Bob & Lisa's Spenser for Hire Pages

Pale Kings and Princes
Robert B. Parker
Published 1987

An intriguing story, not set near Boston! This one is in Wheaton, MA. A newspaper reporter has been killed, and Spencer's hired to find out by who. Wheaton is a town known for it's Colombians and coke. There he meets the chief, his wife (the librarian), his son (the driver for the coke-dealers), and of course the coke king (Esteban) and his wife Emi. Spenser goes in and stirs things up, and watches the results.

The story mostly takes place in Wheaton - the police station, library, a few diners. He stays in the "Reservoir Court" by the Quaaaaabin (in the audio book, he keeps saying "quaybin" instead of "Quahbin") Reservoir. There's a contact point up in Belfast, Maine, and they stop at the rest stop by Portland and then ditch the truck in the North Shore Mall in Peabody.

Lisa Says: Not as interesting as some of his other books, but still of course enjoyable. The characters are each unique and bizarre. Spenser doesn't have a whole lot of interaction with Susan or Hawk - Susan pops in for a visit and consoles him later, while Hawk appears near the end to help snuff the dealers. Juanita is "not a force for good". Spencer's feeling more one-linery than usual in this one.

Wheaton, of course, doesn't exist, but WARE does!! We went hunting in the area of the Quabbin for a town that "matched the description" - and there it was! A mill town, the river, the factory outlets. The Acropolis Pizza, the Ware Cooperative Bank, the red brick town hall and North Street. It was quite a lot of fun :)

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