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US Mall 1 - Nothing to Lose (Jack Reacher, No. 12)
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List Price: $27.00
Our Price: $8.96
Your Save: $ 18.04 ( 67% )
Availability: Usually ships in 24 hours
Manufacturer: Delacorte Press
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Average Customer Rating:   
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Binding: Hardcover
Dewey Decimal Number: 813.54
EAN: 9780385340564
ISBN: 0385340567
Label: Delacorte Press
Manufacturer: Delacorte Press
Number Of Items: 1
Number Of Pages: 416
Publication Date: 2008-06-03
Publisher: Delacorte Press
Release Date: 2008-06-03
Studio: Delacorte Press
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Spotlight customer reviews:
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Customer Rating:
Summary: Nothing to Lose? - Try over 1/2 your readers.
Comment: Another left wing artist, in this case Child, successfully alienates his core audience with his "Child-ish" leftest political tripe.
The only Reacher novel I didn't bother finishing.
Customer Rating:
Summary: Politics aside, still a sub-par Reacher story.
Comment: Many here are knocking this book for Reacher's political views. Regardless of your politics, the book still does not measure up to previous work in the series. If you take out the political discussions, it is a weak story, with cardboard characters and improbable plot twists. Reacher seems to spend half of the book driving around aimlessly and cluelessly. Say what you want about previous books in the series, they were never boring. This one is boring. It reads like Child had to deliver a new book by a certain date, so he sat down and cranked out a couple hundred pages without much thought or care about the content. Or the reader.
Customer Rating:
Summary: An Offensive Disappointment for a Longtime Fan
Comment: My father-in-law and I bonded years ago when he introduced me to the genre of action thrillers. It began when he loaned me a box full of the first 60 or so Remo Williams novels. I still remember that chapter two of each book began with "His name was Remo and . . ."
Our latest action hero has been Jack Reacher, the creation of British television writer Lee Child. Reacher (always Reacher in the series, never Jack) is an imaginative hero. He spent the first thirty-five years or so of his life on military bases. First, as a child of a soldier and then as a top military policeman. The hook is that Reacher, as a military policeman, is something like a super-cop. His targets were trained men, often devious, tough fighters without a moral code.
As he aged, he tired of his regimented life, quit the army, and became a wanderer. Reacher doesn't even have a suitcase. He wears a set of clothes until it wears out, buys good quality English walking shoes, and carries an ATM card and a folding toothbrush. He is something of a cross between Dr. Richard Kimble (The Fugitive) and The Incredible Hulk. Big, tough, strong, and very street smart. He moves from place to place and gets involved in situations usually requiring his violent intervention.
All in all, it has been a highly enjoyable series. The kind of candy I yearned for while working on my dissertation. Upon finishing, I gorged on the likes of Reacher.
The latest, Nothing to Lose, lost me as a customer. Lee Child, the author, seems to have REALLY enjoyed the recent works of village atheists like Richard Dawkins and Sam Harris. He seems to have enjoyed them so much that he had to come up with a highly improbable plot just to demonstrate how stupid he thinks Christians are. Oh, and along the way he manages to claim that nothing the American military has done since 1945 has been worth the price of men's lives.
But Child's little crusade against conservative protestants and American military efforts of the past sixty years wouldn't have been enough to send me packing if the book weren't so bad. The villain catches Reacher multiple times and somewhat inexplicably lets him go. The bad guy has a compound. Reacher spends the entire novel working his way in and out of the compound as he goes between two towns, Hope and Despair. On the one hand, the villain has put together an incredibly devious and ingenious plan to help bring about the apocalypse. On the other, Child (through Reacher) assures us that the villain is a weak-minded man who is accustomed to believing things that comfort him. It is profoundly boring, which is something I have never been remotely close to saying about any of the other books. It was literally an act of will for me to continue reading Nothing to Lose. I was determined to finish because I knew it would likely be the last run for Reacher and me.
Now, having finished, I'm sure of it. It was.
Customer Rating:
Summary: Less but still good
Comment: While this may be the least captivating of the Reacher books, he's still the toughest guy in literature. I certainly don't want to cross him. Nothing to Lose is somewhat unbelievable, but does confront a challenge of the Iraq War not thought about. The writing hasn't declined, only the plot line. Reacher never tires and Child has created a character who lives on in his strengths.
Ron Lealos author of Don't Mean Nuthin'
Customer Rating:
Summary: Child Struck Out
Comment: I am just glad I read the previous Jack Reacher novels before I read this one. If I had happened to read this first I would never have gotten to enjoy the others. Flat characters, rambling storyline, improbable and implausible beyond hope.
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Editorial Reviews:
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Customer Rating:
Summary: Nothing to Lose? - Try over 1/2 your readers.
Comment: Another left wing artist, in this case Child, successfully alienates his core audience with his "Child-ish" leftest political tripe.
The only Reacher novel I didn't bother finishing.
Customer Rating:
Summary: Politics aside, still a sub-par Reacher story.
Comment: Many here are knocking this book for Reacher's political views. Regardless of your politics, the book still does not measure up to previous work in the series. If you take out the political discussions, it is a weak story, with cardboard characters and improbable plot twists. Reacher seems to spend half of the book driving around aimlessly and cluelessly. Say what you want about previous books in the series, they were never boring. This one is boring. It reads like Child had to deliver a new book by a certain date, so he sat down and cranked out a couple hundred pages without much thought or care about the content. Or the reader.
Customer Rating:
Summary: An Offensive Disappointment for a Longtime Fan
Comment: My father-in-law and I bonded years ago when he introduced me to the genre of action thrillers. It began when he loaned me a box full of the first 60 or so Remo Williams novels. I still remember that chapter two of each book began with "His name was Remo and . . ."
Our latest action hero has been Jack Reacher, the creation of British television writer Lee Child. Reacher (always Reacher in the series, never Jack) is an imaginative hero. He spent the first thirty-five years or so of his life on military bases. First, as a child of a soldier and then as a top military policeman. The hook is that Reacher, as a military policeman, is something like a super-cop. His targets were trained men, often devious, tough fighters without a moral code.
As he aged, he tired of his regimented life, quit the army, and became a wanderer. Reacher doesn't even have a suitcase. He wears a set of clothes until it wears out, buys good quality English walking shoes, and carries an ATM card and a folding toothbrush. He is something of a cross between Dr. Richard Kimble (The Fugitive) and The Incredible Hulk. Big, tough, strong, and very street smart. He moves from place to place and gets involved in situations usually requiring his violent intervention.
All in all, it has been a highly enjoyable series. The kind of candy I yearned for while working on my dissertation. Upon finishing, I gorged on the likes of Reacher.
The latest, Nothing to Lose, lost me as a customer. Lee Child, the author, seems to have REALLY enjoyed the recent works of village atheists like Richard Dawkins and Sam Harris. He seems to have enjoyed them so much that he had to come up with a highly improbable plot just to demonstrate how stupid he thinks Christians are. Oh, and along the way he manages to claim that nothing the American military has done since 1945 has been worth the price of men's lives.
But Child's little crusade against conservative protestants and American military efforts of the past sixty years wouldn't have been enough to send me packing if the book weren't so bad. The villain catches Reacher multiple times and somewhat inexplicably lets him go. The bad guy has a compound. Reacher spends the entire novel working his way in and out of the compound as he goes between two towns, Hope and Despair. On the one hand, the villain has put together an incredibly devious and ingenious plan to help bring about the apocalypse. On the other, Child (through Reacher) assures us that the villain is a weak-minded man who is accustomed to believing things that comfort him. It is profoundly boring, which is something I have never been remotely close to saying about any of the other books. It was literally an act of will for me to continue reading Nothing to Lose. I was determined to finish because I knew it would likely be the last run for Reacher and me.
Now, having finished, I'm sure of it. It was.
Customer Rating:
Summary: Less but still good
Comment: While this may be the least captivating of the Reacher books, he's still the toughest guy in literature. I certainly don't want to cross him. Nothing to Lose is somewhat unbelievable, but does confront a challenge of the Iraq War not thought about. The writing hasn't declined, only the plot line. Reacher never tires and Child has created a character who lives on in his strengths.
Ron Lealos author of Don't Mean Nuthin'
Customer Rating:
Summary: Child Struck Out
Comment: I am just glad I read the previous Jack Reacher novels before I read this one. If I had happened to read this first I would never have gotten to enjoy the others. Flat characters, rambling storyline, improbable and implausible beyond hope.
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