Robert B. Parker

Robert B. Parker (1932–2010) was an American crime novelist best known for creating Spenser, the wisecracking Boston private investigator at the center of 40 novels beginning with The Godwulf Manuscript (1974). He also created the Jesse Stone and Sunny Randall detective series and, starting with Appaloosa, a series of Westerns featuring Virgil Cole and Everett Hitch.

He served in the US Army in Korea and earned a PhD in English from Boston University, and in 2002 the Mystery Writers of America named him a Grand Master for his body of work.

Parker died suddenly at his writing desk in January 2010; several later Jesse Stone and Cole & Hitch novels bearing his name were completed by other authors continuing his series after his death.