Western

(2009)3rd western following Virgil & Everett as they show up in Brimstone. They get jobs as deputy county sheriffs and bring to justice a renegade Indian and the town ?owner? who runs out all competing bars and whore houses. Virgil is reunited with Allie and they wind up with a teen age ward as they & Everett head back to Appaloosa for the final book in the series to be published later this year after Parker's death earlier.(PW)Parker's gunslinging saddle pals Virgil Cole and Everett Hitch return for their third adventure, in which the two lawmen-for-hire exchange snappy dialogue and hot lead with assorted owlhoots, deadbeats and unwashed baddies in south Texas. Here, Virgil and Everett rescue Allie French, Virgil's former sweetie who ran off to become a prostitute, and head to Brimstone, where the two gunmen sign on as deputy sheriffs. Brimstone, however, doesn't exactly provide a quiet respite for this trio. Virgil and Allie have a hard time getting over his hurt and her shame, a mysterious Indian is killing local folks and leaving taunting messages, and brutal saloon owner Pike and corrupt preacher Brother Percival are headed for a showdown. Virgil and Everett settle on a tricky solution that involves a talented tracker, a bribe, a double-cross, a noxious cloud of gun smoke and a pile of perforated bodies.

First edition as new

NOTE: This review applies to all four books written by Robert B. Parker.

I've read all of Parker's Spenser series featuring a private eye in Boston, but I'd never tackled his series of Westerns despite being a fan of the genre. I'm really glad I did! These are some of the best books I've read this year.

The series revolves around Virgil Cole, a legendary gunfighter, and his sidekick Everett Hitch, who narrates the books. In Appaloosa, Cole and Hitch end up in the town of the book's title and become the town marshals. What ensues is classic Western: a fight with a corrupt rancher, a doomed romance with a woman of questionable repute, and a final climactic showdown that sends the pair of lawmen on their separate paths, though with no animosity between them.

Resolution is the town that Hitch washes up in after he and Cole part, where he finds work as a saloon bouncer and ends up being the town's de facto marshal. Things get complicated quickly, and his old buddy Cole shows up just in time to help him get the best of the bad guys.

Brimstone is the next town on the duo's journey. They are back together and searching for Allie, the wayward woman who snared Cole in the first book, only to prove less than stalwart. They find Allie, and Cole sets out to learn whether he can forgive her trespasses. Meanwhile, he and Hitch try to head off trouble between a corrupt saloon owner and a fiery evangelist preacher.

Blue-Eyed Devil is the final book in the series, and finds the Cole/Hitch duo back in Appaloosa, the setting of the first book. Along for the ride are Allie and a young orphaned, traumatized teenager who will only talk to Cole. As if that wasn't enough trouble for one gunman, he and Hitch also have to contend with the new marshal in town and his 12-man posse and renegade Indians. ( )

The third novel in the series, Brimstone, starts on the road - Cole and Hitch are chasing after Allie. Once they locate her, they have some issues extracting her from her circumstances (and Allie being Allie does not help much) and after a few local disagreements, the 3 of them end up in the town of Brimstone, looking for a new life and for a place for Allie to get better. It looks like a quiet place - if you ignore the big church which seems to be employing some quite questionable characters and which is on the warpath with the local saloons - except for one. The fact that Cole recognizes well known gunslingers both in the church deacons' list and in the saloon that does not get chased does not make anyone feel safe.

When the church manages to close all the saloons but one and then decides to go after that one as well, things get weird. Everyone has something to win, most people have something to lose and before long our heroes are in the middle of yet another border disagreement and the guns come out. And someone in the middle of it, Allie manages to create a lot more problems - and Cole still sticks by her. It is somewhat practical - there is a young woman who needs a mother figure after being saved from abduction but Cole seems to have the same obsessive focus on his love as Spencer or Jesse Stone in the other series. Which is somewhat expected - Parker's series male leads are alike.

Whatever was ailing the dialog in the second book seems to be solved here - this one was a lot crisper that the previous book. It is not Parker at his best but it is highly readable. Onto the next one. ( )