Books like Stardust

Stardust is only two books away from the halfway point of Parker’s Spenser novels, and it wouldn’t be long before the series would begin to decline. If you would have asked me before I began my recent re-read of the series, I would have told you that is was with this book that the rot began to show. But I’ve changed my mind. Stardust is a pretty good novel.One reason I hated this book the first time around is because the character at the center of the action—Jill Joyce, the beautiful TV actress Spenser must protect, whose stalker he must identify and defuse—is a royal pain in the ass. She’s a drunk who tries to lay any man near her, not out of passion but because of a need for control, and she appears to have no brains, no memory, no emotional depth, and no capacity for loyalty or friendship. So there's that.This time through I liked the book more because I began to understand better what Parker is doing here. Parker likes to write books in which Spenser, the white knight, tries to save lost souls in trouble, and these lost souls have never been the type that grant to their savior any warm fuzzy emotional rewards. On the other hand, they are usually young people, underdogs, often defenseless, and this makes them easier to sympathize with, if not exactly to like. This time, though, I believe Parker said to himself: what if I write a novel in which Spenser's lost soul is neither young (Jill is in her late thirties, maybe older), nor an underdog (Jill is at the height of her popularity), nor defenseless (sexuality is quite a weapon, and popularity a formidable bargaining chip), and, what if, in addition, she is responsible for much of what happens to her? Now, first, how can I convince Spenser to save her?. And then— here comes the hard part—how can I convince my reader that she is worth the saving?As far as I’m concerned, Parker accomplishes these goals in Stardust. How? Well-without giving much of anything away—I’ll just say that it has much to do with a retreat to the woods and some healing involving three orphan dogs with whom Jillian Joyce has a personal historical connection.It comes very late in the novel though. In fact, it wasn’t till the penultimate page that I realized Parker had successfully worked his magic again. Well, it least the magic worked on me.