any suggestions?

baconplease?

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HI Liz,

I have read some of the Harry Hole series (JO Nesbo), some Stephen King (The last one i read was Mr. Mercedes), and other stuff like that. I have read some stuff by Agatha Christie as well :) Thanks any thing would help.
 

cbenoi1

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Quebec cozies - Louise Penny (Inspecteur Gamache)
Street-smart rogue - Lee Child (Jack Reacher)
UK-style hard core - Val McDermid (Tony Hill & Carol Jordan)
Odd couple - Michael Prescott (Tess McCallum & Abby Sinclair)

On the less serious side, yet still with a Detective / Thriller story structure:

Bumbling joke - Janet Evanovich (Stephanie Plum)
Oversexed CIA assassin - John Locke (Donavan Creed)
Investigative thief - Lawrence Block (Bernie Rhodenbar)

-cb
 

cornflake

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There is no one better than Robert B. Parker.
 

pdichellis

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Police Detective mysteries: Try the Harry Bosch series by Michael Connelly. Start with The Black Echo and read the series in order. The detective ages in real time so in each year's book he is a year older, all the way to retirement.

Police Detective, thriller style: Try John Sandford's "Prey" series or his Virgil Flowers series. Most are written in the style of a thriller, with chapters alternating between hero/villain POV.

Gov't Agent thriller: Try Nelson DeMille's John Corey series. Start with Plum Island and read in order.

Private Eye Mysteries: Try some hardboiled classics from Raymond Chandler (The Big Sleep, Farewell My Lovely, The Lady in the Lake) and Dashiell Hammett (The Maltese Falcon, Red Harvest). The Elvis Cole - Joe Pike series by Robert Crais is great for mystery, action, and wise-cracking humor. For a new voice, try IQ by Joe Ide (and the follow-up Righteous, which I haven't read yet).

Hope you find some you like!
 

cornflake

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Are they all detective stories? Also which ones are must reads? Any favorites from the series? Thanks

Spenser is a PI. Spenser is THE PI; Parker is the definitive modern detective writer, the Chandler of his time, in more ways than one. The Spenser novels are a series -- a hella longitudinal series. You can pick them up kind of anyplace. They're timeless, but also somewhat a product of the time they were written (the older ones have no cell phones, and people wear suits with big lapels, heh) I think the first I read was Judas Goat, as that was the first I was given as a kid, and then went back to the beginning and went on through to wherever and bought along as he wrote the rest, and there is a longstanding continual personal plot thread to them w/re the relationships in the books, but you can pick up any and not be confused or anything. They're self-contained. It's just more rewarding if you do it right. :D

Also, just btw, Parker died a few years ago -- the last couple/few Spensers have been written by a person his sons and wife chose to take over for him. I haven't been quite able to read one yet, but I trust them; imo, from reading interviews with him and them over the years, they were a close family very invested in the work and choosing someone to do it for real; it's not a Girl with the Dragon Tattoo money grab situation.
 

cmhbob

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Parker also wrote the Jess Stone series, and that is continuing as well. Stone is a former LA cop with a drinking problem who moves east and becomes the police chief of a small resort town.
 

cornflake

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Parker also wrote the Jess Stone series, and that is continuing as well. Stone is a former LA cop with a drinking problem who moves east and becomes the police chief of a small resort town.

Sunny Randall and Cole & Hitch too, and a couple random standalones (one with Joan iirc), and he finished a Chandler, and none of them are bad, but none are Spenser. :)