's strongest character, Spenser. Coupled with the historical background of Jackie Robinson Parker has produced not only a great and gripping crime novel but also one of the most evocative baseball novels ever written.

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Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

Set in 1947, Parker's superb new novel imagines what it was like for Jackie Robinson, and more centrally for Robinson's (fictional) bodyguard, to see the color barrier broken in Major League baseball. This isn't Parker's first foray outside the mystery genre, though he remains best known for his Spenser PI series (this year's (Bad Business, etc.); in 2001 he dramatized Wyatt Earp in (Gunman's Rhapsody, and earlier he excelled with Perchance to Dream, Wilderness and Love and Glory. In an unusual gambit, however, this time he mixes his storytelling with his firsthand reminiscences (in chapters titled "Bobby") of growing up as a devoted Dodgers fan, a move that adds resonance and a sense of wonder to the taut narrative. The fiction, told in the third person, focuses on Joseph Burke, a WWII vet grievously wounded physically and emotionally by combat and its aftermath. Burke is a hired gun who allows himself no feelings, but when he signs on with Dodger owner Branch Rickey to protect Robinson from racist violence during the ballplayer's rookie season, he comes to respect, then love, the proud, controversial player. Burke also falls for Lauren, a self-destructive society girl with mob connections whom he worked for before Robinson, and it's from Lauren's troubles and the threat of violence surrounding Robinson that the novel's hard, smart action arises. Burke is a tough guy, and the narrative not set around baseball fields takes place in the white and black underworlds as Burke plays various gangsters against one another to protect both Lauren and Robinson. Parker, always a clean writer, has never written so spare and tight a book; this should be required reading for all aspiring storytellers. Parker fans will recognize with joy many of the author's lifelong themes (primarily, honor and the redemptive power of love), and in the Burke/Robinson dynamic, echoes of Spenser/Hawk (the PI's black colleague). Here they will treasure the very essence of Parker in a masterful recreation of a turbulent era that's not only a great and gripping crime novel but also one of the most evocative baseball novels ever written.
Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

From Booklist

The problem with this new novel from the creator of hard-boiled uber-hero Spenser is simple: this is a Spenser novel with new names. Burke is the Spenser clone. He's back from World War II after sustaining severe wounds. After his bride leaves him, he loses his emotional center. After his boxing career fizzles, he hires himself out as a tough guy. (Sound familiar Spenser fans?) A Mob guy refers Burke to Branch Rickey of the Brooklyn Dodgers, who needs someone to protect Jackie Robinson, who is about to become baseball's first black player. Burke and Robinson swap lots of good-natured racial barbs (a la Spenser and Hawk), while Burke confronts the local Mob with the help of a gunsel named Cash (Vince Haller by another name). Interspersed among the mayhem are somewhat disconcerting (why here?) recollections (assumed to be Parker's) of trips to the ballpark in the forties. So is this book bad? No, it's quite good actually, but Parker is at a point in his career (he got there a long time ago) where great athletes sometimes find themselves: 50 more homers for Barry Bonds? Not as many as last year! Despite the similarities to his Spenser series, Parker's characterizations of Burke and Robinson will resonate with readers because, as always, Parker connects with the romantic tough guy residing in so many souls. Wes Lukowsky
Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

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Product Details

• Audio Cassette
• Publisher: New Millennium; Unabridged edition (June 2004)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1590074262
• ISBN-13: 978-1590074268
• Product Dimensions: 7.1 x 4.5 x 1.2 inches
• Shipping Weight: 5.6 ounces
• Average Customer Review: 4.2 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (54 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #2,891,967 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
  • #26 in Books > Books on Cassette > Authors, A-Z > ( P ) > Parker, Robert B.
  • #99 in Books > Books on Cassette > Sports & Outdoors

More About the Author

Robert B. Parker (1932-2010) has long been acknowledged as the dean of American crime fiction. His novel featuring the wise-cracking, street-smart Boston private-eye Spenser earned him a devoted following and reams of critical acclaim, typified by R.W.B. Lewis' comment, "We are witnessing one of the great series in the history of the American detective story" (The New York Times Book Review). In June and October of 2005, Parker had national bestsellers with APPALOOSA and SCHOOL DAYS, and continued his winning streak in February of 2006 with his latest Jesse Stone novel, SEA CHANGE.

Born and raised in Massachusetts, Parker attended Colby College in Maine, served with the Army in Korea, and then completed a Ph.D. in English at Boston University. He married his wife Joan in 1956; they raised two sons, David and Daniel. Together the Parkers founded Pearl Productions, a Boston-based independent film company named after their short-haired pointer, Pearl, who has also been featured in many of Parker's novels.

Parker began writing his Spenser novels in 1971 while teaching at Boston's Northeastern University. Little did he suspect then that his witty, literate prose and psychological insights would make him keeper-of-the-flame of America's rich tradition of detective fiction. Parker's fictional Spenser inspired the ABC-TV series Spenser: For Hire. In February 2005, CBS-TV broadcast its highly-rated adaptation of the Jesse Stone novel Stone Cold, which featured Tom Selleck in the lead role as Parker's small-town police chief. The second CBS movie, Night Passage, also scored high ratings, and the third, Death in Paradise, aired on April 30, 2006.

Parker was named Grand Master of the 2002 Edgar Awards by the Mystery Writers of America, an honor shared with earlier masters such as Alfred Hitchcock and Ellery Queen.

Parker died on January 19, 2010, at the age of 77.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

14 of 14 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Working through the Pain, June 10, 2004

By 

Donald Mitchell "Jesus Loves You!" (Thanks for Providing My Reviews over 110,000 Helpful Votes Globally) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: Double Play (Hardcover)

Double Play introduces a new Parker hero, Joseph Burke, who barely survived a machine gun at Guadalcanal while serving as a Marine in World War II. Back in the states, he doesn't know where he is . . . but he's sure someone's out to get him. After a long physical recovery, his emotional recovery just begins as the story opens.

Burke is a tough guy, and (like Spenser) takes up boxing. But he's better at pounding away and surviving a punch than "floating like a bee" and he soon has to find another line of work. Having scruples makes him a poor enforcer, so he finds himself becoming a body guard. His first job is for a woman who needs to be protected from an abusive boyfriend who's connected . . . and her own bad habits. When that job ends, Burke finds himself in Brooklyn being asked to play the same role for Dodger rookie Jackie Robinson.

The book reminds me of Huckleberry Finn with Jim on the Mississippi in many ways, as Burke finds himself not fitting into either the African-American or the WASP communities as he does his bodyguard work. Burke's awareness of what Jackie Robinson is going through grows, and the reader finds himself taken back to a world that we are hopefully leaving behind as fast as possible where race counted rather than what you did.

Atop of this setting, Mr. Parker overlays gangland vendettas, a love story and his own perspective as a 15 year old on that fateful season in Brooklyn.

For secondary entertainment, you can match up each character in the story to a character from the Spenser books. Although I think Susan would be annoyed to be matched to many of these female characters.

The book has a weakness though that's annoying. It's a little too glib and easy about dealing with the racial hatred of the times. You end up feeling like you are reading about hazing rather than hate.

Any Spenser fan will enjoy seeing the variety of seeing the challenges of doing the right thing from the perspective of pain and numbness rather than from joy and happiness.

6 of 6 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars At the top of his form, July 7, 2004

By 

Richard B. Schwartz (Columbia, Missouri USA) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: Double Play (Hardcover)

This is Parker on the stretch, away from his favorite characters, away from his Boston setting, plunged into the past. When he's stretched he's at the top of his form and demonstrates his moves on every page.

Most of all, the Jackie Robinson story is a story about a time and the first third of the book is background. Parker does the postwar period masterfully and the interspersed personal chapters are a nice, innovative touch. They've drawn some criticism, unwarranted in my opinion.

The characters are fresh, the plotting and dialogue as economical as the best Parker, the resolution touching. I read it straight through, disrupting all of my prior plans for the day, and not regretting a moment of it.

7 of 8 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars One of Parker's best, September 30, 2004

By 

Grey W. Satterfield Jr. (Oklahoma City, OK United States) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: Double Play (Hardcover)

I loved "Double Play." It's been a long time since a book has so resonated in my consciousness. Let me tell you why.

Robert B. Parker and I are about the same age. We were both 14 in the summer of 1947 when most of his book takes place. Like Mr. Parker, I spent my youth listening to ballgames on the radio. I, too, had been a Brooklyn Dodgers fan (until the summer of 1946 when they were supplanted in my affections by the St. Louis Cardinals - but that's a story for another time). I, too, listened to all the wonderful old radio shows of the day, Jack Benny, Fibber McGee and Molly, and on and on that Mr. Parker discusses in his "Bobby" sequences. I saw Jackie Robinson play against the Cardinals in St Louis in that summer of his rookie year, 1947 - I wonder where Burke was? Mr. Parker's mother, a spirited woman who he describes as, "often wrong, but never in doubt," and his father, who dealt with his wife's bossiness with slightly bemused tolerance, reminded me of my own parents' personalities and relationship. Even the unconscious racism of 1940s Springfield, Mass. was reminiscent of the racism that prevailed in Oklahoma City at the time.

The exciting story of the developing respect between Burke, the tough WW-II combat veteran, failed boxer, and body guard; and Jackie Robinson is well told and a lot of fun. Sure their relationship has overtones of Spencer and Hawk but, what the heck, "if it ain't broke, don't fix it." And we can always count on a Robert B. Parker novel to give us three dimensional characters and smart, endlessly entertaining dialog. For example, Burke, although only about 22 in 1947, is older than his time on earth would indicate - and infinitely sadder, too. I think I would have liked "Double Play" a lot, even without its connections to my own childhood but the combination of Mr. Parker's formidable storytelling talent and the time in which his book is set served to make it doubly rewarding for me.