“On the first day of February, the coldest day of the year so far, I took it as a very good omen that a woman I’d never met brought me a sandwich.”This may be the smartest client that Spenser has ever had because one sure way to motivate the private detective is to offer him food. It also helps if you’re hiring him to help an innocent person who got royally screwed over by powerful people because Spenser enjoys sinking his teeth into a case like that almost as much as biting into a free sandwich...

Ace Atkins does a good job capturing the feel of Robert B. Parker's Spenser books, with a straightforward plot and characters that feel authentic. In this 43rd book in the series, Spenser looks into 'for profit' jails for juveniles. The book can be read as a standalone.Robert Urich played Spenser on the vintage television series*****As the story opens a distraught mother from Blackburn, Massachusetts, armed with one of Spenser's favorite sandwiches as inducement, asks the PI to help her son Dill...

Ace Atkins has a great job of filling huge shoes of Robert B Parker in the Spenser series! Very entertaining from the get go. If you have liked the other 42 books in this series, you will enjoy this one!

“Kickback” is TripeIt is time for the estate of Robert B. Parker to give up its pursuit of the almighty dollar and let the poor man rest in peace.I have read and enjoyed every Spenser novel, and a couple of the earlier copycat books were passable, but not this one. Spenser rarely sounds like Spenser. Susan never sounds like Susan. Hawk never sounds like Hawk. The plot is confused and confusing.Atkins includes scatological humor, torture of children, gore-filled descriptions…none of which Parker

What a hoot! This was a very enjoyable romp featuring Spenser, with backup from Hawk, as he sets out to right some very wrong wrongs! Sure, Spenser's wisecracking ways can sometimes be a bit annoying, as can his relationship patter with girlfriend, Susan. Nevertheless, it's part of the package you sign up for when reading one of these novels, and taken with a grain of salt, it's fine.The story begins with a teenager, Dillon Yates, finding himself remanded to a privately funded juvenile detention...

Ace Atkins' loose plotting and preachy, topical story tropes continue to water down the iconic Spenser character. It's like a string of one-liners with after-school special morality and occasional gunplay. Even Hawk seems a bit embarrassed by the proceedings.

Oh, hey, Spenser.. *twirls lock of hair around finger*It's been awhile, how you doin'? *Joey Tribiani voice*You've hardly changed at all... *bats eyelashes*I make no apologies for my love of Spenser, not a one.

This may well be the best Spenser novel in a good long time, including many of the last books in the series that were written by Robert B. Parker himself. As most fans of crime fiction know, the series is now being written by Ace Atkins, who currently has an excellent series of his own featuring a Mississippi sheriff named Quinn Colson. This book has all the familiar touchstones of a Spenser novel, including the Boston setting; Hawk, the very dangerous sidekick; Susan, the romantic interest that...

I think I'm in the camp with the other reviewers who were unhappy with Ace Atkins' most recent take on Spenser, Boston private eye. I agree that the Parker voice seems pretty faint, and the Spenser character of timeless,solid integrity wasn't as apparent - not that he was anything but 100% for right, justice and wise-cracks. He just seemed thin and going through the motions.I also thought Atkins' depiction of Hawk was a bit tone-deaf - having Hawk, who was always a man of few words and extraordi...

This is the first of the novels that I've read after a full year's delay after catching up. I'm happy to say that it is still working, and this feels like one of the best yet.In Kickback, corrupt judges are shuffling kids off to a private prison for kickbacks without proper process and with the slightest of excuses. Spenser reacts to this about as one would expect, and helps not only his client but many others along the way.

This is a tricky one. I don't like stories about abuses of power and so the storyline rubbed me the wrong way. None wrong with the book, I just didn't like the subject matter.

Ace Atkins definitely continues carrying the torch for Robert B. Parker. If you're a Spenser fan, you'll find Kickback to be the quintessential hard-boiled Boston noir for which Robert B. Parker was known. In Kickback, juvenile offenders in a town called Blackburn are being handed harsh sentences for minor infractions, and Spenser knows something malevolent is afoot. Greed, corruption and unsavory connections work in subversive ways, and Spencer must get to the bottom of this snake-pit. Most ama...

Ace Atkins is in fine form as Spenser takes on a corrupt judge and a prison-for-profit in the town of Blackburn. If you are a minor and you step out of line in Blackburn, you will be sent to a prison that promises rehabilitation but is a study in misery and punitive punishments. Parents are forced to sign away their rights. When a single mother reaches out to Spenser he is determined to get to the bottom of the problem and if it happens to take him (and Hawk) to the beaches of Florida to uncover...

We like the Spenser series plenty well enough to add these continuations of the original Parker 39-book set by Atkins, “Kickback” herein his fourth so far. As before with these extension tales, we find mixed blessings with the minus of less humor but the plus of less Susan worship! Otherwise, the outings are satisfactory enough and reminiscent enough of Parker to please. In this latest addition, a horrible juvenile court judge is sending children to jail for months at a time for silly deeds that...

I don't care for hapless, poor children as victims. Hawk's role is marginally and minimally defined. There was no point to running back and forth between Boston & Florida. Only the ending raises the score to acceptable. 4 of 10 stars

4 Stars. There's a bit of editorial in this exciting Spenser novel. Ace Atkins, Robert B. Parker's successor in the series, is commenting through "Kickback" on private prisons, a growing phenomenon in the United States. Our P.I. is hired by a woman whose son has been sent to one of these juvenile facilities north of Boston in the hard-as-nails town of Blackburn, Massachusetts. Is this just a wrongly convicted young man? He set up a humourous but fake, and certainly this side of criminal, Twitter...

I swore I was done reading Robert B. Parker's franchise books. But I picked this one up and flipped through it, and it looked good, so I got drawn back in. I was pleasantly surprised. Ace Atkins doesn't write much like Parker, but he does write well, and he honors the characters and Parker's themes of salvation and redemption. So I'm back, and I'm okay with that. :)

Atkins best Spenser yet - definitely in the Parker style, and Hawk is back! Love the Spenser series, and so glad that Mr. Atkins is able to continue it in superb style.

I liked the previous three by Ace Atkins, but this one was terrible. For example, (view spoiler)[ what was the point of not giving a name to the boy who gets rescued at the very end? Half the book is about him and the dialogue contorts itself to avoid naming him. Leaving him nameless was clearly a deliberate creative choice, and in my opinion, a really bad one. It was as if the author was thinking I want this boy to be the personification of endurance and perseverance and never giving in - and b...

I doubt I'm the first to say that I'll never enjoy the Spenser books as written by Ace Atkins nearly as much as those by the late, great Robert B. Parker. Because of that alone, it's unlikely that any of the post-Parker books will earn 5 stars from me. But doggone it, I enjoyed this one - and I remain happy that Mr. Atkins got the nod to continue the series. But regrets? I've got a few, starting with a more subdued Susan - private investigator Spenser's main (make that only) - squeeze. And then