Small Vices

A Spenser Novel

By: Robert B. Parker

Narrated by: Burt Reynolds

Ellis Alves is no angel. But his lawyer says he was framed for the murder of college student Melissa Henderson...and asks Spenser for help.

From Boston's back streets to Manhattan's elite, Spenser and Hawk search for suspects, including Melissa's rich-kid, tennis-star boyfriend. But when a man with a .22 puts Spenser in a coma, the hope for justice may die with him.

©1997 Robert B. Parker (P)2005 Phoenix Audio, All Rights Reserved

Critic reviews

"Robert B. Parker is a tough act to follow." (The New York Times Book Review)

Standard Spenser

This is standard Spenser fare. If you've ready one Parker mystery, this is very likely the same. Spenser's still cracking wise. Hawk's still tough and kinda scary and Susan's....well...Susan. Utterly standard, solid and forgettable. Charming characters in an uninspired mystery.

Difficult to understand!

This is absolutely one of the most difficult narrations to understand clearly. If you listen in your car, in can be nearly impossible to hear many of the sentence endings. I completely readjusted my stereo (decrease base, increase treble, and turn the volume way up!) to enable me to follow this story. The story is good - a typical Robert Parker - but I don't think I'll invest in any more read by Mr. Reynolds.

Small Vices

Burt Reynolds was terrific. He did all of the voices well, especially Hawk's. Super effort by ole Burt!

One of Parker's Best

I found this book to be one of Parker's best in the Spencer series. It has a little more suspense to it then some of his other's. And I think Burt Reynolds is the perfect narrator for his Spencer Books. I wish they would allow Burt to narrate more of Parker's Books.

Please lose the music. Burt is just ok.

The music at start and end of each chapter is distracting, annoying and cheese. burt reynolds is just ok. Sounds old.

Really good Spenser novel

Story: Really good. There's a lot going on to keep folks interested. Sure, it's the same strategy, poke around until someone makes a run at you, but there are a lot of interesting facets to the story such as.. doing the right thing even if it means helping bad people, the question of children in Spenser and Susan's life, and Spenser's mortality. Performance: Some voices just didn't come across well and, at times, the pace of the narration slowed down to the point where it seemed an extra effort was needed to get the words out properly. Fortunately, that was the exception, so overall I was very pleased. Overall: Highly recommended.

Conundrum

Can anyone explain how Ellis served four years for a crime committed eighteen months ago?

Reynolds and the Book Were Excellent

Once again, Parker came through with a winner -- a fast-moving, often humorous voyage with a well-hidden ending, which, by the way, was a TV movie with Joe Montegna. There was a complaint about Burt Reynold's dropping off his endings. That was OK and perfectly in keeping with the character -- and did you notice there were no complaints about Spencer's sometimes exasperating I said's, he said's, she said's -- which are what he dropped off the most.

Small Vices

As an avid Spenser fan, I found this to be one of the best books in the series. Plenty of twists and turns, along with Spenser's dry humor throughout.

How distracting

I loved the premise of this book, as well as the execution. However, from minute one I thought the narrator was drunk or on drugs. He swallowed and slurred words, had a tone that was, at times, entirely too low to hear - and emphasized the wrong words on many occasions. I'm looking forward to my 2nd Robert B. Parker - read by someone else.