Line #53 Literature/CharlieParkerSeries


1	[[quoteright:300:https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/charlie_parker.jpg]]
2
3	An ongoing series of best-selling supernatural/horror/mystery novels by Irish author Creator/JohnConnolly, following the eponymous detective after the horrific murders of his wife and daughter.
4
5	Novels in the series to date:
6
7	* ''Every Dead Thing'' (1999)
8	* ''Dark Hollow'' (2000)
9	* ''The Killing Kind'' (2001)
10	* ''The White Road'' (2002)
11	* ''The Black Angel'' (2005)
12	* ''The Unquiet'' (2007)
13	* ''The Reapers'' (2008)
14	* ''The Lovers'' (2009)
15	* ''The Whisperers'' (2010)
16	* ''The Burning Soul'' (2011)
17	* ''The Wrath of Angels'' (2012)
18	* ''The Wolf in Winter'' (2014)
19	* ''A Song of Shadows'' (2015)
20	* ''A Time of Torment'' (2016)
21	* ''A Game of Ghosts'' (2017)
22	* ''The Woman in the Woods'' (2018)
23	* ''A Book of Bones'' (2019)
24	* ''The Dirty South'' (2020)
25
26	A novella, "The Reflecting Eye", is printed in Connolly's horror story anthology ''Nocturnes''. It is set between ''The White Road'' and ''The Black Angel'', and introduces a character who would go on to become an important part of the Parker mythology.
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28	There is also another novel, ''Bad Men'', set in the same universe that includes a brief cameo by Parker, and some of the survivors from ''Bad Men'' go on to become supporting characters in the Parker novels. See the Creator/JohnConnolly page for tropes relating to that book.
29
30	In 2019, ''A Book of Bones'' incorporates characters and events from Connolly's (initially stand-alone) 2013 novella "The Wanderer in Unknown Realms" into the Parker continuity. WordOfGod confirms that "The Wanderer in Unknown Realms" takes place in the same continuity as Connolly's other non-Parker novel, ''Literature/TheBookOfLostThings''... meaning that pretty much everything he's ever written now takes place in one big extended universe.
31
32	In 2020, due to the postponement of ''The Dirty South'' amid the coronavirus pandemic, Connolly began releasing a new Parker novella in short daily chapters via his website. "The Sisters Strange" was released at a rate of 600-700 words a day, beginning April 2.
33
34	The stories are often influenced by Judeo-Christian traditions, with later books also drawing on old English and colonial mythologies. Expect a cracking supporting cast, NightmareFuel, GreyAndGreyMorality, musings on good/evil and right/wrong, [[DeadpanSnarker snark]], DescriptionPorn, dead children, [[CreepyChild creepy children]], Maine, and political agendas.
35
36	The [[Characters/CharlieParkerSeries Character Page]] is under construction.
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38
39	Nothing to do with the musician Music/CharlieParker.
40
41	!!Examples:
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43	* AbusiveParents: Angel's father is never stated to have laid a finger on him [[spoiler: but he sold him to paedophiles for booze money for eight years]].
44	* ActionFilmQuietDramaScene
45	* AloofAlly: Walter Cole. The Collector is possibly beginning to settle into this as well, and it is implied that Louis occupied this role before the beginning of the series.
46	* AlwaysCamp: Decorators, as hinted at in The White Road
47	->He looked like a runway model for a decorator’s convention, assuming that the decorator’s tastes veered towards five-six, semi-retired gay burglars. Now that I thought about it, when I lived in East Village there were any number of decorators whose tastes veered in that direction
48	* [[AntiHero Anti-Hero]]
49	* AtonementDetective: Parker is the embodiment of this trope. [[spoiler:The Black Angel suggests that this is the whole reason for Parker's ''existence'' in-universe. He is one of the angels the fell from heaven after Lucifer's revolt, but rather than descending to hell, he became stranded on earth, spending his many lifetimes helping others - dead and alive - in penance for his sins. However, the ending of ''The Wrath of Angels'' seems to refute this theory - according to various in-universe authorities there ''is'' a fallen angel present in the series recurring cast, but it isn't Charlie.]]
50	* {{Backstory}}: Buckets of it. Especially in earlier books, characters would be introduced with pages and pages of it only to be killed off almost immediately. Various characters backstories also frequently inform the plot of the novels, such as in ''The Reapers'' and ''The Lovers''.
51	* BaddieFlattery: Subverted. Parker delights in talking to the bad guys like this.
52	* BattleCouple: Louis and Angel, especially when they're required to play the BigDamnHeroes to Parker.
53	* BetaCouple: Angel and Louis to Charlie and Rachel, with additional support from Walter and Ellen Cole in the first couple of books. Overlaps at times with ShipperOnDeck, as they all at some point or another encourage Charlie to pursue his relationship with Rachel. Later, [[spoiler: after Charlie and Rachel break up, Angel and Louis spend a couple of books trying to encourage him to get with Sharon. As of late, they're pretty much shipping Charlie/any female character who has more than two lines of dialogue. Seems everyone's pretty worried about him...]]
54	* BewareTheNiceOnes: Angel (it's in the name) and Rachel. [[spoiler:Especially pregnant Rachel.]]
55	* BigDamnHeroes: Louis, usually accompanied by Angel. The Reapers puts Parker into the role.
56	* BlackKnight: Parker, although he doesn't like it. Louis is a purer example.
57	* BlondeBrunetteRedhead: Susan, Sharon and Rachel or Susan, Aimee and Rachel. [[spoiler: Fan and author opinion seems equally divided on whether Charlie's next love interest will be Sharon or Aimee, but either way, he's working his way through this trope.]]
58	* BodyHorror: What the Travelling Man does to his victims. Brightwell's goitre. [[spoiler: The book made from human skin in ''The Killing Kind'', complete with freckles, moles, tattoos, scars, navels... and, almost, the skin off Angel's back.]]
59	* {{Bookworm}}: Arno in ''The Reapers'', Earl in ''The Whisperers''.
60	* BoundAndGagged: And ''tortured'' in The Whisperers.
61	* BreakTheBadass: [[spoiler:Angel in The Killing Kind]]
62	* BreakTheCutie: [[spoiler:Rachel, in a process that is drawn out across five books.]]
63	* BreatherEpisode: ''The Killing Kind'' has shades of this - while the central mystery is easily as horrifying as those featured in the other books, the four main characters' personal lives are as happy and uneventful as they get at any point in the series. That is, until the last fifty pages or so, [[spoiler: when Angel gets gruesomely tortured and Rachel discovers she's accidentally become pregnant.]]
64	** ''The Whisperers'' and ''The Burning Soul'' are more like actual breather episodes within the series. Again, the crimes being investigated are just as horrific as ever, but in both books Charlie is investigating cases he's actually been hired to look in to, which have nothing to do with the main characters or their ongoing story arcs. In fact Louis, Angel and Rachel barely appear in either book beyond their obligatory cameos, putting the emphasis strongly on Charlie investigating cases professionally that don't have much of a personal impact.
65	* TheCameo: Charlie Parker makes one in ''Bad Men'', Connolly's only non-Parker crime/thriller to date. Sharon Macy (the lead detective from ''Bad Men'') returns the favour in the eighth Parker novel, ''The Lovers'' [[spoiler: and is implied to be Charlie's new love interest, although at the time of writing this seems to have lapsed into an AbortedArc]].
66	* CantBatheWithoutAWeapon: Louis.
67	* CareerRevealingTrait: Early in ''The Unquiet,'' a minor character by the name of Dave "The Guesser" Glovsky makes a comfortable living by wagering tourists that he can guess things like their weight, choice of car or occupation. Observant by nature, the Guesser accomplishes the latter by looking for distinctive signs on the punters, providing a paragraph of tells to look out for: accountants and typists have a slight flattening of the fingertips, chefs have tiny burns and scars on their hands, and so on. It's for this reason that the Guesser swiftly recognizes that his current customer has spent much of his adult life killing people and is immediately nervous.
68	* CargoShip: [[invoked]] Angel speculates about Earl and Arnie's relationships with the cars they work on.
69	* CasualDangerDialogue
70	* ChuckCunninghamSyndrome: Charlie's dog Walter disappears around the time of ''The Unquiet'', and no mention of him is made for five books until ''The Wrath of Angels'', where he's only spoken of in passing with no explanation for his absence. [[spoiler: Charlie leaves him with Rachel and Sam in Chapter 8 of The Lovers, realising his regular absences were not fair on the dog.]]
71	* CloudCuckooLander: Parker is particularly prone to this.
72	* CollectorOfTheStrange: The Collector. Duh.
73	* CommutingOnABus: Angel and Louis have seen significantly less screen-time ever since The Reapers, whereas previously they were a constant background presence.
74	* ContinuityCameo: Macy from ''Bad Men'' makes her first appearance here in ''The Lovers''.
75	* CoolCar: Parker's Mustangs, possibly the Lexus (the mini-arsenal hidden beneath the spare tyre might help).
76	* ContractOnTheHitman: Bliss.
77	* [[CrazyCatLady Crazy Dog Lady]]: Mrs Bondarchuck.
78	* CreepyChild: Jennifer
79	* CreepyDoll: in some cover art for ''The Unquiet.''
80	* CurseCutShort: Louis mutters "mother-" in ''The Black Angel'', winning bonus points for not actually being interrupted by anything.
81	* DarkAndTroubledPast: And then some!
82	* ADayInTheLimelight: ''The Reapers'' focuses on Louis and Angel, although it's solely Louis's back story that's developed and which influences the present day plot. Meanwhile, Parker takes on [[BigDamnHeroes their usual role]] among the supporting characters. Connolly hinted that he might one day give Angel a similar treatment, but nothing official has been announced yet.
83	** ''The Wolf in Winter'' [[spoiler:has Charlie shot multiple times and left in a coma at around the halfway mark; he's still not woken up at the end of the book. Aside from a couple of scenes in his dream world, the novel switches to third person and follows several groups of secondary characters from then on: primarily Louis and Angel, but also Epstein, Macy, The Collector, and the residents of Prosperous.]]
84	* [[CynicismCatalyst Dead Little Sister]]: Alice to Louis in ''The Black Angel''. Though she's actually his cousin, they were raised together and this trope definitely applies to his actions following her death.
85	* DeadpanSnarker: Louis
86	* DeathByOriginStory: Charlie's wife and daughter. Louis's mother and his (unacknowledged) father.
87	* DescriptionPorn: Endless descriptions of the Maine landscapes, especially in winter. One memorable description of [[Administrivia/TropesAreTools Louis' naked torso]]. Description of torture and death intended to strike fear into the hearts of the hero/villain.
88	* DirtyBusiness
89	* DirtyCop: they pop up every now and then, but most notably Parker himself fit the bill in ''Every Dead Thing''.
90	* DoomMagnet: Charlie being one of these is basically the main drive behind the series. Louis is one as well, to a lesser extent.
91	* DumbMuscle: Tony and Paulie Fulci, Jackie Garner, The Klan Killer(s).
92	* EarlyInstallmentWeirdness: The extreme violence present in the early books is missing from later books. This is done quite subtly though and isn't really noticeably unless read out-of-order.
93	** Louis and Angel are very different in the first couple of books. Louis is far more intimidating and barely speaks, Angel is more confident and happy-go-lucky [[spoiler: although certain events in ''The Killing Kind'' justify changes in his personality]]. It's difficult to imagine Louis in later books insisting on wearing a cowboy hat, in any circumstance. They flirt with each other, are described as "boyfriends" rather than "partners" and are generally a far more normal couple than later books make them out to be. ''Every Dead Thing'' also states they'd been together ten years at that point. ''The White Road'', set a few years later, says they've been together six.
94	* EldritchAbomination: The thing living under Prosperous in ''The Wolf in Winter''.
95	* EmbarrassingNickname: Bird
96	* EvenBadMenLoveTheirMamas: Jackie Garner, the Fulcis.
97	* FirstEpisodeTwist: Charlie begins to develop his supernatural powers (primarily in the form of ISeeDeadPeople) after meeting Tante Marie Aguillard in ''Every Dead Thing'', who [[PassingTheTorch passes on the "gift" to him]] [[spoiler: just hours before she is murdered]].
98	* FlawExploitation: Notable in that Louis is aware of his "flaw", his love for Angel. However, while this comes up occasionally in the narrative, it is only relevant in one scene in which Louis doesn't even appear. [[spoiler: The BigBad took Angel at the end of The Killing Kind in order to hurt Parker, not Louis. He probably wasn't even aware of the inevitable consequences of his act.]]
99	* FreudianExcuse: Parker had never killed a man before the death of his wife and child. Angel’s first every burglary was the result of [[spoiler:child abuse]] and Louis only became an assassin only after [[spoiler:killing the man who murdered his mother]].
100	* FreudianTrio: Parker (ego), Angel (id) and Louis (superego).
101	* FriendlessBackground
102	* FriendToAllChildren: Parker, due to his daughter's death. Lampshaded on a couple of occasions. Angel as well, to an extent. [[spoiler: particularly to children who have been sexually abused, as it relates heavily to his own childhood]]
103	* FriendOnTheForce: Walter Cole, SAC Ross.
104	* GentleGiant: Bear in ''The Killing Kind''
105	* HeKnowsTooMuch: Cebert Yaken and Virgil Gossard in The White Road. Scary in that it is invoked by the ''protagonists''. Although thankfully for them both, they get away with a stern warning.
106	* HeroicBSOD: Parker's state of mind at the start of the series.
107	* HighHopesZeroTalent: Angel's career as a burglar.
108	* TheInformant: Angel acted as Charlie's informant prior to the beginning of the series, when Charlie was still with NYPD and Angel was still actively involved in B&E work.
109	* KidsAreCruel: ''Louis'' was bullied in school.
110	* LameComeback: This gem from Every Dead Thing:
111	->'''Louis:''' Says the guy with a towel on his dick.
112	->'''Angel:''' It's a big towel.
113	* LetsGetDangerous: Played with. Louis and Angel are the primary comic relief characters, but their general badassery and Louis' love of ammunitions means that as often as not they wind up saving the day.
114	* PoliceBrutality
115	* PosthumousCharacter: Susan and Jennifer
116	* PrisonRape: [[spoiler: Angel's backstory]]
117	* PutOnABus: [[spoiler:Rachel and Sam]]
118	* IWantToBeARealMan: Angel played this for laughs in earlier books.
119	->"It's a guy thing. I can do guy things."
120	* ImpersonatingAnOfficer: Louis gains the trust of a possibly witness in Every Dead Thing by flashing his gym membership.
121	* IncrediblyObviousTail: pops up regularly
122	* InsanityDefence: Faulkner invokes this with a suicide attempt.
123	* MacGyvering: Louis uses grain, rags and spare shotgun clips to blow up a barn, killing their immediate pursuers with the unintentional bonus of allowing their [[BigDamnHeroes rescuers]] to find them.
124	* MauveShirt: [[spoiler: Willie Brew]] and [[spoiler: Jackie Garner]].
125	* MirrorScare: The Grady house in The Reflecting Eye is this dialled up to eleven.
126	* MurdererPOV: It doesn't help that the good guys ddo almost as much killing as the bad guys.
127	* NeatFreak: Louis
128	* NobleBigotWithABadge: [[spoiler:Hanson. Although it takes a while for the "noble" part of the trope to come into effect.]]
129	* OOCIsSeriousBusiness: ''The White Road'' opens with Angel and Louis hunting down the men who lynched Louis' (probable) father. Angel kills an unarmed man in cold blood. Out of the main trio, Angel has always been the one least likely to kill, only doing so when lives depend on it. This murder is a sign of how much he's hurting after the events of ''The Killing Kind''.
130	* OppositesAttract
131	* OneHeadTaller: Louis and Angel
132	* OnlyOneName: Angel, Louis, Brightwell, Blue, Bliss, Gabriel, Golem, Kittim, Bear...
133	* ThePromise: Set up in The Reapers, when Louis promises Angel that they will “deal with [the Russians] when the time comes”. Whether or not it will ever be carried out remains to be seen.
134	* RapeAsBackstory: [[spoiler:Angel]] was sold into prostitution by his father between the ages of eight and fourteen; his feelings of pain and betrayal are recounted in some of the [[TearJerker most heartbreaking]] flashbacks in the entire series.
135	** Furthermore, this directly leads him into the life of crime which has him repeatedly incarcerated as an adult; during his final stint in prison, he attracts the attentions of a truly psychotic serial rapist and murderer - it's left vague as to whether he ever actually succeeds in raping him, but he does attempt to murder [[spoiler: Angel]] at least once when he fights back, and [[DrivenToSuicide nearly drives him to suicide]] through fear and desperation. [[spoiler: It's Charlie's intervention to help Angel escape his abuser (by arranging to have the guy murdered) that cements their friendship as something more than a professional cop/informer dynamic.]]
136	* ARealManIsAKiller: Deber's death is hinted to be this for Louis.
137	* SelectiveSlaughter: Louis agreed to work as an assassin for Gabriel on the condition that he would never have to kill a woman.
138	** Leads to an interesting moment in ''The Reapers'' when Louis and Charlie both hesitate before shooting the female villain [[spoiler:who just fatally shot Willie Brew and is about to shoot Louis]], leaving Angel - who is the least inclined towards violence in general, and the only one of the three who gets no enjoyment from it - as the only one who can bring himself to kill a woman if the situation calls for it.
139	* SpellMyNameWithAThe: The Collector
140	* TalkAboutTheWeather: Angel does this in The Reapers, while being chased down by an assassin who is out for Louis' blood.
141	* TalkingToTheDead
142	* TalkingYourWayOut: Presumably how Angel survived his first encounter with Louis.
143	* TellMeAboutMyFather: The Lovers revolves around this trope.
144	* TermsOfEndangerment: Parker has a tendency to do this, somewhat irking his enemies.
145	* ThemeNaming
146	* ThereAreNoCoincidences: "The honeycomb world", a recurring motif.
147	* ThoseTwoGuys: The series dynamic sometimes seems to run on these pairings:
148	** Louis and Angel, obviously.
149	** Jackie Garner and the Fulci twins would be Those Three Guys. The Fulci twins also provide this on their own sometimes, particularly after [[spoiler:Jackie's death in ''The Wrath of Angels'']].
150	** Willie Brew and Arno are a platonic version of the Louis and Angel dynamic up until [[spoiler:Willie dies in ''The Reapers'']].
151	* UndyingLoyalty: Angel (and Louis, by extension) to Parker. Louis to Gabriel.
152	* TheUnSmile: Happens on the rare occasions when Louis attempts a smile. Even Angel describes it as looking more like a brief facial spasm or seizure. To people who are already afraid of him (in other words, most people who aren't Angel or Charlie) it's even more unnerving.
153	* WalkingDisasterArea: No-one exactly has an easy time of it in these books, but Charlie and Angel have both spent their entire lives getting kidnapped and tortured at regular intervals. In Angel's case it's occasionally PlayedForLaughs too though, with his perpetually dishevelled appearance and terrible fashion choices treated as an example of this trope.
154	* WeDoNotKnowEachOther: The first types is frequently invoked, particularly with Parker, Louis and Angel. The second type is played for laughs [[spoiler:at Sam's Christening in The Black Angel]] when Louis pretends not to know Angel, who insists on following him around and talking to him - at the time Angel is wearing a suit so terrible that even casual bystanders are embarrassed.
155	* WeNamedTheMonkeyJack: Charlie's dog Walter, whom he claims to have named after his old friend Walter Cole. No reason is given, although it's presumably affectionate, perhaps done because Walter is one of the few friends Charlie has left at the time he acquires the dog (and possibly the only one he's able to admit to knowing in public). In ''The Wrath of Angels'', it's briefly mentioned that Cole still hasn't forgiven Charlie for naming the dog after him.
156	** Considering that Walter the Dog being named after Walter Cole was only mentioned several books after the fact, and that Walter Cole doesn't appear in the same book where the dog is introduced, it's even possible that it's a back-formation based on an unintentional duplication of the name, with Connolly explaining away why he broke the OneSteveLimit.

Context Literature / CharlieParkerSeries