Bad Luck and Trouble
Lee Child
Delacorte Press, May 15, 2007
U.S. hardcover, first edition
ISBN 0-385-34055-7
384 pages; $26.00

It’s a rite of spring: a new Jack Reacher thriller from the pen of Lee Child. That means I can spend a day completely lost to the joys of a violent yet strangely lovable anti-hero. This year’s adventure features a reunion of army buddies, a terrible threat and a very high body count. No scruples, morals, values, commandments or second thoughts are on display here, save one: loyalty to one’s fellows.

Bad Luck and Trouble opens with a scene of horrifying violence against one of Reacher’s former brothers-in-arms. As a result of this event, Reacher receives a message – an oddity in itself, given that all he owns are the clothes on his back, a travel toothbrush, an ATM card and a passport. With no fixed address or telephone number, he’s a hard guy to get ahold of. But he didn’t train his personnel for nothing, and between Frances Neagley’s detective work and his own, they are able to meet up in a city far from Reacher’s wanderings and miles away from Neagley’s home without ever exchanging a phone call or email. In a similar fashion, if a tad less mysterious and difficult, two others show up in short order. But the remaining three of the Army team of special investigators – those who did the most difficult, bloody and behind-the-scenes work military police can do – have disappeared.

The team votes to work together to find their comrades, with Reacher as their leader. And then the book is off like a hound after a rabbit, dealing out plot point after plot point, leaving the reader short on oxygen – and short on sleep, at least until the last page is turned. One thing is certain: you do not mess with the special investigators.

Reacher is more violent and even oddly greedy this time around, increasing the “anti” quotient of his “anti-hero” persona. He has no qualms about murder, much less robbery. He constantly compares himself to the other special investigators, all of whom seem to be happy in their fairly conventional lives with houses, wives, children and actual jobs with actual wages. The reader does the same: how much longer Reacher will be able to perform the type of manual labor to which he customarily resorts to pay for his motel rooms? He’s got to be in his early 40s by now, and digging ditches can’t be as much fun as it used to be. It makes me eager to see how this experience will affect Reacher, which means I’m already looking forward to next year’s thriller by Lee Child.