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35 of 38 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars
A great idea but a few flaws, December 22, 2004
Night Passage is the first in Robert B Parker's "Jesse Stone" series, set in the mythical town of Paradise, up near Lynne, Massachusetts. Jesse conveniently runs into just about every major character from the Spenser for Hire series during his adventures over the years. In essence, Parker is getting back to his roots. At this point in time Spenser is getting far too old to keep detecting, a point that many, many readers have made with a grin. Stone is picking up the mantle, and returning to the hard liquor, hard edged attitude that Spenser had back when he was a pup. You start with Jesse Stone, aged 34, born in Tucson Arizona, staring at the Santa Monica ocean and pondering how he quit the LAPD. Divorced, 6', 175 pounds, he was a point guard in high school and almost went professional in baseball, but for a career-ending injury. Oh yes, he was in the marines, too. So he drives his Explorer cross country to the tiny town of Paradise, Massachusetts. The drive takes quite a bit of book to tell. When he gets there, to be their new police chief, he finds a mess. White Supremacists, money laundering, lots of sex. And all through it, you get soap opera scenes of Jesse and his ex-wife Jenn who can't quite live together but can't quite leave each other either. The writing is classic Spenser style, although in 3rd person. You get both the good and the bad in that sense. I enjoy the wit and the quick paced action, but I really don't like the soap-opera long drawn out scenes where you have to hear for the 800th time how a couple loves each other but has issues with living together. Also, a number of the actions of the characters make little sense, and seem like they were thrown in for plot reasons. The ending is very rushed and forced. I really like the idea of a new character to keep this universe going, but I hope that by trying to write three series at once, Parker isn't spreading himself a little thin.
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12 of 13 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars
Parker Unveils a New Hero !, April 8, 1999
By A Customer
IN one of his boldest moves of late, Robert Parker introduces us to a new and highly likeable character in Chief Jesse Stone. Fresh from a dead-end job and a serious drinking problem in Los Angeles, Jesse Stone comes to a quaint little town known as Paradise to take over the responsibilities of police chief. Little does he realize what mayhem lurks just below the surface of this seemingly innocent little harbour town. In a plot full of strange characters and even stranger plot twists, Parker unravels another classic suspense mystery novel. If you like Spenser... you'll LOVE Stone!! Just like he handles the "seedy element" in Paradise, Jesse Stone will catch up to you one way or another by the end of the book. I highly recommend it to all Spenser fans that want to welcome Parker's newest hero with open arms ( and minds!).
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19 of 23 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars
Just a Spark in the "Night", February 18, 2003
It is usually not a good sign when a series author decides to branch out to a new series; it usually means that the author himself has become bored with his creation and wishes to stretch his writing muscles a bit with something new. At best, this gives the faithful reader a new reason to enjoy his favorite author. At worst, the previous creation becomes a sort of exercise in frustration as the writer focuses his attention on his new baby. In Robert B. Parker's case, we get the latter. Parker had already registered his continued contempt for his first creation, Spenser, by allowing the stories to get maudlin and sloppy, the margins to get wider and wider, and by publishing two installments of new Philip Marlowe adventures, as well as creating a new series starring a female private eye named Sunny Randall. To add insult to injury, here are we are now with "Night Passage", a fourth series concerning an L.A. cop named Jesse Stone transplanted to Paradise, Massachusetts, a bucolic little town on the Atlantic Ocean. Jesse, plagued by drink and a wishy-washy ex-wife, sets out to remake himself as Chief of Policein a town where no one knows his name. But things get confusing when the department cat is murdered, followed by the killing of the previous chief of police and finally, a young, unwed mother. Jesse is, underneath it all, a good cop, so he is able to pull himself together, solve the crimes and have casual sex with a couple of ladies, thereby working on his abandonment issues. Parker seems intent on making Stone as different from Spenser as possible, but the differences are superficial. Where Spenser is a hulking ex-boxer, Stone is slight. Spenser enjoys a beer or a glass of fine champagne once in a while but is, ultimately, in control, but Stone is a drunk just barely keeping his head above water. Where Spenser's relationship is stable to the point of saccharine sweetness, Stone's is wobbly. Spenser has Hawk. Stone has . . . Suitcase Simpson,. a gangly redheaded police officer. But none of this matters. The writer is still Parker, the soul is still Spenser. Nearly half the novel is taken with Jesse's drive across country and settling in to Paradise. By the time Parker gets around to leveling the plot, we almost wish he hadn't; it is ridiculously unlikely and unworthy of a writer of Parker's heart and intelligence. What makes this novel a good read are the spare, Hemingwayesque prose, the likeable secondary characters, the hints of what is to come. It's an okay start and, I'm not giving anything away, the second book in the series is a grand-slam homerun of a book. You don't need to read this book to enjoy the second (I didn't, until after), but it may set your mind at ease.
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