Customer Reviews

The Pallbearers (Shane Scully Series)

5 star:		(5)
4 star:		(5)
3 star:		(6)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(1)

 

 

I was pleased and surprised when I saw this book at the library, I didn't know that there was a new Shane Scully novel out. As I said, it was good, but not great. For me, it seemed to be missing something.

The Plot was really good. Scully found out that the one man who took care of him as a child had killed himself. The guy wanted Scully and 5 other people to be his pallbearers. As the six met, they understood that they were hand picked special. As the six of them looked in to Pop's death, and couldn't believe that he killed himself. The six of them decided that they'd look into Pop's death. If he was murdered, they'd have to figure out who did it and why, and that person would pay.

That's all I really want to say about the plot. I don't want to give to much of it away. I did like the fact that we were able to see Scully's past, and how he changed from an angry, bitter child to the man he is today. I also liked how the reader is able to get to know the other pallbearers, and see how they turned out. I really liked the character of Jack.

The writing was good as usual. Cannell is able to put us with Scully in that everything he does. Cannell is very good at that.

The downsides is that it just felt like The Pallbearers was missing something. It hard to say, but it just felt empty. I didn't like how it ended.

Don't get me wrong, it's not a bad read, but just not one of my favorites

Huntington House Group Home director Walter Dix commits suicide; he apparently shot himself in the head with a shotgun. Those who were raised by Pop, as his wards called him, are stunned as he was considered a father by many of his kids.

His will selects six of his former boys to be the Pallbearers. This includes Police Detective Shane Scully, whose parents abandoned him three decades ago as an infant. Scully has issues with the suicide denouement as he cannot accept the charismatic surfing Pop killing himself although the cop recognizes his affection and adulation of Pop and his remorse for losing contact could distort his view. The other five pallbearers also have difficulty with the official verdict. Putting off his Hawaii vacation with his wife, LAPD Detective Division acting commander Alexa, Shane leads the other Pallbearers on a quest for the truth.

The latest Scully investigative thriller (see On the Grind and White Sister) is refreshed by taking the detective and readers back into his past as an "orphan"; thus enabling the audience to better understand the demons that eat at his soul. The investigation is fun to follow as the police officially close the case while Scully leads the other pallbearers on investigating what each assumes is a homicide. Although the clues to what happen is too obvious for readers which detracts from the investigation's primary issue as to whether Pop considered "to be or not to be" that is the first question of the inquiry. Still Stephen J. Cannell provides his fans with a deep look at the hero's childhood through his adult eyes looking back to the time that shaped the man he is.

Harriet Klausner

I've read all the Shane Scully novels. This was not one of the better ones. Slow, very predictable, and lacked the charm and cop to cop confrontations of previous novels. Cannell has to go back to the drawing board.

Shane Scully and his wife Alexa are packing for 2 weeks in Hawaii - a long awaited vacation. Right then, the phone rings and announces that the head of Huntington House (a home for orphaned children where Shane had once lived) is dead - an apparent suicide. The 6 pallbearers (including Shane) decide that no way would Pop Dix had done such a thing. They set out to prove that Pop was murdered.

This was a fast and entertaining read for the better part of an afternoon into evening.

My single favorite idea put forth by Cannell in the Pallbearers came late -- in Chapter 58 -- during a dialogue between Scully and Mesa. MESA: "...he had this Zen lesson for me...two wolves fighting over my soul...one evil...wants to eat my heart...the other good...wants to protect my spirit. I remember getting more pissed by the minute. He was patronizing me...So I finally asked him, Okay, if these wolves are fighting, which would will win? You know what he told me?" SCULLY: "Yeah...he said the wolf you feed will win...I remembered the story well. Walt had told it to me the second week I'd been there. The day he'd caught me stealing money from the office." In spite of their similar school of hard knocks childhoods, Mesa (the guy who chose to feed his evil wolf) became an individual who lacked heart. Scully, though a perennial rule breaker and no angel himself, chose to feed the wolf who protected his spirit and lived life with a great deal of heart (and also regret, guilt and finally atonement).

I liked Scully's speculation about why they (Scully, Vargas, Diamond, Straw, Cotton and Lavicki) were chosen to be the Pallbearers. SCULLY: "All of them had started right where I had, all had come out someplace completely different. Six graduates of Huntington House. Pop's favorites. Or at least, that's what I thought at the time." Cannell didn't leave us hanging too long -- in Chapter 9, Alexa (Scully's wife) gives her take on the reason. The reader can accept Alexa's analysis or look for deeper reasons and keep thinking right up 'til the end. I thought that in addition to Alexa's take, each of the pallbearers brought his/her own area of expertise to help solve the case. Most of the names are nouns -- I couldn't figure out if that was of significance. (Scully means herald, Vargas means slope or fenced. Lavicki means???)

TYPOS: kneeding (should be kneading) on page 120 and waiver (should be waver) on 189.

Have read better Scully books. I really like Shanne Scully and was glad to read about his youth but the story was a little draggy at times.

Pop Dix who raised Scully along with many, many more kids has killed himself, or has he? The six pallbearears do not think so. Why were thse six chosen to be pallbearears out of all the kids Pop helped to raise? They decide to work to gether to find our if he really did kill himself.

Scully gets beaten up more than once, gets a few bones broken and has a hard time putting up with the other five people. The last few pages of the book move very fast and have a lot of action, finally. There are some other very good characters in the other pallbearears, Jack, Diamond, Vargas and my favorite Cotton.

The last page is very moving and should bring a tear or two to your eyes.

If you like Scully it will do.

The Pallbearers is the first time read of a Stephen Cannell novel for me. The author starts the story with a bang. The apparent suicide of Detective Shane Scully's childhood mentor turns to murder. The selected pallbears commence an investigation and along the way Mr. Cannell developes some interesting characters.

For nearly 80% of the novel it was a gripping tale. Unfortunately, the ending is a total disappointment. The story moves from Los Angeles to an Indian reservation in Arizona. A big fight ensues and the bad guy is arrested. The reader never does learn why each of the pallbears was selected by their mentor.

While the story was entertaining, I'll have to give a lot of thought as to whether I will read another Stephan Cannell novel. I certainly won't purchase a new hardcover edition.

I'm going to skip the plot summary, since it's already in many other reviews on here. I will say, I thought the plot dragged a little with the flashbacks and the fact that Cannell seems to try to beat the "poor orphan/disadvantaged kids" idea to death, both in flashbacks and present-day narrative. That said, however, I very much enjoyed the crime mystery. The characters were interesting, as always. Scully is in his usual rare form, and I also loved Sabas Vargas as the tough, reformed Mexican gang member and Jack as the still-criminal, recently paroled biker. This book has a bit of an anti-climatic ending, but I enjoyed it anyway, and I'm looking forward to the next Shane Scully novel.

I have enjoyed tremendously reading Stephen Cannell books for years and was so sorry to hear he had passed. This book was not my favorite but definitely worth the money.

First Sentence: In 1976 America was just coming out of a protracted depression called the Vietnam War, but back then I was still in the middle of mine.

Homicide Detective Shane Scully was abandoned as an infant and grew up in the system. The only person who ever tried to give him some sense of being cared for was Walter "Pop" Dix, executive director of Huntington House. When Shane is told Pop committed suicide and specifically asked that Shane be a pallbearer, it doesn't make sense. Shane hadn't seen Pop in years. When the other five pallbearers, all associated with Huntington House, convince Shane that Pop wouldn't have committed suicide, and unofficial murder investigation, with a very unofficial team, begins.

As much as I've enjoyed Cannell's television shows over the years, I'd never read one of his books. It seems I'd have been better staying with television.

On the positive side, Cannell does create an interesting cast of characters, providing background and dimension to each one, including the cat. He doesn't assume you've read previous books in the series, which I appreciated. He links the characters by a common thread but doesn't quite tie off all the ends, which I didn't mind. I did appreciate not having Scully being infallible or supermacho, although there was macho there, such as being able to have sex after virtually no sleep for an extended period of time and having been beaten to a pulp. However, for the most part, his female characters are strong and very capable, which I also appreciated. Cannell's writing can be characterized by short chapters that are very visual and action-packed.

On the downside, there are massive coincidences, an entire chapter of portents--those of you who've followed my reviews know how I despise portents--and some actions by the protagonist that were completely unbelievable. There points where the plot progression was so deliberately telegraphed it made it predictable.

I didn't hate the book but even among airport books there are levels; those you deliberately take with you and those you're stuck buying at the airport news shop of lack of choice. This is the latter but still an entertaining read to keep one occupied for a few hours.

THE PALLBARERS (Pol. Proc-Shane Scully-Los Angeles/Arizona-Cont) - Okay
Cannell, Stephen J.
St. Martin's Paperbacks, ©2010, US Paperback - ISBN: 9780312532451