The Enemy (Jack Reacher Series) [Abridged, Audiobook, CD] [Audio CD]

Lee Child (Author), Dick Hill (Reader)

Book Description

Publication Date: November 30, 2009 | Series: Jack Reacher Series (Book 8)

Jack Reacher. Hero. Loner. Soldier. Soldier’s son. An elite military cop, he was one of the army’s brightest stars. But in every cop’s life there is a turning point. One case. One messy, tangled case that can shatter a career. Turn a lawman into a renegade. And make him question words like honor, valor, and duty. For Jack Reacher, this is that case... New Year’s Day, 1990. The Berlin Wall is coming down. The world is changing. And in a North Carolina “hot-sheets” motel, a two-star general is found dead. His briefcase is missing. Nobody knows what was in it. Within minutes Jack Reacher has his orders: Control the situation. But this situation can’t be controlled. Within hours the general’s wife is murdered hundreds of miles away. Then the dominoes really start to fall... Two Special Forces soldiers - the toughest of the tough - are taken down, one at a time. Top military commanders are moved from place to place in a bizarre game of chess. And somewhere inside the vast worldwide fortress that is the U.S. Army, Jack Reacher - an ordinarily untouchable investigator for the 110th Special Unit - is being set up as a fall guy with the worst enemies a man can have. But Reacher won’t quit. He’s fighting a new kind of war. And he’s taking a young female lieutenant with him on a deadly hunt that leads them from the ragged edges of a rural army post to the winding streets of Paris to a confrontation with an enemy he didn’t know he had. With his French-born mother dying - and divulging to her son one last, stunning secret - Reacher is forced to question everything he once believed...about his family, his career, his loyalties - and himself. Because this soldier’s son is on his way into the darkness, where he finds a tangled drama of desperate desires and violent death - and a conspiracy more chilling, ingenious, and treacherous than anyone could have guessed.

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

Child (The Persuader, etc.) brings back his intrepid hero, Jack Reacher, for another excellent mystery, which steps back in time to the eventful first few weeks of 1990. The Berlin Wall has just come crashing down, marking an end to the Cold War, and as a result, the U.S. Army is facing a massive restructuring of purpose and personnel. During this turbulent time, 29-year-old Reacher, an MP major stationed to a base in North Carolina, is called on to investigate the death of a two-star general found dead in a seedy motel. Veteran reader Wolf, who has given voice to Reacher in seven previous novels, slips easily into this character; his calm, thoughtful delivery fits perfectly with Reacher's contemplative first-person narration. Wolf uses his voice to draw listeners into Reacher's investigation, as the MP ponders each clue and follows a trail of cover-ups and murder to the highest echelons of the military. Although Wolf struggles a bit with his French accents, his narration complements one of the best novels in Child's series.
Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved. --This text refers to an alternate Audio CD edition.

From Bookmarks Magazine

Child continues to knock out his action sequences with flair, but in The Enemy, he takes time to depict the piecemeal construction of a criminal investigation. He also spends energy on the hero’s relationship with his mother and brother, an effort that further fills in Reacher’s background and will surely please long-time fans of the character. It’s true, Child throws in some clichéd elements to this otherwise first-rate story. But most reviewers easily looked past that flaw. “After reading these books for so many years, I’m not easily kept in the dark,” claims the St. Petersburg Times, “so it’s always fun when I’m still guessing toward the end.”

Copyright © 2004 Phillips & Nelson Media, Inc. --This text refers to the Hardcover edition.

See all Editorial Reviews

Product Details

• Audio CD
• Publisher: Brilliance Audio on CD Value Priced; Abridged edition (November 30, 2009)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1441826432
• ISBN-13: 978-1441826435
• Product Dimensions: 5.6 x 5 x 0.5 inches
• Shipping Weight: 2.1 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 3.9 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (201 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #1,847,256 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

More About the Author

Lee Child is the #1 internationally bestselling author of thirteen Reacher thrillers, including the New York Times bestsellers The Enemy, One Shot, The Hard Way, and the #1 bestselling Bad Luck and Trouble and Nothing to Lose. His debut, Killing Floor, won both the Anthony and the Barry awards for Best First Mystery, and The Enemy won both the Barry and the Nero awards for Best Novel. Foreign rights in the Reacher series have sold in forty territories, and all titles have been optioned for major motion pictures. Child, a native of England and a former television director, lives in New York City, where he is at work on his fourteenth Reacher thriller, 61 Hours.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

72 of 79 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Exciting police procedural with a blockbuster ending., May 16, 2004

By 

Mary Whipple (New England) - See all my reviews
(TOP 50 REVIEWER)    (COMMUNITY FORUM 04)    (HALL OF FAME REVIEWER)   

This review is from: The Enemy (Jack Reacher, No. 8) (Hardcover)

In the taut, staccato style reminiscent of Raymond Chandler or John D. MacDonald, Lee Child presents his eighth Jack Reacher novel, a police procedural with a difference: Reacher is an MP, an army Major at Fort Bird, North Carolina, obedient to a different set of rules and objectives. Recently transferred from Panama to be MP Executive Officer, Reacher must immediately investigate the death of a two-star general who has died in a seedy, nearby motel, presumably with a prostitute. His briefcase, containing the agenda for a top-secret conference in California, has disappeared, and when Reacher and his aide, Lt. Summer, go to break the news to the general's wife, they find her dead, too, bludgeoned to death with a crowbar within hours of the general's death.

With almost military precision, dramatic complications unfold, and Reacher soon finds himself facing two new deaths, one of which is a gruesome butchering which takes place on the base. Ordered by superiors to cover up the murder by calling it a "training accident," Reacher and his aide investigate surreptitiously, soon discovering that his MP XO counterparts at twenty more bases throughout the world have also been newly appointed to their positions, all of them on or around December 29. Obvious questions arise about who is pulling the strings, who has the power to transfer so many MPs to new posts, and why someone would want to do so.

Child is a meticulous writer whose plot follows a strict chronological order and moves at a breath-taking pace, with one dramatic scene following hard on the heels of another. Reacher and his aide Summer are not fully developed characters, but they do not need to be as they struggle to learn who is controlling the grisly chess game which has resulted in four deaths. The action is resolved in an extravagant grand finale, with twists and turns and spectacular surprises. Though the ending resolves the disparate threads, it may also be a disappointment to some readers, since the premise behind the plot and the motivation which led to the murders, when finally revealed, seems too unrealistic to justify the murderous extremes to which "the enemy" has gone. Though Child is brilliant in creating an exciting story packed with action, the final pages feel cynical and reveal a view of humanity that is grim. Mary Whipple

19 of 19 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars A master work from a master craftsman, May 12, 2004

By 

Rae "rae_2756" (Oakland, CA USA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: The Enemy (Jack Reacher, No. 8) (Hardcover)

Lee Child writes books the way Miles Davis played music. Every composition contains recognizable elements, and yet every composition is completely different.

In a Lee Child composition, some of the recognizable elements are: clean, elegant prose; a tight plot; abundant twists and turns; and more than one heart stopping surprise. An added element in "The Enemy" is that this book not only stops the heart, but tugs at the heartstrings.

The eighth Jack Reacher novel, "The Enemy" takes place in 1990, as the Berlin Wall is coming down and the world is drastically changing. In the Army, Jack Reacher's life-long home, change is not good. It's an enemy to be defeated by any means necessary. Reacher is a man who has dedicated his life to doing the right thing, to protecting the Army. Now he's faced with an awful task: he must protect the Army from itself.

In seven previous Jack Reacher novels, we've come to know him as a loner, a man who cannot and will not end his chosen life of wandering isolation. In "The Enemy" we meet a younger Reacher, not yet hardened by the choices this case will force upon him. This Reacher is just a bit warmer, just a bit more accessible, with an easier sense of humor.

When he's inexplicably transferred from Panama to Fort Bird, North Carolina, Reacher doesn't think much of it - hey, it's the Army - but he soon discovers that this is no ordinary assignment. A heart attack victim at the local no-tell motel is a two-star general. The general's wife is found murdered. Reacher's commanding officer is replaced, suspiciously, by a vicious idiot who wants nothing more than to make Reacher the fall guy for the entire mess. And in Paris, Reacher's mother is very, very ill.

Partnering with a young, female lieutenant, Reacher sets out to solve the mystery in spite of the roadblocks in his path. And, typically, he refuses to let anything or anyone stop him. Just as typically, Reacher is determined to do the right thing, no matter what the personal cost may be. In this case, the personal cost will be high - maybe more than Reacher can afford.

The question at the heart of the book is, who or what really is the enemy that Reacher has to fight? And does he have any hope at all of winning the battle? Lee Child has written another gripping novel, one with heart and soul, suspense and passion - a masterwork from a master craftsman.

23 of 25 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Flashback to Reacher as Army Major / MP -- fine tale!, May 31, 2004

By 

Gerald M. Bull "Jerry Bull" (Fairview, TN United States) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: The Enemy (Jack Reacher, No. 8) (Hardcover)

We've been hooked by Child's Jack Reacher series since reading "Killing Floor". Unlike the other seven, which feature our leading man as basically a vagrant vigilante, wandering around incognito solving difficult problems and snapping necks here and there (!), in "Enemy" we have almost a Clancy-style military thriller from when Jack was still in the Army. After being transferred rather suddenly just before New Year's 1990, Jack is soon embroiled in the murder of a 2-star found in an unlikely motel near the Ft. Bird post. When the general's wife, two states away, is murdered hours later, it's obvious something more sinister than an assignation gone bad is at hand. Reacher partners with an ambitious young black Lt. Summer, and together they chase clues (and each other periodically), with not as much violence on Jack's part as usual, until a conspiracy originating at high levels is uncovered. Still the plot takes unusual turns and twists right 'til the end, building deep suspense that keeps the page turns flying! And in the end, Jack administers a pleasing touch of his own brand of justice just in case!

An interesting side development is the death of Jack's mother in Paris. He meets his brother Joe there to visit with her and through some rather poignant scenes, we share the brothers' agony as they deal with their mother's dignified approach to a fatal cancer. This part of the story helps us make sense of later relationships and interactions between Reacher and Joe...

Child's stories never fail to entertain and "Enemy" is no exception. A complicated plot lets Reacher reveal his more intellectual side, and the "prequel" nature of this story sheds new light on his behavior in the current time tales that have preceded this book. All in all, another fine and enjoyable novel from Lee Child.