Bill's Book Series


Jack Reacher Novels

Author: Andrew Child,Lee Child

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For my second blog I wanted to move the action from Britain to the USA. I will be writing a lot about British books as I am a big fan of Scottish and Irish noir (not sure if that is a real genre or I made it up but it will seem apt if you read the books) and, being from Britain, I have read a lot of British authors. So, I thought it would even things out a bit if I selected an American protagonist even though, by pure coincidence, Lee Child is a Brit (a fact I didn't know until very recently).

Spoiler alert...for those of you who don't know yet, Lee Child is no longer writing the Jack Reacher novels and has passed the mantle to his brother Andrew. Actually, I don't know exactly when the transition is occurring or if it has already occurred. The latest book in the series, The Sentinel, out now but yet to be read by yours truly, is credited as being written by both Lee and Andrew. To add to the confusion, Lee's name is in a larger font.

Lee Child started writing this series in 1997 and has written a novel a year since then. Jack Reacher is a larger than life character in more ways than one. He is a retired Military Police major who spent many years tracking down and subduing big-assed perpetrators who were trained to kill, so immediately you'd put your money on him in a donnybrook. He is also 6' 5" in his stockinged feet, 250lbs of toned muscle, has an internal clock that can tell time almost to the second, can analyze situations and predict outcomes like a chess grandmaster, has supernatural animalistic hearing, choreographs a fight better than a WWE promoter, is violent but only when absolutely necessary, has an acute sense of justice, doesn't have a permanent address preferring instead to stay on the move, lives off the grid in hotels and buses and sometimes jail, doesn't own anything other than what he can carry in his backpack and a bank account into which his military pension is paid, cannot walk away when he senses something is not right, and can get into trouble just by sitting on a park bench. In short, he is a capeless caped crusader without trying to be.

I exaggerate slightly but only very slightly. From the description above you might think of him as someone out of a marvel comic but Lee Child has somehow managed to keep him on the credible side of incredulity. It may be because we all secretly want a hero like Jack Reacher who can smash through the bullshit of real life, get to the crux of the problem and fix it in just the right way to satisfy our sense of justice and morality. Or it could be the way the author walks us through Reacher's reasoning and logical train of thought that makes us believe there is only one solution to the problem and it is Jack's way.

Either way, the books are addictive and difficult to put down. I warn you, if you want to read yourself to sleep do not try it with these books. Many a morning I have woken less than refreshed with my Fitbit telling me, "Yes, you did go to bed at 11:00 PM but you didn't fall asleep until 2:00 AM you idiot. Put the book down and nobody will get hurt."

Most of the stories start with him either hitch hiking into a small town, rolling into a small town on a bus or, on one occasion, just sitting on a bus when trouble somehow finds him. It be may something that someone says, the way somebody looks, he might see something suspicious along the way, someone who should know a lot better might looks at him the wrong way, or the local constabulary might think he looks suspicious (after all, in certain areas of the country he would be classed as a vagrant, arrested and run out of town). Regardless how it starts, escalation will occur and blood will spill and Jack Reacher will make it all right in the end. Along the way you can almost guarantee that he will be set upon by the local tough guys whose safety in numbers routine (at 6' 5" and 250 lbs would you challenge him one-on-one?) seriously backfires. It's all good fun and usually very exciting.

Given that almost fantastical nature of Jack Reacher, I was shocked when the 5' 7" big nosed Tom Cruise was cast in the role of the 6' 5" colossus who is Jack Reacher. I was even more shocked when I watched the movies and really enjoyed them. Maybe they stood Cruise on a box in every scene to disguise his height but there was no way they could bulk him up to the large framed superhuman I was expecting but somehow it worked. In my opinion, the size of Tom Cruise actually made Jack Reacher a far more believable character and ensured that the movies, like the books, stayed in the realm of believability.

There is no doubt that Jack Reacher has stepped beyond what is conventionally legal in the pursuit of justice (that's an understatement). He appears to live outside of the law but because he has no fixed abode and the reports of his against-all-the-odds achievements have reached almost mythical proportions, he appears to be a ghost to many in law enforcement. This has led to a very interesting spin-off series which I have just discovered and not yet had the pleasure of reading. Diane Capri has written what appears to be at least 14 books in a series called Hunt for Jack Reacher. Lee Child has endorsed them saying, "Intricate and ingenious. Make some coffee. You will read all night", so I suspect they will be good. She may be a friend of Lee Child but I need to do a bit more research. If you know more than I do feel free to reply and fill me in.

Anyway, the Lee Child Jack Reacher series has spent a lot of time on the best sellers lists so I am sure you will enjoy them. If you have not read them yet, I hope this review has sparked your interest. Feel free to send me your thoughts as a reply below.

Happy reading!



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