Status
Available
Series
Genres
Collection
Publication
New York: Jove Books, 1998,c1997.
Description
THE FIRST NOVEL IN LEE CHILD'S #1 NEW YORK TIMESâ??From its jolting opening scene to its fiery final confrontation, Killing Floor Ex-military policeman Jack Reacher is a drifter. Heâ??s just passing through Margrave, Georgia, and in less than an hour, heâ??s arrested for murder. Not much of a welcome. All Reacher knows is that he didnâ??t kill anybody. At least not here. Not lately. But he doesnâ??t stand a chance of convincing anyone. Not in Margrave, Georgia. Not a
User reviews
LibraryThing member reading_fox
Nominally the first of the Jack Reacher novels, although most of the stories are discret plots that can be read in any order, and chronologically "the Enemy" comes first, this is still not a bad place to begin reading Jack's adventures. It is worth noting that Jacks character is still in
Jack Reacher is an ex-military police major. Having left the army 6 months ago he's visiting all the bits of america that he's heard about but never had a chance to see. A rare conversation with his brother leads to him getting off a bus just outside the town of Margrave to go and see if there's any trace of an old blues musician Blind Blake. Within minutes of his arrival he's arrested on the charge of murder, and despite having a convincing alibi he's sent to the local state prison, along with a preppy local called Paul Hubble. Paul talks and when they're released on the weekend Jack decides to stick around and find out what's going on, aided by the attentions of the attractive Roscoe.
Killing floor sets the tone for all the Jack Reacher books, there is descriptive and graphic violence mostly perpetrated by Jack, although often in self defense. I don't know how technically accurate the various moves are but it sounds as if he knows what he's talking about. There is also a good mystery to unravel, some intellgient conversation with a beautiful women and a bit more violence finish it all off. Gripping and dramtaic action is definetly what Lee Child is best at, and Jack Reacher the ideal character for delivering it, everybody else is just along for the ride and to provide a bit of dialog to keep the suspense flowing.
Is it beliveable? Not really. But it's cracking good fun, grabs you on page one and sucks you in for the roller coaster ride all the way through.
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development in this book and some features later get abandonded while others added. Lee Child hasn't written a bad book, and even though a few rough edges are still being settled in this book, as a debut it is very impressive!Jack Reacher is an ex-military police major. Having left the army 6 months ago he's visiting all the bits of america that he's heard about but never had a chance to see. A rare conversation with his brother leads to him getting off a bus just outside the town of Margrave to go and see if there's any trace of an old blues musician Blind Blake. Within minutes of his arrival he's arrested on the charge of murder, and despite having a convincing alibi he's sent to the local state prison, along with a preppy local called Paul Hubble. Paul talks and when they're released on the weekend Jack decides to stick around and find out what's going on, aided by the attentions of the attractive Roscoe.
Killing floor sets the tone for all the Jack Reacher books, there is descriptive and graphic violence mostly perpetrated by Jack, although often in self defense. I don't know how technically accurate the various moves are but it sounds as if he knows what he's talking about. There is also a good mystery to unravel, some intellgient conversation with a beautiful women and a bit more violence finish it all off. Gripping and dramtaic action is definetly what Lee Child is best at, and Jack Reacher the ideal character for delivering it, everybody else is just along for the ride and to provide a bit of dialog to keep the suspense flowing.
Is it beliveable? Not really. But it's cracking good fun, grabs you on page one and sucks you in for the roller coaster ride all the way through.
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LibraryThing member ImBookingIt
I'd give the first half of the book 4 stars, maybe even slightly higher. For me, I simply couldn't deal with the violence of the second half. It overshadowed the (interesting) plot, so that I couldn't really appreciate it.I knew going in that this is a thriller rather than a mystery, and that Jack
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Reacher is known for his being a seriously kick-ass kind of guy. I haven't really read this genre before, and started out with a fairly open mind as to how it was going to work for me.I expected that there would be lots and lots of action, a relatively minimal plot, and not much in the way of character development. This describes the second half of the book perfectly. The first half had much more plot and less action than I expected. Characters met my expectations.I quite liked the look into the world of counterfeiting. The setup was fairly involved and well supported. In the first half, Reacher was shown to be a kick-ass guy, and indeed several asses were kicked. Only a few of these asses ended up dead, and the ratio of plot to people killed by the good guys remained within my tolerance. In the second half, there were many more bad guys that evidently needed killing, and Reacher wasn't too bothered by needing to oblige. The plot continued to move along, but this movement was bogged down for me by the bodies and general mayhem.I actually think this was a well executed example of the genre, but the genre probably won't ever be a favorite of mine. I was listening to the audio version of Killing Floor. Maybe I'd do better with print where I can skim over sections that don't interest me. Show Less
LibraryThing member LisaMaria_C
I disliked this novel, maybe because I'm missing a Y chromosome. First, the style of the prose and voice of the first person narrator, Jack Reacher, really irked me. The style reminded me of irritatingly faux Hemingway. Spare, choppy with lots of short declarative sentences and sentence fragments.
I stayed leaning up on the bars, motionless. Baker signaled Hubble to walk with him around the far side of the squad room. Toward the rosewood office in back. As Hubble rounded the end of the reception desk, I saw his feet. Tan boat shoes. No socks. The two men walked out of sight into the office. The door closed. The desk sergeant left his post and went outside to part Baker's cruiser.
It's pretty much all like that--unvarying and that style doesn't wear well. Imagery? Great description? Actual sentence: It was about as distinctive as the most distinctive thing you could ever think of. The other problem I had with the voice (and character) was that, as the blurb from Jeffrey Deaver put it, Jack Reacher is one of those "tough guy heroes." The kind that has not a trace of a sense of humor and all the affect of a Vulcan purged of all emotion at Gol. The kind of guy that has the first pretty woman in view have the hots for him and sleep with him within two days of meeting him (almost of of which he spent in jail) even though she's a police officer who met him when taking his prints, he's been living like a vagrant and he's a murder suspect. The kind who kills with his own hands without a ripple of remorse or queasiness. And the violent streak got worse as the novel went along--at first it was justifiable self defense, even if ruthless and brutal. (In an early encounter Reacher gouges out an eye.) But it eventually became Mike Hammer-like cold-blooded murders--only justifiable to fans of Death Wish.
The part I did like was that Reacher is a former military policeman who has a Sherlock Holmes touch about him at times. Such as when he dazzles Detective Finley with deductions about his background. (Except, please, there's no such thing as "Harvard tones." There's a Boston accent among natives of the area, but that's different. Child supposedly has a British background, so maybe superimposing Oxford in his mind unto Harvard explains that piece of bizarreness.) It was also entertaining how even when he had been arrested for murder and was being questioned, Reacher was treating Finley more like a colleague investigating the murder with him than his interrogator. That had a kind of cool about it I appreciated in the beginning.
But coincidences pile up (two brothers who haven't met in years cross paths by chance in a small Georgia town they had never before visited even though one is based in D.C. and the other is a drifter criss-crossing the country), plot holes yawn as wide as canyons (a treasury agent is investigating a case that threatens the United States economy; he's reported killed and it's ignored by the Feds), implausibilities stack (Reacher, a West Point graduate who reached the rank of major by 36 has been involuntarily demobilized out of the army because of budget cuts) and as mentioned above, Reacher begins to kill in a way that would make Rambo proud, giving me testosterone poisoning. So, unless someone tells me this series or author got way, way better, this will be my last Lee Child novel. Hell, to be honest, after this experience no matter what anyone tells me this will be my last Lee Child novel.
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Here's a sample paragraph from fairly early on that's typical:I stayed leaning up on the bars, motionless. Baker signaled Hubble to walk with him around the far side of the squad room. Toward the rosewood office in back. As Hubble rounded the end of the reception desk, I saw his feet. Tan boat shoes. No socks. The two men walked out of sight into the office. The door closed. The desk sergeant left his post and went outside to part Baker's cruiser.
It's pretty much all like that--unvarying and that style doesn't wear well. Imagery? Great description? Actual sentence: It was about as distinctive as the most distinctive thing you could ever think of. The other problem I had with the voice (and character) was that, as the blurb from Jeffrey Deaver put it, Jack Reacher is one of those "tough guy heroes." The kind that has not a trace of a sense of humor and all the affect of a Vulcan purged of all emotion at Gol. The kind of guy that has the first pretty woman in view have the hots for him and sleep with him within two days of meeting him (almost of of which he spent in jail) even though she's a police officer who met him when taking his prints, he's been living like a vagrant and he's a murder suspect. The kind who kills with his own hands without a ripple of remorse or queasiness. And the violent streak got worse as the novel went along--at first it was justifiable self defense, even if ruthless and brutal. (In an early encounter Reacher gouges out an eye.) But it eventually became Mike Hammer-like cold-blooded murders--only justifiable to fans of Death Wish.
The part I did like was that Reacher is a former military policeman who has a Sherlock Holmes touch about him at times. Such as when he dazzles Detective Finley with deductions about his background. (Except, please, there's no such thing as "Harvard tones." There's a Boston accent among natives of the area, but that's different. Child supposedly has a British background, so maybe superimposing Oxford in his mind unto Harvard explains that piece of bizarreness.) It was also entertaining how even when he had been arrested for murder and was being questioned, Reacher was treating Finley more like a colleague investigating the murder with him than his interrogator. That had a kind of cool about it I appreciated in the beginning.
But coincidences pile up (two brothers who haven't met in years cross paths by chance in a small Georgia town they had never before visited even though one is based in D.C. and the other is a drifter criss-crossing the country), plot holes yawn as wide as canyons (a treasury agent is investigating a case that threatens the United States economy; he's reported killed and it's ignored by the Feds), implausibilities stack (Reacher, a West Point graduate who reached the rank of major by 36 has been involuntarily demobilized out of the army because of budget cuts) and as mentioned above, Reacher begins to kill in a way that would make Rambo proud, giving me testosterone poisoning. So, unless someone tells me this series or author got way, way better, this will be my last Lee Child novel. Hell, to be honest, after this experience no matter what anyone tells me this will be my last Lee Child novel.
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LibraryThing member enemyanniemae
I don't know about this book. I read an older Jack Reacher novel and it was very tense and well written. Lee Child's writing (and his research) definitely improved as he went along. This first installment in the Reacher series was just OK. There are a lot of very implausible things that happen in
The story is told from Reacher's perspective in the first person. He's ex-military and is pretty much a vagrant. He has no home, no address, no permanence of any kind. On a whim he asks the bus driver to let him get off near a small town in Georgia because his brother once told him about a blind guitar player's death and he wants to see if he can find out anything about it. He hasn't spoken to his brother for years. Wouldn't you know that he is arrested for murder as he sits in the diner eating breakfast and the murdered person just happens to turn out to be his brother, who also just happens to be a hot shot in the Treasury Department? (Interestingly, no one from the government seems to be concerned that he's gone off on a job and then disappeared-- huh?) Add a yuppie banker in deep trouble, a pretty lady cop and a Harvard by-the-book lawman. Mix in a group of villains so stereotypical that it's almost funny. Toss in a weekend in the pen and madness ensues.
If I had read this novel first and not One Shot (which I believe is the ninth in the series), I might not have continued. However, since One Shot was so good, I will give Lee Child and Jack Reacher the benefit of the doubt and keep going. I do hope that he gets better fast.
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this thriller... things that make you just sort of go "Oh, come on." The story is told from Reacher's perspective in the first person. He's ex-military and is pretty much a vagrant. He has no home, no address, no permanence of any kind. On a whim he asks the bus driver to let him get off near a small town in Georgia because his brother once told him about a blind guitar player's death and he wants to see if he can find out anything about it. He hasn't spoken to his brother for years. Wouldn't you know that he is arrested for murder as he sits in the diner eating breakfast and the murdered person just happens to turn out to be his brother, who also just happens to be a hot shot in the Treasury Department? (Interestingly, no one from the government seems to be concerned that he's gone off on a job and then disappeared-- huh?) Add a yuppie banker in deep trouble, a pretty lady cop and a Harvard by-the-book lawman. Mix in a group of villains so stereotypical that it's almost funny. Toss in a weekend in the pen and madness ensues.
If I had read this novel first and not One Shot (which I believe is the ninth in the series), I might not have continued. However, since One Shot was so good, I will give Lee Child and Jack Reacher the benefit of the doubt and keep going. I do hope that he gets better fast.
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LibraryThing member Eyejaybee
This is the first Lee Child book that I have read and I have to admit that I was impressed, despite my prior expectations to the contrary. I don;t often read this sort of high action thriller but thought that this one was written very well in a clear concise style that certainly held my attention.
A nice easy and enjoyable read for the holiday period.
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A nice easy and enjoyable read for the holiday period.
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LibraryThing member Schmerguls
This is an excitng book and is the first novel by Child. It features Jack Reacher, who is tall and powerful He by chance stops at a town in Georgia, where coincidence has him accused of killing his brother. He is taken to jail where he brutally takes care of killer types in the prison. He never is
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in much doubt as to how to proceed to overcome his powerful enemies. All his plans work out, and he does a lot of fornicating as he proceeds to blow away those who would do him wrong. It is pleasant that evil is so thwarted and that nothing very often goes wrong. But when one reflects on the events they are seen to be mostly incedible. But that is not bothersome when one reads along in the fast-paced story. There is no subtlety in the prose and anyone looking for intricacy or uncertainty in the story will not find it. Show Less
LibraryThing member jimmaclachlan
I read this as a paperback & it didn't wow me. I hadn't planned on reading any more in this series, but several of my friends really like the series, so I thought I'd give it another shot. Maybe I'd like it better as an audio book or now.
I didn't. Probably liked it less. Child's writing is
Reacher is too much in charge too often, & the constant build of him over other characters just got old.When he figured out how the counterfeiting was being done & told Finnley is one example. It's also an example of treating his readers like idiots. There were half a dozen obvious clues pointing to this revelation. I guess the women were impressed by his manly smell because he wandered around in the heat for days without a change of clothes or a shower & they still seemed to like him. There were a lot of other examples & they steadily eroded my appreciation of his character.
Child did the same thing with the shotguns making them into some sort of magical killing machines.A ten gauge shotgun is fearsome, but their killing cone is a direct ratio between their choke & load. Ask any decent goose or duck hunter, but I certainly wouldn't have feared for the women unless the guy was going to shoot directly at them.
Several plot holes were just too glaring, especially at the end. The amount of money paying off the town businesses, the supposed secrecy, & all was just too much. It's such a big secret that only business owners know after 5 years, but Reacher finds out after talking to a guy twice? He also said there must be $100K in the old guy's closet when a bit of math would put it at $250K or so. We need to believe Reacher has the estimates down in other places.
The mountain of money was silly. The bills weren't transported in by dump truck. They'd have been in boxes, should have been stored in boxes & then transferred into other boxes. To save time & effort, I would have ordered boxes just a hair bigger & not bothered unboxing the money at all since it was just being transferred.
What was the sudden rush to transport the money & why was the Coast Guard thing such a big shock? They were supposedly stockpiling money for just such an event, but leave it loose in a mountain that anyone who enters the building can see. So they figured it would be a few months away & have killed everyone off, but still haven't gotten it boxed up when their self-imposed deadline for shipping is one day away. They couldn't figure out any other way to transport it after the Coast Guard clamped down? After an entire year? Everyone is so shocked they were so brilliant in the scheme, but they couldn't plant money inside equipment or something? Please.
Reacher's surprise at the circus at the end was way overdone. I expected Child to & believe the story would have been much better served by killing Roscoe off at the end.
There were some good points in the book. Some of the scenes were well done & the story was a good one overall. I liked the way the odd, main coincidence was worked in. I have the 2d audio book in this series. I think I'll try to listen to it. I've heard the series gets better. It has to.
I didn't. Probably liked it less. Child's writing is
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repetitive. Often he seemed to be trying to make the point that much more exciting, but it just bored me. He writes like his readers are idiots & can't keep a point in mind for a few paragraphs. He also spends a lot of time describing the obvious & minutiae, but skips inconvenient details like Reacher's hygiene.Reacher is too much in charge too often, & the constant build of him over other characters just got old.
Child did the same thing with the shotguns making them into some sort of magical killing machines.
Several plot holes were just too glaring, especially at the end.
The mountain of money was silly. The bills weren't transported in by dump truck. They'd have been in boxes, should have been stored in boxes & then transferred into other boxes. To save time & effort, I would have ordered boxes just a hair bigger & not bothered unboxing the money at all since it was just being transferred.
What was the sudden rush to transport the money & why was the Coast Guard thing such a big shock? They were supposedly stockpiling money for just such an event, but leave it loose in a mountain that anyone who enters the building can see. So they figured it would be a few months away & have killed everyone off, but still haven't gotten it boxed up when their self-imposed deadline for shipping is one day away. They couldn't figure out any other way to transport it after the Coast Guard clamped down? After an entire year? Everyone is so shocked they were so brilliant in the scheme, but they couldn't plant money inside equipment or something? Please.
Reacher's surprise at the circus at the end was way overdone. I expected Child to & believe the story would have been much better served by killing Roscoe off at the end.
There were some good points in the book. Some of the scenes were well done & the story was a good one overall. I liked the way the odd, main coincidence was worked in. I have the 2d audio book in this series. I think I'll try to listen to it. I've heard the series gets better. It has to.
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LibraryThing member jedziedz
The first book in the series. Jack Reacher stops by a small town and within hours is in jail for a murder he didn't commit. Throughout the next few days, he and a few local cops, take down a group of corrupt townspeople. This is a great read for those who love books with a lot of action.
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Personally, I liked this book but felt it could have been shorter. There were many instances when the author would go on for the length of a page and discuss the type of gun Reacher was using or the reasons why he couldn't shoot from a certain angle. Other than that, this was a great read. Show Less
LibraryThing member bibliobbe
So, you arrive in a small town, for no reason other than a famous blues guitarist used to live there. Shortly after your arrival, you are arrested for a murder that happened before you got there. Turns out the dead guy was your brother. It probably helps that you’re a former military policeman
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who specialised in homicide. That way, you’ll be able to spot the extreme corruption in town, and work out pretty quickly who are the good guys and who are the bad guys. Maybe. Well, it’s true thrillers don’t really do it for me, but this was entertaining enough. If you’re stuck at the airport with a long flight ahead of you and nothing better to read you could do it, otherwise... Show Less
LibraryThing member PGAllison
The start of Lee Child's fantastic tough thrillers featuring Jack Reacher. Apart from the occasional improbable coincidences this is perfectly plotted, and I don't know of any writer in the genre who does it better.
LibraryThing member MediaWrite
This is the best of all Lee Child's Jack Reacher novels. Read this first, then read all the rest. Action, mystery, and a very intriguing central character. Jack Reacher has a consistent, admirable code of ethics very much like John D. McDonald's Travis McGee. He always triumphs over the bad guys,
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which I have to say is very satisfying. The author researches his subjects thoroughly, right down to meticulously detailed methods for adjusting a rifle's sights so it fires true. The writing style is spare, not flowery; done so well that you enter the author's world and don't leave it until you finish the book. Show Less
LibraryThing member Bookmarque
For years I’ve heard about the Jack Reacher novels, but this is the first one I’ve read. I’m already committed to too many series as it is, but I figured what the hell. Overall it was pretty good. Preposterous, but engaging. I solved the patently transparent mystery pretty much at once so
Those with little tolerance for well described violence need not apply. Reacher does not hesitate to kill when he has to. Bloodthirsty he is not, but he will end things finally if forced. He prefers silent methods though, which make for better scenes, but can be a bit off-putting if you're wired that way. Me, I wasn't bothered by them. They seemed appropriate to both the situation and the characterization of Reacher. If you can live with that and the fact that the series seems to be built on wild coincidence, you'll like these. I think a part of me wants to be Jack Reacher. At least to have his cool sensibilities and unflappable demeanor.
I am disappointed by one thing however. I was going with the flow, enjoying all of the tactical and technical details that make up a large part of who Reacher is. Planning, assessment, weapons, tactics, self-defense, observations, judgments; it was all fascinating and I bought it. Right up until the part where Reacher put a Desert Eagle in his pocket. Does Child have any idea how frigging big a Desert Eagle is? I suspect he just thought it sounded cool. A Desert Eagle is not a stealthy weapon, neither is it one that fits comfortably or unobtrusively in a pocket.
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that’s not what kept me engaged. It was more like watching MacGuyver – the danger wasn’t real, you just stuck around to see how he’d make it through. Plus I like Jack Reacher and I liked Roscoe and Finlay, too. And who doesn’t want to stick around to see a bunch of scumbags get taken down?Those with little tolerance for well described violence need not apply. Reacher does not hesitate to kill when he has to. Bloodthirsty he is not, but he will end things finally if forced. He prefers silent methods though, which make for better scenes, but can be a bit off-putting if you're wired that way. Me, I wasn't bothered by them. They seemed appropriate to both the situation and the characterization of Reacher. If you can live with that and the fact that the series seems to be built on wild coincidence, you'll like these. I think a part of me wants to be Jack Reacher. At least to have his cool sensibilities and unflappable demeanor.
I am disappointed by one thing however. I was going with the flow, enjoying all of the tactical and technical details that make up a large part of who Reacher is. Planning, assessment, weapons, tactics, self-defense, observations, judgments; it was all fascinating and I bought it. Right up until the part where Reacher put a Desert Eagle in his pocket. Does Child have any idea how frigging big a Desert Eagle is? I suspect he just thought it sounded cool. A Desert Eagle is not a stealthy weapon, neither is it one that fits comfortably or unobtrusively in a pocket.
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LibraryThing member harpua
A friend of mine has talked about Lee Child's books quite a bit lately so I thought I'd give one a try. Overall not a bad story. I did have it pretty much figured out from the get go so as I moved through the story, there was not much suspense. However, I did enjoy the path from beginning to end.
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The middle slowed down and made it hard to pick up for a little bit, but the last third of the book picked up nicely and was very enjoyable. Jack Reacher intrigues me as a character and I'm looking forward to more of his adventures. Show Less
LibraryThing member miyurose
This was very good. The main character was unique and interesting, and he kept you intrigued. Also, while I could feel there was going to be a twist, I didn't quite have it figured out. I like to be surprised. And I've discovered it's the first in a series. I'll be sure to check out the others!
LibraryThing member JSJStein
I loved the character of Jack Reacher. Will read more now in this series
LibraryThing member nightrreaders
Lee Child came through again with this one. I really enjoyed way things started out. Although some of the story was predictable, it was still worth the read. This book has a lot of well written action, interesting characters and still managed to throw in a few unexpected twist. I would say that
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this book is well worth the read. Show Less
LibraryThing member chmessing
I read this for my office book club. Would not have picked it up otherwise, but enjoyed it. It's your basic hard-boiled police procedural, which will require you to suspend reality for the sake of the story. But it's worth it and I would read more of this series.
LibraryThing member edwardsgt
Another excellent Reacher novel with an interesting plot line. Reacher is six months out of the Army and on the road, when on a whim he visits Margrave Georgia and finds himself accused of a murder as a stranger in town. The usual twists and turns of a Lee Child plot and I won't say more which
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might give it away, but it me wanting to turn the page to see what happened next. Sometimes I had a hunch about who was a bad guy, but my expectations about who would come to a nasty end didn't always come true. Enough said! Show Less
LibraryThing member cfink
Lee Child introduces Jack Reacher, a loner with all the grit of Sam Spade and all the heart of Phillip Marlowe. In fact, Child himself channels the noir greats with his terse, no nonsense writing style.
The story revolves around the co-opting of an entire small southern town, and its citizens'
Less important than the plot is the lead character, Jack Reacher. An ex-military policeman, he is now a benign drifter. Child uses great prose to paint his character and the action. The mood broods with a constant sense of doom around the corner, keeping the pages turning.
What a treat that there are many more Jack Reacher books!
The story revolves around the co-opting of an entire small southern town, and its citizens'
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complicity in illegal doings. To avoid spoilers, I'll save the details to the reader. Plenty of mystery, crime, and plot to go around. Be forewarned: there is some gruesome violence.Less important than the plot is the lead character, Jack Reacher. An ex-military policeman, he is now a benign drifter. Child uses great prose to paint his character and the action. The mood broods with a constant sense of doom around the corner, keeping the pages turning.
What a treat that there are many more Jack Reacher books!
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LibraryThing member kylenapoli
I know Child, and Jack Reacher himself, have a rabid following, but this did not make me a believer. Perhaps later books in the series are better, less workmanlike? Still, I wouldn't hesitate to grab one at, say, an airport bookstore on a long layover.
LibraryThing member debavp
Lee Child has been talked about quite positively the past few years so I decided to give his Jack Reacher series a try.
I was pleasantly surprised. Some tough violence, which makes me wonder the direction Reacher is going to evolve in.
Absolutely fantastic way to introduce a character--Child
Looking forward to the next installment.
I was pleasantly surprised. Some tough violence, which makes me wonder the direction Reacher is going to evolve in.
Absolutely fantastic way to introduce a character--Child
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literally builds Reacher before your eyes, and does not give you a ton of filler. Like the other characters in the book, you have to learn who this guy is right along with them.Looking forward to the next installment.
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LibraryThing member crazybatcow
It's a suspenseful crime novel with some violence and a cold hard main character. Is it a very original plot, no; is it hard to figure out the mystery, no; do you like the main character, sorta. (Actually, the only real mystery in the story is where the title came from... the plot doesn't have
If you're looking for some insight into a man's behavior, or some touchy-feely stuff, you won't find it here. Jack Reacher starts out in the novel as an intelligent hobo and by the end of the story mutates into an intelligent cold hard killing machine. Is this believable, no... is it enjoyable... OH YEAH.
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anything to do with what one would think of when thinking of a killing floor, but anyway...)If you're looking for some insight into a man's behavior, or some touchy-feely stuff, you won't find it here. Jack Reacher starts out in the novel as an intelligent hobo and by the end of the story mutates into an intelligent cold hard killing machine. Is this believable, no... is it enjoyable... OH YEAH.
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LibraryThing member jimmaclachlan
It was written pretty well, very engaging at times & the characters were fairly well fleshed out, but there were huge plot holes, especially at the end. Logic was tossed to the winds for effect & it hurt the book irreparably.
The book relies heavily on coincidence. That was terrible, but it got
Still, I didn't put it down, but I was disappointed. I don't think I'll get another of this, the Jack Reacher series, unless someone tells me they get better. I'd also be curious to know if any of the other books are better.
The book relies heavily on coincidence. That was terrible, but it got
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stretched. About halfway through, the book should have been winding up, but instead it got padded out with too much bad plot. I felt the author was struggling for the word count.Still, I didn't put it down, but I was disappointed. I don't think I'll get another of this, the Jack Reacher series, unless someone tells me they get better. I'd also be curious to know if any of the other books are better.
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LibraryThing member porchsitter55
An excellent, suspenseful thriller that kept my interest from page one. The main character is named Jack Reacher, who gets off a bus just outside a small town. searching for the real story behind an old blues singer's death, only to find the little town of Margrave filled with corruption,
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counterfeit money, incredible coincidence.....and murder. This one was just right....not too light, not too heavy. A perfect mix of action, adventure and drama. I can't wait to read more by this author! Superb writing! Show Less
LibraryThing member Aloel
Welcome to Margrave, Georgia—but don't get too attached to the townsfolk, who are either in on a giant conspiracy, or hurtling toward violent deaths, or both.
There's not much of a welcome for Jack Reacher, a casualty of the Army's peace dividend who's drifted into town idly looking for traces of
Banking on the help of the only two people in Margrave he can trust—a Harvard-educated chief of detectives who hasn't been on the job long enough to be on the take, and a smart, scrappy officer who's taken him to her bed— he sets out methodically in his brother's footsteps, trying to figure out why his cellmate in Warburton, a panicky banker whose cell-phone number turned up in Joe's shoe, confessed to a murder he obviously didn't commit; trying to figure out why all the out-of-towners on Joe's list of recent contacts were as dead as he was; and trying to stop the local carnage or at least direct it in more positive ways. Though the testosterone flows as freely as printer's ink, Reacher is an unobtrusively sharp detective in his quieter moments—not that there are many of them to judge by.
There's not much of a welcome for Jack Reacher, a casualty of the Army's peace dividend who's drifted into town idly looking for traces of
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a long dead black jazzman. Not only do the local cops arrest him for murder, but the chief of police turns eyewitness to place him on the scene, even though Reacher was getting on a bus in Tampa at the time. Two surprises follow: The murdered man wasn't the only victim, and he was Reacher's brother whom he hadn't seen in seven years. So Reacher, who so far hasn't had anything personal against the crooks who set him up for a weekend in the state pen at Warburton, clicks into overdrive.Banking on the help of the only two people in Margrave he can trust—a Harvard-educated chief of detectives who hasn't been on the job long enough to be on the take, and a smart, scrappy officer who's taken him to her bed— he sets out methodically in his brother's footsteps, trying to figure out why his cellmate in Warburton, a panicky banker whose cell-phone number turned up in Joe's shoe, confessed to a murder he obviously didn't commit; trying to figure out why all the out-of-towners on Joe's list of recent contacts were as dead as he was; and trying to stop the local carnage or at least direct it in more positive ways. Though the testosterone flows as freely as printer's ink, Reacher is an unobtrusively sharp detective in his quieter moments—not that there are many of them to judge by.
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Subjects
Awards
Anthony Award (Nominee — First Novel — 1998)
Macavity Award (Nominee — First Novel — 1998)
Barry Award (Winner — First Novel — 1998)
Dilys Award (Nominee — 1998)
Language
Original publication date
1997-03-17
ISBN
0515123447 / 9780515123449