The Enemy (Jack Reacher, No. 8)
by Lee Child
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Book Reviews of The Enemy (Jack Reacher, No. 8)
Book Review: Child's Reacher exceeds his grasp
Summary: 2 Stars
Although I don't normally read in this genre, I have to say that Child's work is strangely compelling, and the Reacher character that I was introduced to on a long flight interested me enough that I have gone back for more.
I have to agree with the previous reviewer, D.R. Jeanclerc that "the subtle mark of good writing is that its flow makes it virtually transparent to the reader." However, that is only one element of "good writing", and while Child produces excellent, transparent beach-reading, he seriously stumbled with "The Enemy". In this prequel to the rest of the Reacher series, I had expected to find out why the Reacher character ended up a drifter with a penchant for taking revenge against villains who hurt the innocent. I mean...how many Majors who got their $70,000 RIF bonus in the 90's didn't cash in ther experience in the corporate world by getting an MBA or other advanced training? So I was prepared to find out how someone with a background so similar to mine could end up so different. Namely, how does one follow all the rules to get accepted into USMA, get commissioned from one of the most rigid and hidebound institutions in the US and advance to Major in 6 years (impossible in the MP Corps, but okay, I'll suspend disbelief until it is explained) and then willfully and exuberantly break all of them when it is convenient to him?
I don't expect authors who write about the military to have actually served. However, I do expect them to take the time and effort to research the background of their subjets or at least have respect for them, (or at least get an editorial staff who have left Manhattan at some point in their lives).
The Enemy is full of editorial pratfalls (the use of English jargon instead of terms an American would use, ie. counterpane (instead of bedspread, and yogurt "pot" instead of container (which is used as an alternative to pot at times). One can almost detect a British accent in the odd turn of phrase from time to time as well. This wasn't as distracting as the military inaccuracies, which occur on almost every page of the book. They are too numerous to name, but if you have served you wil be distracted from the story on almost every page as you gasp in amazement at how poorly Child knows the US military. This is lamentable enough, considering how much editorial support exists to ensure this doesn't happen without altering the value of the story (the back story of armor/infantry tensions being laughable at at time when the Heavy/Light concept was part of US Army doctrine).
Child also doesn't get soldiers right, but again, that would require 1000 words to explain how. He should do what he does best...spin a story with Reacher in the middle in a generic setting with generic supporting characters and let hell break loose.
What is truly disappointing is Child's failure to get into how a person becomes a Reacher. As an individualist who follows his moral compass even when it is against his interest (to an extreme degree), Reacher has become an interesting character in most of Child's well written thriller/mysteries. However, this ex-soldier, ex-investigator could not finish the novel. If Mr. Child ever wants a proofreader who can set him straight, he can come to me. I'm the one standing with the millions of other vets who could have helped him out if he had asked. Normally I enjoy his novels for what they are...I would skip this one.
Book Review: A GO for Hollywood
Summary: 2 Stars
Not the full-blown "Thriller" of the Chicago Sun-Times cover blurb, but rather more the police procedural that spends too much time on procedural tedium without providing enough motivation for the reader to soldier on. That, along with the unnecessary digressions, gives the book a padded feel. The author does successfully tick off and satisfy the core catechism of today's political correctness, so the result should be a GO for Hollywood. Of course criminals in this type of fiction always get their constitutional rights violated, but that--setting aside the over-the-top ending--is just part and parcel of this subgenre, which, by the way, hardly means that such writings are "conservative," as is naively believed by many about television's "24." Having now read five Reachers in no particular order, this reader has become increasingly disenchanted. A few reviewers rightly point out that this is "entertainment," not nonfiction. And having no military experience, it is hard to judge the charges by others of massive military inaccuracies. But good novelists need to write fairly realistically on their subject to protect their readers' 'suspension of disbelief.' If Reacher were to investigate, for example, the corrupt practices of a rogue pack of military police dogs, or if he were to become the target of the arms-dealing Quaker Mafia, the minds of many readers would be thrown out of the story, the spell would be broken, and these readers would begin to wonder and think about the author himself. This problem came up big-time in another Reacher novel, in a scene where a group of evil partygoers snatched up a hostage, used him as a shield, and then began chaining out of a house toward Reacher in sort of an extemporaneous killer conga line. Forcing Reacher back toward a cliff edge, this multi-person centipede-like beast miraculously twisted right and left, as if a single organism, dodging any attempt our hero made to safely shoot around the hostage. In the film version, maybe Reacher could be played by Leslie Nielsen. In another Reacher, a serial murder mystery was solved when it turned out that all the victims [Spoiler Alert] had been forced to perform various bizarre complicated suicidal acts by use of hypnosis, which might be plausible for all readers who have spent their lives happily dwelling deep inside a Utah salt cavern and therefore have escaped exposure to any rudimentary information of what hypnosis is capable. On the positive side, it probably says a lot for how skillfully this omni-competent Reacher character has been crafted that it becomes extremely disappointing when the character's creator writes things that are so jaw-droppingly unlikely. In fact, implausible story endings seem to be a specialty. This is doubly unfortunate coming from a writer who obviously possesses the talent to do much better. Overall it can't be denied that Jack Reacher is quite the character, and while he and I are finished, long may he battle the evildoers.
Book Review: Typical Hollywood Military Mystery
Summary: 2 Stars
This was the first book by Lee Child that I've read, and I must admit that found it to be a page turner, for two reasons. The first is that it is an complex, if predictable, mystery story, with an interesting main character and I got sucked into the story and wanted to find out how it ended. The second is that its portayal of the military is so uninformed as to be laughable. Almost every page contains a howler for anyone who has even a passing familiarity with the military. It is crystal clear that Mr. Child has never set foot on a military base, has made no attempt to research the US military, and apparently has never even spoken to anyone in the military. His research appears to have consisted in reading an occasional Newsweek and watching Dr. Strangelove and Hogan's Heros reruns over and over. Indeed he couldn't even be bothered to find out how far Fort Irwin is from LAX. (It's not 30 miles, it's more like 200; ever heard of Google??) I have always been told that writers should write about things they know. For Mr. Child to make his protagonist an army MP, and then apparently conduct no research about the military was a brave step, which has been very successful for him. Perhaps this is because most people are willing to believe anything about the military, especially if it portrays all officers as mildless automatons (except for our enlightened protagonist, of course). Just a few examples: the plot revolves around the notion that "the Armored branch" and the "Infantry branch" are segregated within the army, and indeed in vicious and deadly competition. A character is surprised to see an infantry officer on an "Armored" base. This just in: ALL infantry divisions have armored units attached and ALL armored divisions have infantry units attached. They always work together and are based together, it's called "combined arms", its been official army doctrine for at least 70 years. Another revelation which may shock and amuse: actual members of the military have lives outside of work, we own cars, houses, we have kids, we even wear civilian clothes when we're off duty. Not Reacher, of course, he wears BDUs when traveling to Paris, a trip paid for with magical "travel vouchers". Reacher and his girlfriend and subordinate (that's a big no-no for those of us in the military, by the way) fly from DC to Germany in a "transportation corp" C-130, a four engine turboprop; not a C-141 jet flown by the Air Force Military Airlift Command. In the real world people are not routinely transferred across the globe on 24 hours notice at the whim of passing colonels, things are a little more bureaucratic than that. The military doesn't design office coffee pots and then issue them to units, we buy them at Wal-Mart like everyone else does. This list is only the tip of the iceberg. If you enjoy mindless mysteries to pass the time, you'd probably enjoy this book, but it's more of a fantasy than a mystery.Book Review: Young Jack Reacher and the Case of the Dead General
Summary: 5 Stars
I first started reading Lee Child with Persuader, the seventh book in his Jack Reacher series. It was good...really good, and I started picking up the series from the beginning. The eighth volume, The Enemy, was therefore a double treat: not only was it was the first book to be written after Persuader, it was also the first one that looked at Reacher's past as a Military Policeman in the U.S. Army. And as anticipated, this book was as much of a pleasure to read as all the others.
The story opens with the discovery of a general's body in the wee hours of New Year's Day, 1990. The general died naturally enough of a heart attack, but in a compromising position: in a sleazy hotel room hundreds of miles from where he should have been. Due to the rank of the dead man, Reacher is called in to oversee the investigation and to cover up any embarrassments. This would be okay if not for two things: the general's wife is found murdered later the same day and Reacher finds that there is a key missing document: a meeting agenda that those in the know say doesn't exist, but Reacher believes does (after all, no military meeting can be conducted without an agenda).
With more deaths, Reacher's problems get worse, especially when he gets a new superior who wants to cover up the crime and is willing to use extortion to make Reacher comply. Reacher doesn't react well to such threats, however, and he digs in more, risking his career and maybe his freedom or even his life. The investigation will take him to Europe and back.
A nice thing about this book is that we get to see a Reacher who is distinctly the character who we've read about in other books but also a bit different. In this story, Reacher is a little more naïve, making mistakes here and there. He is also in denial about the end of the Cold War and his role in it. They will always need MPs, he thinks, but readers of the other books know he will soon be out as the military reduces its force. In addition, we finally get to see Reacher's brother Joe (who died at the beginning of the first book, Killing Floor); the two of them will deal with their dying mother, an event that will also try the usually cool Reacher.
As stated before, this is another great book by Child. If you've read other books by him, you'll know that he delivers a top-notch story consistently. If not, this book is as good a place to start as any, as continuity is not hugely important. The Enemy is five-star fare.
Book Review: Exciting police procedural with a blockbuster ending.
Summary: 4 Stars
In the taut, staccato style reminiscent of Raymond Chandler or John D. MacDonald, Lee Child presents his eighth Jack Reacher novel, a police procedural with a difference: Reacher is an MP, an army Major at Fort Bird, North Carolina, obedient to a different set of rules and objectives. Recently transferred from Panama to be MP Executive Officer, Reacher must immediately investigate the death of a two-star general who has died in a seedy, nearby motel, presumably with a prostitute. His briefcase, containing the agenda for a top-secret conference in California, has disappeared, and when Reacher and his aide, Lt. Summer, go to break the news to the general's wife, they find her dead, too, bludgeoned to death with a crowbar within hours of the general's death.
With almost military precision, dramatic complications unfold, and Reacher soon finds himself facing two new deaths, one of which is a gruesome butchering which takes place on the base. Ordered by superiors to cover up the murder by calling it a "training accident," Reacher and his aide investigate surreptitiously, soon discovering that his MP XO counterparts at twenty more bases throughout the world have also been newly appointed to their positions, all of them on or around December 29. Obvious questions arise about who is pulling the strings, who has the power to transfer so many MPs to new posts, and why someone would want to do so.
Child is a meticulous writer whose plot follows a strict chronological order and moves at a breath-taking pace, with one dramatic scene following hard on the heels of another. Reacher and his aide Summer are not fully developed characters, but they do not need to be as they struggle to learn who is controlling the grisly chess game which has resulted in four deaths. The action is resolved in an extravagant grand finale, with twists and turns and spectacular surprises. Though the ending resolves the disparate threads, it may also be a disappointment to some readers, since the premise behind the plot and the motivation which led to the murders, when finally revealed, seems too unrealistic to justify the murderous extremes to which "the enemy" has gone. Though Child is brilliant in creating an exciting story packed with action, the final pages feel cynical and reveal a view of humanity that is grim. Mary Whipple