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Summary: A hot new adventure!
Review: Jack Reacher is hitching a ride through the heat of West Texas when a Latina woman invites him into her air-conditioned white Cadillac. As they head south to Pecos she proposes a dire scheme involving motherhood, marriage & murder.I've not met Jack Reacher before, although Lee Child has written four previous books about him. Reacher's a huge, unkempt & unlikely hero. Reminiscent of the Lone Ranger except he wears no white hat, nor clean clothes for that matter. An army brat, dragged from base to base by his parents, he then enlisted as an investigator in the Military Police. Let go after thirteen years of service, during the downsizing of the military, he's been bumming around the country looking for some peace, & getting into trouble & out of motel bathroom windows. This young wife's story piques his curiosity although what she asks of him butts him up against his principles. Still, the Cadillac is a cool haven, the woman is beautiful & Reacher goes along for the ride. Where it takes him is into a viper nest of oil wealth, racial hatred, domestic violence, tax evasion, a husband's return from jail, & lying lawmen. I liked ECHO BURNING - a well-written story with probable people, intense action & a view of life that makes you think!
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Summary: MR. CHILD'S BEST BOOK SINCE
Review: Last year, when I read RUNNING BLIND, I gave it a somewhat scathing review, stating that Lee Child hadn't produce a really exciting book since THE KILLING FLOOR, promising myself that I'll never buy another "Jack Reacher" novel in hardback for as long as I lived. As far as I was concerned, Mr. Child had three strikes against him and had struck out with me as a fan. Well, I broke the promise to myself with the publication of ECHO BURNING, and I'm glad I did. This novel turned out to be a winner in every sense of the word and represents the sheer craftsmanship that Lee Child is capable of bringing to his work. In his newest book, Jack Reacher once again returns and finds himself caught up in a game of lies, abuse and murder. While hitchhiking out of Lubbock, Texas in an attempt to escape the wrath of the law, he's picked up by Carmen Greer, a beautiful, married Latino woman who's driving a luxurious white Cadillac. Mrs. Greer is looking for someone to kill her abusive husband, Sloop, who's due to get out of prison, and she thinks that Reacher would be the perfect person to take care of her little problem. Since Reacher doesn't consider himself to be a cold-blooded killer, he politely refuses her kind offer. He does, however, agree to go back to the ranch where she and her daughter, Ellie, live with Sloop's family and to act as a protector for her. This leads to our hero finding himself in the middle of a really large domestic dispute. Except for Carmen and Ellie, nobody in the Greer family likes having his presence at the ranch, and they attempt to do everything within their power to force him to leave. When Sloop get out of jail and returns home, only to be murdered on the night of his arrival, it looks as though Carmen decided to take matters into her own hands. No one believes that she is innocent, except for Reacher, and he's not absolutely sure himself. As he attempts to find out who the real killer is, Reacher suddenly becomes the focus point of a three-person "hit" team, and he must find a way to stay alive long enough to finally get to the truth. ECHO BURNING is a taut, suspenseful thriller that displays the brilliant writing that Lee Child is capable of penning. He captures the heat and isolation of the Texas landscape perfectly, while giving us characters filled with either an outright meanness or a hidden evil. Though Reacher is able to read people, judging how good or bad they might be, he may have just met his match with the Greer family. There are so many lies and half-truths being told by, and about, the family that our main character won't know whom to believe, and neither will the reader. Is everything that Carmen Greer told Reacher a lie so that her husband could be murdered, or is the Greer family really a nest of vipers, ready to kill to protect its own? In this novel, Mr. Child touches the inner core of what evil really is and how it hides behind the masks of ordinary people. Jack Reacher, however, shines at his best as he decides to take on a whole town, if necessary, to do what he feels is right, meeting violence with violence, and handing out death to those who want a piece of him. ECHO BURNING is one tough novel that gives us a deeper look at the character of Jack Reacher and the essence of humanity in him that reaches out to help those who are being preyed upon. This is definitely the kind of person you want covering your back when the bad guys are closing in. For those of you who loved THE KILLING FLOOR, Mr. Child has written another book that equals, if not surpasses, the quality of his first novel. It's one I'm proud to highly recommend!
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Summary: Reacher, the Good Samaritan
Review: Ex-Army M.P. Jack Reacher is thumbing a ride to make a hasty escape from a small south Texas town when he is picked up by a young attractive Hispanic woman driving a big white Cadillac. The woman, Carmen Greer had been cruising the locale picking up rough and tumble looking men to coax them to protect her from her husband, Sloop. At 6 feet 5 inches and 250 pounds, Reacher certainly fit the bill. Carmen Greer had married into an old monied Texas family with a sprawling ranch outside of Pecos in oppressively hot and dusty Echo county. She had married Sloop, the eldest son, after becoming pregnant. The spousal abuse started soon after. Unfortunately due to the racism of the Greer family against "beaners" or Mexicans and the lax laws in that part of the state, Carmen's cries went unheeded. Reacher initially refused his assistance especially after he was asked to kill Sloop Greer. His posture however softened after meeting Carmen's vivacious six year old flaxen haired daughter Ellie. Reacher posing as a ranch hand looking for work at the Greer's Red House Ranch, instantaneously sized up the situation. Unknown to Reacher was that the family was concurrently being surveyed and stalked by two groups of three individuals with unknown motives. As Reacher became more deeply involved in this passion play he became aware that there was a plethora of secrets and lies surrounding the inhabitants of Echo county. Lee Child, while intriguing me with the exploits of his hero Reacher, never convinces me that Reacher was influenced enough to actually give a darn about Carmen Greer's dilemma. I however will march forward to the next novel in the series.
Rating: 
Summary: This is my least favorite
Review: book so far in Lee Child's "Jack Reacher" series. Jack's a loner, and it is fitting that he's back on the road again after trying unsuccessfully to settle down. He's in hot, dry, west Texas (and Child really makes you feel as though you are there - you're thirsty throughout the story!) where he's enlisted himself to help an abused (?) wife, Carmen Greer, and her daughter, Ellie. Greer's tale is fraught with lies, and, if I were Jack, I would have given up on her. She's not able to escape her husband, Sloop, and his secretive pack of friends that
have a past that leads to bloodshed. The pace bogs down from time to time, and it is difficult to root for Carmen. The ending is a lot more transparent than anything Child has given us previously. Worst of all, Child gets bogged down in his own descriptiveness, a problem encountered in his earlier works, where it was more forgiveable and did less to hurt his characterization and his pace. Not giving up on Jack, because he is the most refreshing hero of the past few years, but one more average work by Lee Child will send me scurrying for some new authors!
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Summary: Is Carman Lying or Not?
Review: That's what Reacher needs to find out. Reacher is thumbing his way through Texas in the middle of a real heatwave. He is picked up by a young Mexican woman and his life changes direction. She has quite the story to tell him about her life with an old Texas family, and Reacher believes her - even when no one else does. She also has a vary smart little girl that Reacher realizes that he has to protect along with her mother. This book really shows what life can be like for people of other races (especially Mexicans) in the heart of redneck Texas in the "back of beyond". Chid is a talented writer and his plots and characterizations are masterful. I didn't find that this book was as much "edge-of-your-seat" suspense as the previous ones, but I found the plot more complex and that made up for it. Lucky for this poor woman who is really at the end of her tether, she manages to get Reacher into her car and once he's there, and understands the extent of her suffering, he knows he's going to stick around to help her and her daughter. Child writes absorbing and finely crafted thrillers, and if you haven't discovered him yet, then you have a treat in store.
Rating: 
Summary: Unrealistic and Mediocre at Best.
Review: Mr. Child has taken writing blindly to a mediocre level of mediocrity. It's not that he is a bad author, it just seems he's happy to pump out books without putting the information or will into what had the potential to be a terrific series of novels. The story itself is not bad, but it takes Reacher from being a street smart, tough guy to a naïve adolescent, to the hard-nosed almost psychic investigator whenever the circumstances dictate. Reacher is once again hitchhiking around before being picked up by a beautiful woman who has tales of cruelty, deprivation, and scorn. She convinces Reacher to accompany her, to the middle of nowhere, to protect her from her rich, about to be released from prison, abusive husband. The story also includes the obligatory instances of extreme racism throughout the South, the typical power hungry politicians, and the ideal Harvard graduate lesbian atoning for her wealth by toiling in a legal mission for the indigent immigrants. Sound a little tired and over-done? It is. In Echo Burning Lee Child doesn't put much research what he writes and should be able to claim some knowledge about, but you'll find the book has more than a few instances of erroneous 'facts'. The story is based on Jack Reacher, a former military policeman, but Mr. Child only has the vaguest notion of what the military life is like. He continually refers to Reacher's past experiences, which could not have happened in the U.S. military, ever, unless you gained everything you know about the army from watching TV. Another example would be that Jack Reacher is purported to be a master at firearms, yet he only has the shallowest knowledge of them and their capabilities. Some of what he states is not only wrong, but is foolishly dangerous if ever done. Oh, and the U.S. army's military police do not assassinate their fellow soldiers and definitely not on a routine basis. I cannot recommend the unrealistic Echo Burning, but if you like this genre, I would recommend books by Andy McNab or James Lee Burke instead. McNab and Burke both write good, knowledgeable novels about genuine characters that with all their strength still have human flaws and that is something Lee Childs novels do not have.
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Summary: Wow! Read this and bought 4 more copies to send as gifts!
Review: All I can say is that this is one hell of a book! I was totally engrossed from the first page to the very last page. When I finished it, I went out and bought 4 more copies to send as gifts to friends and to my son and my daughter. It is beautifully written, beautifully crafted, and kept the tension and pace humming the whole time I was reading it. In addition it has some very good social commentary, so it is more than just a typical whodunit. It is the first Lee Child book I have read, and so I also went out and bought every one of his other books. I'm almost hoping I don't like them quite as much, because I can't afford buying 4 more copies of each one to send as gifts!
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Summary: Jack Reacher, Modern Day Lone Ranger
Review: In our hearts, if we're guys, we want to be Jack Reacher. Heck, I bet even a lotta gals wouldn't mind being him. Here's a guy from nowhere, going everywhere, or is he from everywhere going nowhere. Whatever, he always seems to wind up somewhere where there is a damsel in distress, wrongs to right and plenty bad guys between him and truth, justice and the American way. Reacher, travels with only a tooth brush and sometimes not even that. He buys cheap clothes, wears them for a few days, tosses and replaces them. He has no roots, no possessions except his own sense of right and wrong. Laws? They're for other people. ECHO BURNING opens with Reacher climbing out of the back window of a sleazy motel as the cops drive by the front. Seems he broke the nose of one of them the night before. But it's small town West Texas, hotter than a branding iron outside, and the next town is miles down the road. Reacher sticks his thumb out with visions of spending the next ten years in a Texas slammer when a pretty young woman picks him up. What are the odds someone like that would pick up someone like him? There had to be a reason, Reacher muses. And before long she gives it to him. Her husband is in jail, gets out any day now and he's a wife beater. He beat her before he went in and she's afraid he'll take up right where he left off. She wants Reacher to kill him. Reacher says no, but agrees to kind of guard her. She brings Reacher home as a hired hand to help take care of the horses. Big bad guys who work for the ex want Reacher to take off. The husband's brother wants Reacher to split too. The sheriff doesn't like him and it's beginning to look like the woman might have made up the wife beating bit, but Reacher senses something isn't right and that's trouble for whoever gets in his way. Okay, I know the Reacher character is a little improbable, but I sure like him. I like the way he breezes into the picture, then fades out, a quiet Lone Ranger, only to show up in the next story, righting wrongs, making the unjust just. I like him a lot. I also like the clean and crisp writing style of Lee Child, like it lot. Ken Douglas, Underpaid Writer
Rating:
Summary: Very Good
Review: This is my least favorite Reacher Novel yet. And I have to say that I still thought this was a great novel. Reacher is picked up by a lady with a six year old daughter while hitchiking on the road. He fast becomes embroiled in a family full of problems. Not only are the problems family problems but the friends of the family are trouble as well. This is truly a novel of where the past actions come back to haunt the characters of the book. There are so many lies it's hard to know when the truth starts. Interesting. A great novel.
enjoy.
Rating:
Summary: Great Book
Review: I love the Reacher series by Lee Child, and this is probably my second favorite book of his that I have read so far. Interesting characters and plot twists the whole way through keep you wanting to read more and more.
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