THE HAUL

There aren’t many things that keep me away from browsing for books at Abids on Sundays. One of them is a fever and the other, not surprisingly, is the family. This Sunday it wasn’t a fever that kept me away from Abids but the family. To be precise, they wanted to go on a trip somewhere far from Hyderabad and that too on a Sunday. Since it had been quite a long time that I had been out of the city I agreed reluctantly and off we went to Vemulawada which is that the next post might be about.

Robert B Parker is one heck of a crime writer. I wouldn’t have known it sooner had I not packed his ‘Chance’ for the trip to Vemulawada on Sunday. I hadn’t planned to read it right away after I had picked up the book only last month. But now I am glad I did not let it remain on the shelf for ages and took it out to read last Sunday. It was so riveting that I couldn’t put it down. Normally while on trips I wouldn’t do anything other than staring out through the window at the scenery passing by but on this trip I read. All through the four hour journey to Vemulawada and again on the return trip to Hyderabad I sat reading the fantastic book. I felt like I was reading one of Elmore Leonard’s books with crackling dialogue and fast action.

After I finished reading ‘Chance’ I wanted to check out his other books in the Spenser series. I read that Robert B Parker had written in all thirty seven novels featuring Spenser, the Private Investigator. Sometime back at a bookstore I had spotted a Spenser book so no sooner had I landed at Hyderabad the first thing I did the next day was to hare off to the bookstore. I found, not one but three Spenser books- ‘The Widening Gyre,’ ‘Hugger Mugger’ and ‘Pot Shot.’ Of these, Hugger Mugger was the least priced so I picked it up though I wanted to buy all three. However eager I am I do not plan to read it right away but will allow at least a week to pass by before I take out the book and read it.

I am terribly pleased by my mongrel tastes in books because I have managed to find another great crime writer who many put in the same league as Raymond Chandler and others. Here’s what the blurbs on ‘Hugger Mugger’ say :

‘A winner… the famous dialogue is polished to a high shine…terrific’- Kirkus Reviews

‘His one-liners are so sharp you could slice salami with them. Bottomline: in the winners circle’- People

‘The snappy back-and-forth dialogue and rimshot wisecracks are here in abundance’- Chicago Tribune

Now the visits to Abids and second hand bookstore will acquire a sharper suspense, to see if I can find any Robert B Parker title featuring Spenser