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One of the problems that the author of a suspense/thriller series faces is the fact that he or she is exposing their protagonist to a high level of danger throughout the books that they create. What may seem credible in book three or four can feel like overkill by book five or six. Fortunately, Lee Child has found the key to maintaining believability in the Jack Reacher series, of which PERSUADER is the seventh. In each of the books, he takes Jack in a new direction, and in each he faces an altogether different set of circumstances than in any of the previous works. PERSUADER opens with a rip-roaring scene that starts the book off at a torrid pace. Just when you've digested the opening scenario, you discover that all is not as it seems. Reacher is working with the FBI to infiltrate a purported drug dealer's home, and he obtains access through an elaborate set-up. Jack has two missions. The first is professional, and that is to try to find a female agent who has gone missing from the operation. The second is personal and involves settling the score on a murder that happened more than ten years earlier. He had done what was necessary at the time, but when he sees a "dead man walking", he realizes that he was unsuccessful. Hired as a bodyguard for Zachary Beck, successful Oriental rug seller, Reacher lives on Beck's estate and is able to investigate from the inside while being supported covertly on the outside by FBI agent Susan Duffy. Reacher has a background in the military, and he uses the skills he learned there to deal with the nasty characters that he comes up against. Never hesitating to kill when it's necessary, Reacher doesn't suffer any angst about his actions. In this situation, Jack is dealing with many untrustworthy people. Out of those, he tends to feel a sense of protectiveness for those who are victims of their situation and not necessarily intrinsically evil, even though they often don't return the favor. Reacher has his own moral code, which may be different from the mainstream, but it guides him and he lives by it. Child came perilously close to stepping over the credibility line with Jack dodging danger right and left and moving on after being injured. He managed to avoid the "Energizer Bunny" syndrome, wherein the protagonist takes a lickin' and keeps on tickin'. It's a measure of Child's skill that the reader goes along with the possibilities that he has created, even if they hover close to over the top. The characters are so well developed that we are willing to grant some leeway in terms of total plausibility. One unique aspect of Child's work that sets him apart from many thriller writers is that he creates strong female characters, and Susan Duffy, the FBI investigator, is a great match for Reacher. Child is an excellent writer, and PERSUADER is a worthy addition to the series. I liked it less well than the previous book, WITHOUT FAIL, which had more of a personal feel to it. In this case, I felt more removed from Reacher as a person than I did in that work. Nonetheless, very few writers can beat Child at his ability to create a complex plot and ratchet up the suspense to gut-wrenching levels without sacrificing the development of the characters along the way.
Reviewed by Maddy Van Hertbruggen, December 2003
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