From a helicopter high above the empty California desert, a man is sent free-falling into the night…. In Chicago, a woman learns that an elite team of ex–army investigators is being hunted down one by one.... And on the streets of Portland, Jack Reacher — soldier, cop, hero — is pulled out of his wandering life by a code that few other people could understand. From the first shocking scenes in Lee Child’s explosive new novel, Jack Reacher is plunged like a knife into the heart of a conspiracy ...
And so are we. Plunged into the action from the spectacular first chapter of Bad Luck and Trouble. From then on, there's no looking back. The book boasts excellent action scenes and Child's detailed writing does not detract from the enjoyment.
This is my third Lee Childs. And the Reacher I'd read before this one had already won my approval.
The Wikipedia entry, for Bad Luck and Trouble, has some engaging trivia on the book - a must for Reacher aficionados. Jack Reacher is Child's protagonist for a series featuring this singular man's various adventures. Jack's family, if any, is, effectively, the army.
Recently, I read another Jack Reacher, The Enemy, which was not as enthralling as this one, where I learned about and met his mother and brother. However, in Bad Luck and Trouble, it's to the aid of his ex-comrades from the army that he rushes. All it took was a mere sequence of numbers.
This Reacher is not one of his usual lone wolf stories. While it's true that a Reacher story usually has him teaming up with someone, often a lady, in this novel, it's almost like one of those J. T. Edsons where different members of the cowboy hero's extended family come together, from diverse parts of the country, to bring the villain/villains to justice.
Of course, there's the lady with whom Reacher will sleep in the course of the book - but that's part of the Reacher format, in any case. Here, however, we have two women in the team but no orgies! One of the reasons I do like my Lee Childs is that the author does the fairly decent thing in how he portrays the female actors in the dramas.
A part of the Reacher charm is the reflection of some of the author's life philosophies - some that he appears to try to live and others that he perhaps upholds. Thus, Reacher is not bound by the fetters with which most of us in today's world are chained: roots, credit cards and other such. It is said that Lee Child also follows some of that banking advice. However, while Child has used his earnings from the books to live well and has property, Reacher is like an Indian sadhu - free of all attachments.
 |
| "Lee Child, Bouchercon 2010" by Mark Coggins. Licensed under CC BY 2.0 via Commons - https://wiki2.org/en/File:Lee_Child,_Bouchercon_2010.jpg#/media/File:Lee_Child,_Bouchercon_2010.jpg |
Apparently, the title is taken from a song:
Albert King, Stevie Ray Vaughan - Born Under a Bad Sign
The very title holds promise - what can be worse than bad luck? Bad luck and trouble!
No comments:
Post a Comment