Too often, a relative trying to continue a successful thriller or crime fiction series can't catch the right tone. When Felix Francis became the solo author of the horse-racing series Dick Francis created, I lost interest in the books. And for me, the first few Jack Reacher thrillers that Andrew Child stepped into fell flat: The character's peculiar and intriguing blend of thoughtful, rescuing, and well-trained martial and military arts collapsed into a tough brute banging with his fists and feet in every situation.
So I'm very excited and pleased to say that CHAIN REACTION, number 31 in the series, regains the flavor of the earlier work, even though it has both brothers' names as authors. Even better, it brings back one of the women Reacher cared about earlier: Susan Turner, now a general and still the kind of decision maker that Reacher respects. Turner can't trust her own team to discover why a covert operative's been murdered out in Summertown, Colorado. It's a long way from her HQ in Washington, DC, and although the location is a bare-bones one—a couple of solar farms, five data centers, a motel, and a diner (it couldn't be a Reacher novel without a diner!)—something there must be valuable enough to kill for.
Of course, Turner's first problem to solve is how to engage Reacher. As he sniffs around the edges of her career, he's not too interested. "Not his circus, not his monkeys. Not anymore." But on the other hand, he can't help being a bit curious. Why does a one-star general want him enough to agree to meet him at a diner he knows ("Good coffee, good grill work, good griddle work. Decent pie."), and what makes the case a fit to his own peculiar skill set?
CHAIN REACTION arrives with terrific timing for a period when data centers are more than just a scientific curiosity -- in some states and cities, their control is critical in elections. And as Reacher might well comment, the only thing more likely to get you into trouble than a one-star general is a politician.
Settle in for a well-paced classic Jack Reacher case that demands much more than a pair of fight-toughened fists. None of us can control much of today's politics. It's good to feel that Reacher, however, can serve justice once again.
416 pages, newly released, and a perfect way to survive election week and the throes of change that follow.
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