The Enemy: A Jack Reacher Novel: 8 - Softcover

Child, Lee

Softcover

ISBN 10: 0440245990 ISBN 13: 9780440245995

Publisher: Dell, 1900

Synopsis

Jack Reacher. Hero. Loner. Soldier. Soldier's son. An elite military cop, he was one of the army's brightest stars. But in every cop's life there is one case that changes everything. For Jack Reacher, this is that case.

New Year's Day, 1990. In a North Carolina motel, a two-star general is found dead. His briefcase is missing. Nobody knows what was in it. Within minutes Reacher has his orders: Control the situation. Within hours the general's wife is murdered. Then the dominoes really start to fall.

Somewhere inside the vast worldwide fortress that is the U.S. Army, Reacher is being set up as a fall guy with the worst enemies a man can have. But Reacher won't quit. He's fighting a new kind of war-against an enemy he didn't know he had. And against a conspiracy more chilling, ingenious, and treacherous than anyone could have guessed.

About this title

Review:

Lee Child is a quiet, undemonstrative man who is phlegmatic about his success in the thriller field. The Enemy will no doubt attract the usual enthusiastic acclaim, and it deserves to. One thing that is guaranteed to please Child is the open-mouthed astonishment of American readers who learn that this writer of the most idiomatic American thrillers (with brilliantly realised US locales) is actually English. But there's never a sense of striving for effects in such taut Child novels as Killing Floor and Die Trying. Child simply delivers the goods, US-style--and The Enemy is no exception.

Child's usual protagonist, the tough and resourceful Jack Reacher, is in North Carolina on New Year's Day, 1990. Elsewhere, world-shaking events are underway, such as the tearing down of the Berlin Wall. But Jack's job as a Military Police Duty Officer has him concerned with what initially seem to be less significant happenings: a soldier has been found dead in a sleazy motel and when Jack goes to the house of the soldier (a two-star general) to inform his wife, he finds her also dead. Needless to say, events in another part of the globe are having fatal repercussions in the US, and Reacher is soon up to his neck, with the body count rising.

As a glimpse into the early life of Jack Reacher (now securely one of the most admired heroes in contemporary thriller writing), this is meat and drink to the Child aficionado. Child foregrounds characterisation in his pacy narratives, and this eighth outing for Jack has all the adrenalin-producing qualities of its predecessors. --Barry Forshaw

Review:

"A fabulously suspenseful prequel.... [Lee Child's] best so far."--Kirkus Reviews, starred review

"Textured, swift, and told in Reacher's inimitably tough voice ... Child has few peers in thrillerdom."--Publishers Weekly, starred review

"The best showcase of Child's talent to date. .... one of the best thriller writers at work."--Rocky Mountain News

"The Enemy sizzles with suspense and action. Child sets a breathless pace."--Orlando Sentinel

"A rip-roaring read from the first page to the last ."--St. Petersburg Times

"[Jack Reacher is]. . .the thinking reader's action hero a surprisingly tender combination of chess master and G.I. Joe."--Seattle Times

"Will keep you guessing until the final page."--Playboy

About this edition

• Publisher: Dell
• Publication date: 1900
• ISBN 10: 0440245990
• ISBN 13: 9780440245995
• Binding: Mass Market Paperback
• Number of pages: 496