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THE #1 NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLING JACK REACHER SERIES THAT INSPIRED TWO MAJOR MOTION PICTURES AND THE UPCOMING STREAMING SERIES REACHER “The truth about Reacher gets better and better. . . . This series [is] utterly addictive.”—Janet Maslin, The New York Times Jack Reacher was alone, the way he liked it, soaking up the hot, electric New York City night, watching a man cross the street to a parked Mercedes and drive it away. The car contained one million dollars in ransom money because Edward Lane, the man who paid it, would do anything to get his family back. Lane runs a highly illegal soldiers-for-hire operation. He will use any tool to find his beautiful wife and child. And Jack Reacher is the best manhunter in the world. On the trail of vicious kidnappers, Reacher learns the chilling secrets of his employer’s past . . . and of a horrific drama in the heart of a nasty little war. He knows that Edward Lane is hiding something. Something dirty. Something big. But Reacher also knows this: He’s already in way too deep to stop now. And if he has to do it the hard way, he will. This edition contains an excerpt from Lee Child’s Bad Luck and Trouble.
THE #1 NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLING JACK REACHER SERIES THAT INSPIRED TWO MAJOR MOTION PICTURES AND THE UPCOMING STREAMING SERIES REACHER “The truth about Reacher gets better and better. . . . This series [is] utterly addictive.”—Janet Maslin, The New York Times Jack Reacher was alone, the way he liked it, soaking up the hot, electric New York City night, watching a man cross the street to a parked Mercedes and drive it away. The car contained one million dollars in ransom money because Edward Lane, the man who paid it, would do anything to get his family back. Lane runs a highly illegal soldiers-for-hire operation. He will use any tool to find his beautiful wife and child. And Jack Reacher is the best manhunter in the world. On the trail of vicious kidnappers, Reacher learns the chilling secrets of his employer’s past . . . and of a horrific drama in the heart of a nasty little war. He knows that Edward Lane is hiding something. Something dirty. Something big. But Reacher also knows this: He’s already in way too deep to stop now. And if he has to do it the hard way, he will. This edition contains an excerpt from Lee Child’s Bad Luck and Trouble.
Due to publisher restrictions the library cannot purchase additional copies of this title, and we apologize if there is a long waiting list. Be sure to check for other copies, because there may be other editions available.
Due to publisher restrictions the library cannot purchase additional copies of this title, and we apologize if there is a long waiting list. Be sure to check for other copies, because there may be other editions available.
JACK REACHER ORDERED espresso, double, no peel, no cube, foam cup, no china, and before it arrived at his table he saw a man's life change forever. Not that the waiter was slow. Just that the move was slick. So slick, Reacher had no idea what he was watching. It was just an urban scene, repeated everywhere in the world a billion times a day: A guy unlocked a car and got in and drove away. That was all.
But that was enough.
The espresso had been close to perfect, so Reacher went back to the same cafeŽ exactly -twenty—four hours later. Two nights in the same place was unusual for Reacher, but he figured great coffee was worth a change in his routine. The café was on the west side of Sixth Avenue in New York City, in the middle of the block between Bleecker and Houston. It occupied the ground floor of an undistinguished -four—story building. The upper stories looked like anonymous rental apartments. The cafe itself looked like a transplant from a back street in Rome. Inside it had low light and scarred wooden walls and a dented chrome machine as hot and long as a locomotive, and a counter. Outside there was a single line of metal tables on the sidewalk behind a low canvas screen. Reacher took the same end table he had used the night before and chose the same seat. He stretched out and got comfortable and tipped his chair up on two legs. That put his back against the cafe's outside wall and left him looking east, across the sidewalk and the width of the avenue. He liked to sit outside in the summer, in New York City. Especially at night. He liked the electric darkness and the hot dirty air and the blasts of noise and traffic and the manic barking sirens and the crush of people. It helped a lonely man feel connected and isolated both at the same time.
He was served by the same waiter as the night before and ordered the same drink, double espresso in a foam cup, no sugar, no spoon. He paid for it as soon as it arrived and left his change on the table. That way he could leave exactly when he wanted to without insulting the waiter or bilking the owner or stealing the china. Reacher always arranged the smallest details in his life so he could move on at a split second's notice. It was an obsessive habit. He owned nothing and carried nothing. Physically he was a big man, but he cast a small shadow and left very little in his wake.
He drank his coffee slowly and felt the night heat come up off the sidewalk. He watched cars and people. Watched taxis flow north and garbage trucks pause at the curbs. Saw knots of strange young people heading for clubs. Watched girls who had once been boys totter south. Saw a blue German sedan park on the block. Watched a compact man in a gray suit get out and walk north. Watched him thread between two sidewalk tables and head inside to where the cafe staff was clustered in back. Watched him ask them questions.
The guy was medium height, not young, not old, too solid to be called wiry, too slight to be called heavy. His hair was gray at the temples and cut short and neat. He kept himself balanced on the balls of his feet. His mouth didn't move much as he talked. But his eyes did. They flicked left and right tirelessly. The guy was about forty, Reacher guessed, and furthermore Reacher guessed he had gotten to be about forty by staying relentlessly aware of everything that was happening around him. Reacher had seen the same look in elite infantry veterans who had survived long jungle tours.
Then Reacher's waiter turned suddenly and pointed straight at him. The compact man in the gray suit stared over. Reacher stared back, over his shoulder, through the window. Eye...
About the Author-
Lee Child is the author of more than two dozen New York Times bestselling Jack Reacher thrillers, with most having reached the #1 position, and the #1 bestselling complete Jack Reacher story collection, No Middle Name. Foreign rights in the Reacher series have sold in one hundred territories. A native of England and a former television director, Lee Child lives in New York City and Wyoming.
Reviews-
Starred review from March 27, 2006 In bestseller Child's 10th novel to feature ex-army MP Jack Reacher (after 2005's One Shot ), a sidewalk cafe encounter in New York City plunges Reacher into one of his most challenging—and thoroughly engrossing—adventures to date. Acting out of "reflex and professional curiosity" (and the promise of a generous fee), Reacher agrees to help sinister ex-army officer Edward Lane, whose posse of six Special Forces veterans are even more ominous than he, track down his kidnapped daughter and trophy wife. Since the kidnapping of wife number one five years earlier ended in her death, Lane cautions Reacher that he will not brook police interference ("You break your word, I'll put your eyes out"). From Lane's quarters in the West Side's venerable Dakota apartment building to the shady sections of SoHo and Greenwich Village, the author's atmospheric descriptions make Manhattan a leading player, with menace lurking at every intersection. The inevitable showdown, on a farm outside a tiny English village, ranks as one of Child's most thrilling finales.
August 7, 2006 Ex-army MP Jack Reacher is contracted by Edward Lane, the leader of a mercenary company, to track and recover Lane's kidnapped wife and daughter. But while Reacher is adept at finding people, this time he's got his work cut out for him, for in this case, the client seems to be just as suspect as the criminal. Hill narrates with a crisp, midrange baritone which effectively, if not spectacularly, conveys Child's prose. For the most part, Hill speaks naturally and clearly, but at times, he seems to exaggerate his enunciation, which results in some stilted passages. He doesn't alter his style much when shifting between dialogue and description, and so conversations are sometimes not as engaging as they could be. While Child's prose reads fine on the page, Hill's interpretation of it seems a bit too smug, which makes even the hero a bit unlikable. Hill's adequate performance will likely be sufficient for the casual audiobook listener but not for connoisseurs. Simultaneous release with the Delacorte hardcover (Reviews, Mar. 27).
Starred review from March 1, 2006 Jack Reacher may know the time to the minute without a watch and bring justice to bear wherever he goes, but this time he does it the hard way, sweating the details and working the clues. Because this time -despite his acute observation and intuition -he makes some wrong assumptions and a mistake that could turn tragic. Watching the passing scene over espresso in a New York café , Reacher sees something that involves him in the kidnapping of Kate Lane, second wife of Edward Lane, whose first wife, Anne, was also kidnapped and killed, despite FBI efforts. Lane, rich from hiring out ex-military mercenaries, contracts with Reacher, who works covertly with private investigator Lauren Pauling, a retired FBI agent who had led the Anne Lane case. In his tenth outing (after "One Shot", Reacher is humanized by both his mistakes -as he finds that both kidnappings are not what they seem -and his relationship with the fiftyish Pauling. Tension builds through plot twists to another riveting finish by Child, who shows again his mastery of the thriller. [See Prepub Alert, "LJ "/06.]" -Michele Leber, Arlington, VA"
Copyright 2006 Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.
Starred review from February 15, 2006 Child's last two Jack Reacher novels (" One Shot" , 2005, and " The Enemy" , 2004) have emphasized procedural detail rather than the high-octane action that gave the series its identity. There's still plenty of procedure, but this time the gearshift is back in overdrive: "Reacher, alone in the dark. Armed and dangerous. Coming back." Former military cop Reacher does his level best not to come back: he lives off the grid (no address, no belongings), but his instincts keep driving him toward solving other people's problems, the kind that won't stay solved without violence. Here, he's having an espresso in Greenwich Village when a man walks across the street, gets in a car, and drives away. It happens every day, but it's not always a kidnapper picking up the ransom. Soon Reacher is involved in helping a ruthless mercenary find his wife and stepdaughter before the kidnappers tie up loose ends. There's a lot more to it than that, though, and it takes three-fourths of the novel before Reacher figures out who the bad guys are. Like all the best thrillers, this one is about more than pace: yes, the narrative propels you forward with a locomotive's thrust, but Child never loses sight of the small detail or the human fabric--not unlike Reacher in the dark, armed and dangerous, intent on the action in front of him but always aware of the sights and sounds to his sides and behind him. (Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 2006, American Library Association.)
Rocky Mountain News
"A Reacher novel is the closest thing to guaranteed joy short of a honeymoon."
The Biloxi Sun Herald
"Reacher, a former Army military police major, is a character like no other. Intuitive, independent, indomitable - he walks softly and carries a very big stick."
The Miami Herald
"Plenty of suspense writers play the tough-guy-with-a-heart-of-gold card, but Child is indelibly skillful, quickly sketching intriguing characters as he drops bombshell after bombshell. With its taciturn but engaging hero and almost unbearably prolonged tension, The Hard Way makes reading easy indeed."
Contra Costa Times
"In The Hard Way, Reacher is better than ever."
Denver Post
"Fans...will find themselves hanging onto their armchairs for dear life. The Hard Way is a breathless, well-paced thriller."
Janet Maslin, The New York Times
"Nine red-hot books ago, Lee Child concocted the rough, tough Superman of the crime-busting genre, as smart and charismatic as he is unbeatable. And then Mr. Child broke the mold. Early next week (why delay good news?), Reacher returns in this series' 10th installment, The Hard Way. It's one more labyrinthine story that takes off like a shot: as usual, Mr. Child has you at hello."
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