Gone Tomorrow by Lee Child

So, I had read everything my favorite authors had in print. Needing something to read, I had no choice but to try an author I had not read. Gone Tomorrow, a 2009 Jack Reacher novel by Lee Child was on sale, so I grabbed it. Soon I was inside the head of Jack Reacher, the enigmatic main character of Lee Child's Jack Reacher series and protagonist of the 2012 movie, Jack Reacher, starring Tom Cruise.

First off, Reacher is an intriguing character. He is a retired U.S. Army Military Police Major with a service record that would impress anyone. Reacher is homeless by choice, has no possessions, and travels mainly by thumb. He hitchhikes in solitude, on desolate Nebraska highways in the dead of winter or on other lonely roads in America.

Reacher stumbles into situations by random chance, but once he takes it upon himself to investigate, he is tenacious and unstoppable. He is a big man with exceptional fighting skills. He also has unusually long arms that make him an even more dangerous weapon. Reacher's mind compulsively performs calculations - time, distance, and probabilities. He extrapolates forward and in reverse, and is usually correct with his uncanny predictive reasoning.

Reacher notices the unnoticeable and has a special talent for recognizing deception and deducing that someone is lying. He is always calm and stoic, never given to emotion or impulsiveness. When he acts, he acts decisively and plans for the contingency he considers most likely.

Lee Child's storytelling is efficient. He does not bog down the story with excessive description. Instead, at every stage, he provides just enough detail to set the scene in the reader's mind. The story progresses at just the right pace and allows the reader to make assumptions for a while that turn out to be untrue.

I have read one other Lee Child novel from the Jack Reacher series, A Wanted Man. While that book is more revealing about Reacher's mental processes, the plot is not quite as varied and interesting as in Gone Tomorrow. These books are engaging and entertaining, and I recommend them for fans of thriller novels.