Worth Dying For by Lee Child

THE #1 NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLING JACK REACHER SERIES • Don’t miss the hit streaming series Reacher! A heart-racing page-turner that hits the ground running and then accelerates all the way to a colossal showdown “Jack Reacher is the coolest continuing series character now on offer.”—Stephen King, in Entertainment Weekly There’s deadly trouble in the corn country of Nebraska . . . and Jack Reacher walks right into it. First he falls foul of the Duncans, a local clan that has terrified an entire county into submission. But it’s the unsolved case of a missing child, already decades old, that Reacher can’t let go. The Duncans want Reacher gone—and it’s not just past secrets they’re trying to hide. They’re awaiting a secret shipment that’s already late—and they have the kind of customers no one can afford to annoy. For as dangerous as the Duncans are, they’re just the bottom of a criminal food chain stretching halfway around the world. For Reacher, it would have made much more sense to keep on going, to put some distance between himself and the hard-core trouble that’s bearing down on him. For Reacher, that was also impossible.

I have literary pretensions. I've got bookshelves full of high-falutin' stuff, and I wouldn't be seen dead in the same room as a Dan Brown novel. But every time I pick up a Lee Child I'm hooked. I simply cannot put it down until Jack has taken down the very last bad-ass. As with any of the Reacher books Worth Dying For has holes you can pick at should you be so inclined, but to hell with all that. I don't care. I'm on board for the whole crazy ride. I know exactly why I like these books so much. It's because, deep down, I wish I was Jack Reacher.

At the end of a harrying week, there's not much better than settling down to read about Jack Reacher kicking whatever, taking names, and meting out justice.

The last couple of novels have been a little more on the cerebral side for Reacher (not that they haven't had plenty of violence), which is fine – Reacher's more than just brawn, he's got a brain. But by page 43 of this book when the first fight (well, the first real) starts you can tell this us going to be a lot different than the last couple of books, there's going to be a good deal of violence, and the reader's blood is going to be pumping a lot. And wow, is there a lot of fighting going on – I haven't kept notes or anything, but I don't remember as much hand-to-hand fighting in a Reacher book in ages – if ever. Well-exectued by both Child and Reacher, I should add.

There is a misunderstanding involving one representative of the for parties that Reacher is up against here. The kind of misunderstanding that would make classic sit-com fodder, but here serves to ratchet up the paranoia and mutual suspicions between the parties. I had a lot of fun watching how one chance encounter and a million to one happening unravels something that really could've taken Reacher down, particularly in his weakened condition.

That weakened condition is one of the best things about this book – there's a strong link between Worth Dying For and [b:61 Hours|6977769|61 Hours (Jack Reacher, #14)|Lee Child|http://d202m5krfqbpi5.cloudfront.net/books/1320512665s/6977769.jpg|6932011], the strongest since [b:Tripwire|220970|Tripwire (Jack Reacher, #3)|Lee Child|http://d202m5krfqbpi5.cloudfront.net/books/1309280265s/220970.jpg|1383273] and [b:Running Blind|455925|Running Blind (Jack Reacher, #4)|Lee Child|http://d202m5krfqbpi5.cloudfront.net/books/1174926706s/455925.jpg|694428] – 11 books back – and, from what I've learned from a couple of TV interviews, this link continues in his latest, [b:Never Go Back|17262159|Never Go Back (Jack Reacher, #18)|Lee Child|http://d202m5krfqbpi5.cloudfront.net/books/1367779855s/17262159.jpg|23756807] (further incentive, not that I need it, to catch up with this series). His body is still recovering from the trauma endured, and his mind is set on the officer who's taken his old position. I really appreciated that, it's good to see that these aren't just random adventures, but there's some continuity at work here, even if the novels are completely stand-alone in nature.

The villains at the center of this mess are probably the vilest that Child has yet cooked up – and that's saying something. Once everything about their criminal activities is revealed, you're more than ready for Reacher to do his thing. Which he – naturally – does with aplomb and efficiency.

Take your blood pressure meds, get in your comfy chair and kick back for a heck of a read.

[b:Worth Dying For 8357992 Worth Dying For (Jack Reacher, #15) Lee Child https://d.gr-assets.com/books/1356095648s/8357992.jpg 13212200], the 15th Jack Reacher novel, picks up shortly after the events of [b:61 Hours 6977769 61 Hours (Jack Reacher, #14) Lee Child https://d.gr-assets.com/books/1320512665s/6977769.jpg 6932011]. Reacher still hasn't physically recovered from those explosive events when he finds himself deep in a new set of problems.It all starts simply enough. Reacher is making his way across Nebraska and stops at a remote Motel. He aids an abused woman and in the process runs afoul of the Duncans, who seem to rule this part of the Nebraska corn country. It soon becomes apparent that something evil is going on. The Duncans use local muscle to get rid of Reacher, or rather they try to. (As anyone who has read any Jack Reacher books knows, he is very very hard to get rid of.)Reacher soon finds himself fighting to survive against not only the local muscle, but also three sets of out-of-state gangsters, which just makes the mystery deeper. Why are all these thugs interested in this remote stretch of Nebraska? There is a deep secret here, and Reacher is just the man to dig it out.Lee Chile surprised me several times in this book as the story took unexpected turns.Good story.

Vacation reads #2
Trigger warning for child rape/torture/murder. Nothing “on screen” but the implications of the reveal were so horrifying I had to read something else for a good while before I went to sleep. I was only reading this because of the ending of the last one and wish I hadn't.