High Profile

(G.P. Putnam’s Sons, 290 pages)

JESSE Stone, police chief in the mythical harbour town of Paradise, Massachusetts, becomes the centre of unwanted attention when a famous radio talk show host is found hanging from a tree in a seaside park, three .32-calibre bullets in his chest.A national media hoard camps on Jesse’s doorstep; and the governor, a friend of the victim, barges in to demand results. But with all the enemies the victim has accumulated, Jesse has too many suspects — and too few clues.

The heat on Jesse is turned up higher when the victim’s assistant turns up dead in a Dumpster, and higher still when the autopsy shows she was carrying the married radio host’s baby.

That’s the premisf High Profile<$>, the sixth and most intricately plotted novel in Robert B. Parker’s entertaining Jesse Stone series.

Jesse, a taciturn police officer beset with alcohol and women trouble, is the most compelling character Parker has created since he introduced us to a private eye named Spenser more than 30 years ago.

In h Profile<$>, the prose is as spare and biting as ever. It’s easy to overlook how fine the writing is because Parker’s style rarely calls attention to itself, going down so easy that you can forget you are reading. His books are not so much read as inhaled.

Yet Parker nearly always does something to annoy the discerning reader.

Early in the investigation, Jesse journeys to New York City to interview the victim’s agent, his lawyer, his wife and an ex-wife. Inexplicably, he interviews them in a group in the agent’s office. It’s a mistake not even a rookie detective would make. What if they are reluctant to talk freely in front of each other? (They are.) Why give them such an easy opportunity to make their stories mesh? (They do.)

Jesse, a clever and experienced detective, would never do something that stupid.

Meanwhile, a subplot is unfolding.

As fans of the series know, Jesse is obsessed with his slutty ex-wife, Jenn, who is always popping in at inopportune moments to complicate his life. It would be nice if, after six books, Parker could give us one reason why a decent guy like Jesse loves a despicable woman who uses sex as a commodity and lies like most people breathe; but the reader must accept Jesse’s love on faith.

Meanwhile, Jesse is seeing a smart, attractive Boston private eye named Sunny Randall, the main character in another Parker series. In fact, he thinks he may love her, too.

When Jenn bursts in to declare that she has been raped, and that her rapist is now stalking her, Jesse can’t break away from his big case. So what does he do? He gets Sunny to protect her.

What? There’s not a man alive who would throw those two women together.

So, both the plot and the subplot hang on absurdities.

If the reader can suspend disbelief and accept them, however, the rest of the story is both suspenseful and entertaining.