61 Hours: A Reacher Novel (Jack Reacher Book 14)

If "open" user reviews are useful in deciding whether to choose a book or not (and as an avid reader I take choosing books very seriously, it's one of my great pleasures in life), if you are familiar with this series it's an easy choice. This is one of my very favorite (top five) series across all genres, and having wistfully looked at the picture of the cover for months, I'm happy to say the wait was worth it. For me, recently Lee Child has tightened his already clean, sparing prose down with the recent "Gone Tomorrow" and seems to be following in the same vein here. Also, as in "Gone Tomorrow" this is a less insouciant, in-your-face, mature Reacher, who while formidable does makes mistakes, and at one point in the story demonstrates a real anguish that I've seldom seen in this series. Since others have laid out the plot I won't go through it again, just add that I am not quite sure how Child or any good writer does it, but this is one of those stories where events, some larger, some smaller, begin to mass and vortex together, and steadily the tension ratchets up and up, and in this book it's relentless, had to keep turning the pages until 3 in the morning. The actual language used is basic enough, and Child is a genius at saying just enough. Another element as mentioned by others is the omnipresent, deadly, burning cold of an indifferent South Dakota winter - the way this is written you can FEEL a steering wheel jerking from you under the ice ruts, and the sting of icy snow. As usual the relationship Reacher forms with a woman on a telephone is an intelligent one, Child's depiction of the women Reacher encounters are much appreciated vs. those of the author Brian Haig (where the brilliant beautiful female in question always seems to end up being a psycho!) In its way this book is brutal and pulls no punches on your emotions, at least there were a couple of places where I was thinking "oh no......" So, if you are new to this series, it's just a damn good read, and you are doing yourself a disservice if you don't backtrack and pick up the earlier novels. If you are a Reacher fan this is a worthy, gripping, edition to the series. The one grief I would have, and maybe it's kind of a need for the perfect hero, is while Reacher certainly remains heroic, and a realistic one in the this book and the last, I miss the supremely self-confident, quick-tongued Reacher of earlier novels (like when he threatened to turn over an oily slacker and use his face like a mop). Perhaps he is a bit godlike in earlier novels and this seems to be akin to the earlier Clint Eastwood westerns which eventually evolved to a more complex, vulnerable character depicted in the Outlaw Josey Wales. But I miss the avenging angel Reacher of "Bad Luck and Trouble", "The Hard Way" and "Persuader". He's more human here, and it's more "realistic" in that way, but I miss the guy who head-butt a smarmy deputy off a bar stool in "Echo Burning" a.k.a. all is right with the world, eventually, as Reacher makes it right, but this book isn't that way, some bad stuff happens that can't be made right. And too, if I want non-stop, popcorn-movie action, I read James Rollins, and I think Lee Child wisely moves his character along in the series. In any case will re-read, and I'll be counting down the months to the next book, again. PS. I don't know that I would describe this book as a true "cliffhanger", I think things are spelled out by the evidence left behind. Guess I'll find out if I'm correct, eventually. Since I don't have a mind like Jack Reacher's I'll have to wait.

"61 Hours", Lee Child's 14th Jack Reacher novel, seems to be dichotomizing the support of his readers between those who love it or those who hate it and never plan to buy another. Having read all 14 Reacher novels, I can safely say that "61 Hours" is a departure, at times, from the Child/Reacher formula but it is only a change in style, not substance. In "61 Hours", action and violence, while present, take a backseat to plot development, old-fashioned sleuthing, and a backstory that involves a new female ally and revelations from his army past as well as from his childhood. While containing less of the traditional slam bang action, we see a more fully fleshed, human side of Reacher in this novel; indeed, we still see his incredible strengths and talents but this time they are balanced a bit more with his humanity and, yes, even vulnerability. In "61 Hours", Reacher has bummed a ride on a senior citizen tour bus that runs off an icy road near Bolton, South Dakota. Once he helps everyone reach Bolton safely, Reacher is slowly drawn into a complex of circumstances that seem to be a perfect storm (pun intended). There is a deadly cold front and snow storm approaching, a riot is expected at any moment in a nearby maximum security prison, a biker gang is apparently operating a high yield meth lab at an abandoned military facility just out of town, a vicious drug cartel in Mexico wants an elderly eye witness in a drug trial killed, and just what is in that abandoned facility in the first place. Lee Child does a masterful job of interweaving all these elements into a fast paced well plotted read that has Reacher moving to an invisible clock from the crash of his bus to an unknown but seemingly monumental event 61 hours later. I have been a bit disappointed by some elements in the past several Reacher novels but I enjoyed this one even though I would have liked a little more of the Reacher trademark action. If this was a different angle by the author to broaden Jack Reacher as a character, I have no problem with it. However, I sincerely hope that he returns to form in his next outing which apparently will be a followup to the cliffhanger ending of "61 hours". This is a recommended read for both Reacher fans and those seeking a well plotted thriller.

I have been a fan of Lee Child’s Jack Reacher action novels for many years. I just completed reading this book 61 Hours and found it to be another suspenseful and action packed tale. The weather played a big part in this story. It is ice cold and snowing in South Dakota when the bus Jack was riding in went off the road and crashed near Bolton, South Dakota. There were mostly elderly people on the bus with the exception of Jack and the driver of the bus. Jack helped some of the injured people off the bus and it was freezing outside at this point. In a short while a police officer from Bolton arrived on the scene. The police department also brought a bus, which was used to transport prisoners to their federal lock up in Bolton. After all the injured and elderly boarded the bus and took them to various hotels and hospitals. Jack and police Officer Andrew Peterson of the Bolton Police Department begin talking and the real meat of the novel begins. The story gets a little more complicated because of the policies which have to be followed by Bolton P.D. when it comes to a prison riot and what the officers are assigned to do in such a case. There is also a serious problem with someone who is going to attempt to kill a witness who is supposed to testify against a connected thug. Jack gets involved with the problems of Bolton P.D. and the wind, snow and icy cold weather all add to the challenges Jack Reacher must meet. I never give away too much information when I review a novel because it spoils it for the reader. If you are a Jack Reacher fan you should check out this book, 61 Hours. I found it to be a somewhat suspenseful book because of the hours count down in the book. Rating: 5 Stars. Joseph J. Truncale (Author: Tactical Principles of the most effective combative systems)

Child has done it again! Another thriller. Lee's ability to keep my interest by teaching me real life facts along with the fiction of Jack's deeds, has me riveted from page one. When I met Jack Reacher, I fell in love with Child's style of writing, i.e., learning RL stuff along with the simple entertainment of a whodunit. 61 Hours starts out with a bang--bus crash: a bus full of senior citizens will freeze and die unless help arrives quickly. Jack steps up, confers with the bus driver and uses his unique set of skills to ensure the safety of his new friends. Jack always assumes the commanding role when a bad situation occurs. Throughout the series, in his exploration of the U.S., when he is drawn into a bad situation, he does what he can to save the wronged party, bring justice to a corrupt situation and to guard the innocent. In 61 Hours, the innocent is an elderly woman scheduled to testify against drug traffickers. Then comes another layer involving an underground facility. Oh and, by the way, a murder occurs. And here's another "oh and, by the way," Jack spent much of his military service as a homicide investigator. This is barely an accurate summary of the storyline, but I don't want to spoil the delight you will take as you read 61 Hours. How did I find Lee in the first place? Airport bookstore. After I check through security, I double-check my itinerary and see my three-legged, eight-hour-long day on planes and layovers, airport bookstores beckon me, challenge me to find a novel that will kill time. Usually, I'm finished with the book and throw it away when I reach my final destination. But but one fortuitous day I selected a Child novel. I logged onto Amazon.com and bought the rest of the series (sorry Lee, I wait for the paperbacks). I am frustrated that, usually, Jack appears only annually. I've read through the series twice now, in chronological order; I'm starting again with The Killing Floor. The facts regarding how currency is made fascinates me. I learn more about RL situations in Child's novels than I ever did in college--remember The Persuader? I learned about military weaponry. How about the one where he is kidnapped and ends up preventing the San Diego port from being blown to bits? I learned about cults, cult leaders, as well as how to stay alive in an "enemy camp." Every book teaches as well as entertains me. To sum it up, 61 Hours is fabulous, as good or better than previous installments of the Jack Reacher series. When I recently moved, I didn't bring the Pattersons, the Connellys (although I sometimes miss Harry Bosch), the Elmore Leonards, the Grishams nor the Castles. I brought only the Lee Child's Jack Reacher series. Lee Child is brilliant. His writing is intelligent and well thought-out. The pacing is excellent. I could go on and on about Lee Child, author extraordinaire. Sorry, Jonathan Kellerman, you've been replaced as my favorite author by Lee Child. I wish I knew a Jack Reacher. He's honest, hardworking, intelligent, and he has a great sense of humor. I wish I could meet a guy like that.

Here Child dwells on Reacher's mortality more than ever before. I found it pleasant since everyone ages, especially I lately. At 50 you don't write like you're 30. God forbid. Plus Child shines a new light, literally, on the timeless subject of the hero's death. The vivid ice and snow establishes both death as well as the relentless power of meth, in addition to a beautifully detailed chiaroscuro background. Really extraordinary. The imagistic narrative, threaded beaded through time, offsets Reacher's strength and determination. Oddly mythical. While everyone else is "busy dying", he is "busy being born", to knick from Dylan. Note that Reacher hardly eats, a big departure. He evolves explicitly here. Take the use of space as well as time. Child uses the frozen emptiness of the plains and a cavernous sky to fill with the clock-narrative. Eerie and Poe-like. Reacher distances himself from everything more than usual. Deliberately it seems, like he's in on the author's game to charm the reader. It also puts him under a spotlight in the spooky, otherworldly settings. Frankly, there were times when I thought he was dead. The story is a bare stage or building platform, and even launch pad in the bizarre and stunning climax. Also, note the emphasis on sound, like you could hear as perfectly as see, or both interchangeably. Weird. I chose my title because of the crisp yet surreal quality of all the passing scenes, like little paintings hanging in space. Exhaust clouds around the pipes, the backs of cars in the night with the headlights pointing away from the viewer. Wonderful visual touches. Magritte-like too. Almost like this was written by another writer who had a graphic design and architecture background. Precise, contemporary feel. (Death!) Thus was the Salter residence so rich and luminous in contrast. Again, I wondered if it figured in a heaven fantasy. Salter was a sort of angel, with Susan as another, so disembodied yet so angelic too. While, on the other hand... Having lived and worked all over Central America, I feel the villain was faithful to a type I used to encounter. Latinos all have an odd, "magical realism" quality to them, even when they are dull. Besides, villains are supposed to be horrid. Plato is clearly satanic, especially when the jet first ascends and travels north. Prince Of Darkness, indeed. This is exaggerated down in "hell", with everyone but him twisted into demonic shapes. The countless vanities massed along shelves. The other two Mexican "angels". Very striking. It felt a bit like Nothing To Lose, with time replacing space as the central element, but then 61 Hours just pulled away into entirely new territory. However, I am a Persuader freak, so I prefer the blood and guts stuff like the superlative Gone Tomorrow. As for actor to play him? Forget it--a young John Wayne was the only chance. In fact, unless there is a genius director I don't know of, no one will ever try. Which is fine with me.

When Lee Child is on his game, he is the best contemporary writer of high-adrenaline pop fiction, bar none. His clipped sentences and staccato paragraphs spit out taut story lines with unembellished precision - a modern version of "Dragnet's" Sgt. Joe Friday's, "Just the facts, ma'am." And facts he delivers - fascinating bits of minutia to enhance and elucidate, making sure his stripped down prose is not simply dry. And then of course there is Jack Reacher who, when on his game, combines Sherlock Holmes' deductive power with King Kong's strength to match the superlatives of his creator. And in "61 Hours," both Child and Reacher are on their game - big time. This marks a milestone for Child, a blockbuster of a novel that matches the suspense and tension of earlier monsters like "Killing Floor", Trip Wire", and "Persuader" relying this time on Reacher's brain more than raw brawn. Child, as usual, wastes no time hooking the reader, this time using a bus crash in a Great Plains blizzard leaving a couple dozen senior citizens stranded - with Jack Reacher. Meanwhile, a diminutive fiend from Mexico City known as "Plato" is plotting the deal of a lifetime. Reacher and his elderly companions are eventually rescued by the PD of the nearest town, Bolton, Soth Dakota, recently home to a brand new "ultramax" federal prison. A gang of outlaw bikers inhabits a mysterious Cold War military base on the outskirts of town, assumed to be housing an illicit meth lab of colossal scale. It is the suspected drugs and an upcoming trial that form the core of Child's suspense, as the lone witness tying the drugs to the gang is septuagenarian town resident Janet Salter, a charming and spunky retired librarian who requires 24/7 police protection to make sure she stays alive long enough to testify at trial. Child paces the story cleanly through mile-markers - "Five to six in the evening, thirty-four hours to go" - as he counts down from the opening "...exactly sixty-one hours before it happened." The frigid tundra of snow and ice and wind of South Dakota perfectly frames a similarly dark plot - a deep undercurrent of depression and despair that penetrates and shakes even the stoic but usually confident Jack Reacher. Vulnerability, doubt, and questions of mortality layer new dimensions on the increasingly complex character of the ex-Army MP nomad. While trying to bust the mystery of the abandoned and forgotten military outpost, Reacher reconnects, via phone, with the current commander of his old command, Major Susan Turner, exposing decidedly un-Reacher-like reactions. Meanwhile, back in Bolton, the blizzards continue but fail to deter the bodies piling, while Reacher puzzles over a baffling series of events and contradictions. In short, whether Lee Child has heeded the counsel of his fans and backed off the political commentary that unnecessarily marred some recent sub-par efforts, or whether he simply decided to go back to the lean-and-mean basics that has set him so far above the pack in this genre, "61 Hours" sets a new course for this talented author, leaving his readers gasping for the next fix. An intelligent, fast-moving, and ultimately thought provoking masterpiece of crime fiction - it really is good to have Lee Child back!

Lee Child can weave an interesting tale about Jack Reacher but may drive readers who are familiar with proper sentence structure and use of punctuation to the brink. I know that’s the case for me. I purchased the entire Jack Reacher series of books after seeing the first season of the series. I never would have read so many of his books if I hadn’t already paid for them. I have often wondered why, with all the money that Lee Child must have brought in from his writing, he can’t seem to afford a staff who will proofread and correct the many mistakes throughout his books. Same goes for his publisher. I held onto hope with each successive book that he might learn something about writing and make his books easier to read. I hoped, with the addition of his brother on the last couple, that the books would improve but seemed to get only worse. Sometimes, 2 whole pages of back-and-forth banter are written with nothing to occasionally let you know who is speaking, so multiple readings may be needed at times to sort it out. I think almost all, if not all, of the pages have sentences with commas where none are needed, periods where commas are needed, clauses used as sentences, and a new paragraph starting from a clause that belongs in the previous sentence of the preceding paragraph. As I said, hard to read if you understand basic sentence structure. There are often times where I wish Lee had done one iota of research to get facts right. I refer to passages in the stories where it was apparent that Lee Child had no experience or knowledge; I guess, more or less, the writing is off the top of his head. Some problems are: 1: He thinks the flashing emergency lights of vehicles in the western states are the same as in much of the New England states (blue on fire trucks and red on police). 2: He didn’t know what the average shoe size in America is actually 10 ½ (stating it as 9) 3: He thinks a large man like Jack Reacher would have what Lee evidently thinks of as a large foot size of 11, instead of something closer to 14 or 15 (I am 6’1” and wear a 13.) I assume Lee has a small foot. 4: Lee has never been near a fast-moving train, thinking there is violent ground movement when the train is even over a mile away and hurricane force winds near one traveling 60 mph. 5: He seems to think that all gas stations and quick marts sell khaki pants and various shirts, packs of socks, and underwear. 6: Jack Reacher can knock anyone unconscious and very often dead with one punch. I can remember only a couple times when it took two. 7: He thinks face bones will “shatter” from a Jack Reacher punch and can knock out a gorilla or even an elephant. Jack also never has injuries to his hand or elbow from such amazing blows. 8: Jack Reacher’s hands are said to be as large as a dinner plate and his fists as large as Thanksgiving turkeys…really? Yes, his books are hard to read for these and other reasons caused by lack of oversight by his publisher and lack of staff. Please, I hope never to find out he has a staff that lets this stuff through. Good storyteller, other than the lack of research on details and no idea as to sentence/paragraph structure.. Rating would be five for the story.

I enjoyed the book. Reacher is bullet proof as usual. However some events in the book were predictable, but that doesn’t change the entertaining read.