-- 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....

Young Spenser is tough. No doubt about it. After all, he’s being raised by his father and uncles—three of the toughest men in town. He knows how to fight, and he’s had to prove it. But his father taught him something far more valuable: sometimes the toughest thing a guy can do is walk away from a fight.
 
So when Spenser sees his friend Jeannie being taken in a boat downriver by her abusive father, he knows he has a...

“Ebullient entertainment.”—Time
A hotshot reporter is dead. He'd gone to take a look-see at “Miami North”—little Wheaton, Massachusetts—the biggest cocaine distribution center above the Mason-Dixon line.
Did the kid die for getting too close to the truth . . . or to a sweet lady with a jealous husband?
Spenser will stop at nothing to find out.
Praise for Robert B. Parker's...

Boston P.I. Spenser heads west to the rich man’s haven of Potshot, Arizona, a former mining town reborn as a paradise for Los Angeles millionaires. This western idyll is being threatened by a local gang of desert rats, misfits, drunks and scavengers the police seem powerless to corral. Led by a charismatic individual known as The Preacher, this motley band of thieves selectively exploits the town, nurturing it as a source of wealth while systematically...

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.

Spenser is back and embroiled in a dangerous and multi-layered case. Someone has been killing racehorses at stables across the south, and Walter Clive, president of Three Fillies Stables, hires him to find out who. Spenser goes to Georgia to protect Hugger Mugger, a two-year-old destined to become the next Secretariat. Disregarding the resentment of the local Georgia law enforcement, he takes the case. Despite the veneer of civility, Spenser encounters...

The adoring wife of a senatorial candidate has a smile as sweet as candy and dots her "i's" with little hearts. A blond beauty, she is the perfect mate for an ambitious politician, but she has a little problem with sex and drugs—a problem someone has managed to put on videotape.
The big boys figure a little blackmail will put her husband out of the race. Until Spenser hops on the candidate's bandwagon.
But getting back the tape of...

Spenser is..."The sassiest, funniest, most-enjoyable-to-read-about private eye around today...the legitimate heir to the Hammett-Chandler-Macdonald tradition." --The Cincinnati PostThe Boston Globe