Without Fail [Import] [Hardcover]

Lee Child (Author)

Product Details

• Hardcover: 398 pages
• Publisher: Bantam Press UK; First Edition edition (2002)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0593046862
• ISBN-13: 978-0593046869
• Product Dimensions: 9 x 6.2 x 1.6 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.4 pounds
• Average Customer Review: 4.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (135 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #1,437,154 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

40 of 41 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars A COMPLEX THRILLER SURE TO PLEASE, May 27, 2002

By 

Gail Cooke (TX, USA) - See all my reviews
(VINE VOICE)    (COMMUNITY FORUM 04)    (HALL OF FAME REVIEWER)    (TOP 500 REVIEWER)    (REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Without Fail (Jack Reacher, No. 6) (Hardcover)

England born, New York based thriller writer Lee Child has made an impact on his chosen genre with his first five novels. Much of the acclaim he has received is undoubtedly due to the creation of his memorable protagonist, Jack Reacher. Jack is a cool, canny and collected former military cop who needs all his skills and know-how in "Without Fail."

A female Secret Service agent comes to Reacher with an astounding request: "I want to hire you to assassinate the Vice President of the United States." According to her this is the only way to test the security system she has in place to protect the newly elected V.P.

When she makes this request, she does leave out one significant detail: a team of accomplished killers have already drawn a bead on the Vice President. They, of course, are not aware of Reacher's involvement.

Child has spun a complex, unsettling thriller that will satisfy the most ardent suspense fiction fan.

- Gail Cooke

37 of 40 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Lee Child At His Best, May 9, 2002

By 

Sharon Katz (Brooklyn,, New York USA) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Without Fail (Jack Reacher, No. 6) (Hardcover)

Some people want Vice President-elect, Brook Armstrong dead. They tried to kill him in September. They had the silencer on the gun and the perfect location but the bullet missed. No one in the crowd heard the gun shot. Armstrong's hair stirred as the bullet moved past him but he thought it was nothing more than the wind. The attempt was a failure and no one noticed. They would try again. Soon. ...

So begins Lee Child's newest and best book to date, WITHOUT FAIL. ...This is the sixth in the series.

WITHOUT FAIL takes the readers behind the scenes of the Secret Service and shows us how they react to situations, why they do what they do to protect the people they're hired to protect, and we also get to see the measures they go through to do their job successfully.

Lee Child's books get better and better with each addition to the series. WITHOUT FAIL is a real page-turner with plenty of excitement all through it. Child has not only made a detailed study of his character, but he has delved into the workings of the military and government. Yes, on occasion Reacher and Neagley sometimes seem to have superhuman powers, but the readers will willingly forgive those moments to cheer on the heroes of this story.

This new fast paced novel not only keeps you on your toes trying to figure out who wants to kill the Vice President-elect but also keeps you wondering why. Child gives us the answers to the questions as the book progresses. We start to understand how personal childhood experiences control our actions as adults.

In WITHOUT FAIL, Child has written a wonderfully thrilling story. I highly recommend this well written book.

23 of 24 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars Is Jack becoming a social animal?, April 29, 2003

By 

Joseph Haschka (Glendale, CA USA) - See all my reviews
(VINE VOICE)    (TOP 500 REVIEWER)   

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This review is from: Without Fail (Jack Reacher, No. 6) (Mass Market Paperback)

I'm attracted to Lee Child's novels because of the hardboiled and self-contained nature of his hero, Jack Reacher. After almost two decades as a military cop in the U.S. Army, Jack now wanders the U.S. with only the clothes on his back - no car, no charge cards - and a penchant for crossing paths with assorted villains. Very soon, the reader begins to feel sorry for the Bad Guys.

Reacher is so unpolished that one sometimes wonders how he reached officer grade O-4 (Major), which would imply managing a wardrobe, knotting a tie, and displaying minimal social skills in the officers' mess and at the CO's annual Christmas party. It's not that Jack is a Neanderthal; he just doesn't care to run with the rest of the lemmings anymore.

In WITHOUT FAIL, M.E. Froelich, who heads the Secret Service protection detail for the newly elected Vice President, Brook Armstrong, hires Reacher to audit the security of the new Veep's protective screen. Froelich is also the ex-girlfriend of Jack's dead brother. After finding holes through which a potential assassin could drive a monster SUV, Reacher learns why the Service really wants his help. The VP is receiving credible death threats. And it may be an inside job.

I would've awarded WITHOUT FAIL at least one more star had it not been a Jack Reacher adventure. But it is, and here our prickly protagonist has to play well with others: Froelich, her boss Stuyvesant, FBI guy Bannon, and a colleague from Reacher's old Army days, ex-Sergeant Frances Neagley. Reacher's talent for punitive violence is severely curtailed compared to past episodes, revealing itself only at the very beginning and the very end. In between, Jack is reduced to being a consultant, even to the point of wearing a suit. Say it ain't so, Lee!

The most interesting character is Neagley, now employed by a civilian security firm. She's ostensibly more deadly at physical combat than Reacher himself, and he admits to being afraid of her skills. So, the reader waits, hoping she'll unleash some mayhem. In the meantime, we learn that Frances, while being a little in love with her old military boss, has a severe dislike of being touched due to some unspecified trauma in her past. Unfortunately, Neagley remains mostly a cipher, and the entertainment value of her character is left pretty much unexploited. Perhaps she'll appear in a future Reacher novel. Better still, the author should give her a series of her own.

I hope the next Reacher thriller is JACK IS BACK. With a vengeance.