RIP Robert B. Parker

I am a huge fan of genre fiction. Fantasy, Horror and Science Fiction fill my bookshelves at home and I am always on the lookout for new genre fiction at the libraries and in the stores. So keeping that in mind, a non-genre author has to be really REALLY good to keep my attention. One of the best was Robert B. Parker (pictured left) who died on Monday at age 77.

A couple years back I got into reading author biographies and blogs and started to notice that all sorts of my favourite authors (Stephen King and Peter David for example), talked about how they were always looking forward to the new Robert B. Parker book.

Doing some quick research I found that his books were detective novels, not normally my thing, but hey, I was up for something new. So back in 2004 I picked up his first Spenser novel, The Godwulf Manuscript, and I was hooked. His books are fast-paced, action-packed and in many places laugh-out-loud funny.

My personal favourite is Early Autumn (pictured right), where Spenser becomes a sort of father figure to a boy called Paul, simply suggesting that every problem can be worked at, and every situation can be made better.

At the rate of one book a month I had just caught up with his current book last month. There are still a couple works to be published, but it's a shame to know that soon I'll have read the last of the books written by this incredible writer.

If you haven't tried his books yet, I envy you, reading them is a real treat.