When you read Sixkill, Robert B. Parker's death is never far out of mind. This is his last Spenser novel. Ironically, in this book, one of the most powerful characters, Hawk, Spenser's best friend and extremely effective colleague is absent from the action, off on a mission in Asia, nowhere to be found. Instead Spenser meets a man who needs his help, a Cree named Zebulon Sixkill, an out of shape bodyguard who never really learned how to fight, a man who pops pills and drinks too much and is employed by an unpleasant celebrity who may have killed a girl.
Spenser becomes a mentor to Zebulon. It's similar to Early Autumn where Spenser has found someone who needs guidance and wants to learn. Spenser teaches Z. how to train and how to fight. When it becomes clear that Spenser is in a very dangerous situation, Z. is there to help him.
I think Parker was very smart in this book to make repeated references to the fact that Z., as he grows into himself, actually sounds a lot like Spenser. This has been a complaint of Parker's books, that, for example, Sunny Randall seems really to be just Spenser in a dress. I personally don't care if the way they speak or the way they talk does sound the same. It's like a Van Morrison song. If it's something you love, you just want to hear it as much as you can.
The book made me sad, because there was so much talk in it about Spenser's mortality. There was a heightened sense in this book that he really did put himself in danger with his work and that death was a real possibility. I felt sad, because I really did like the character of Z. I would have liked to see how Parker would have included him in future books. I would have wanted to see how he and Hawk would have gotten along.
It was shocking to me when Parker died. I wonder what he knew. The final pages of this book feel so much like a creative ending. They're beautiful and they made me cry. Perhaps it's just pure coincidence, but it felt like the perfect conclusion to a story that I wanted never to end.
