The book
“Personal: A Jack Reacher Novel” by Lee Child (Delacorte Press, 353 pages, $28)
Lee Child’s latest book, “Personal,” recently debuted at No. 1 on the New York Times best-selling fiction list. This is Child’s 19th book featuring his deadly anti-hero Jack Reacher.
If you have read some of the other books in this series, you’ll surely know what to expect. As each book opens Reacher is often on the prowl, wandering the highways of America searching for heaven knows what. He might be hitchhiking or riding on a Greyhound bus. Reacher’s chosen modes of conveyance lend an anonymity to his mobility. He has no car, no address and no luggage, save for a toothbrush.
As “Personal” begins Reacher is on a bus bound for Seattle. He’s heard that someone just tried to assassinate the president of France. He read about it in a newspaper. It happened in Paris. A sniper took a long-range shot with a rifle and barely missed. Reacher believes that this failed attempt has “nothing to do with me.”
He picks up a discarded newspaper, a copy of the Army Times. Reacher is a former military policeman. He wants to read the obituary section.
He glances at the personal ads. In the middle of one page it reads:
“Jack Reacher call Rick Shoemaker.”
Reacher is impressed. Rick Shoemaker was a former military colleague.
He owes Shoemaker a favor, he calls him and is soon engulfed in something different from what fans of this series might expect.
Typically Reacher gets thrust into situations involving total strangers. This time he’s being drawn into an international conspiracy.
And it gets personal.
Reacher reports to a military base. He has surmised the personal ad is the handiwork of former nemesis, General O’Day. O’Day wants Reacher to find the sniper who tried to shoot the president of France. There are only five snipers in the world who could have attempted a shot from that distance. One is an American, just released from prison having served a 15-year term.
It becomes personal because Reacher was responsible for sending the American sniper to prison in the first place. “Personal” reads like a spy novel. Reacher flies to Paris with a young woman named Casey Nice.
She’s with the State Department or perhaps the CIA. We can never be sure who is who or what is what in espionage novels.
Child tosses us a few tidbits about Reacher’s past. In France we learn new things about Reacher’s mother. Most of the story unfolds in London.
Reacher and his sidekick go there searching for the American sniper.
They believe the sniper is being protected by a gang of criminals. The leaders of the Group of 8 countries will be meeting soon in London.
They must apprehend this sniper before their meeting takes place.
Some readers will expect a notorious bad guy to surface. They won’t be disappointed. In “Personal” our villain is a giant. As Reacher wages his final battle with this immense adversary we almost fear for him.
Almost. Be cautioned; Reacher can be mercilessly violent. This reviewer found his utter lack of compassion for his victims in “Personal” to be somewhat unnerving.
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