So, after finishing Worth Dying For by Lee Child on September 13, I started Less Than Hero by S. G. Browne. I finished this one on September 27. A few years back, The Husband and I met S. G. Browne at a book reading held by SF in SF - Science Fiction in San Francisco. Browne's book, Lucky Bastard, had recently been published and he was there to talk about it. Lucky Bastard, a sci-fi cop novel set in San Francisco, was a good read - strange but good. It was fun to read a book set in the city where I lived for almost 20 years - I could really picture the places, geography, and settings Brown wrote about.
The Husband got Less Than Hero from the library and passed it to me to read when he finished. Reading the synopsis on the back of the book, I was a little skeptical as to whether I would like this one. But, it was quite entertaining and I enjoyed it. This is the story of a group of men living in New York who make a living being "guinea pigs" for drug trials. Each of the guys has an interesting life outside of their guinea pigging. Lloyd panhandles with a variety of entertaining signs one of which invited people to hurl insults at him for money - will take verbal abuse for money.
"When I first started using this sign a couple of years ago, I received the standard insults and derogatory comments meant for me and my wasted life. For what I represented. For what I'd become.
A social tumor.
A rash on the ass of civilization.
An oozing pus bag of failure.
More often than not, the insults weren't accompanied by a donation but by malicious laughter. Sometimes people spit on me, which isn't technically verbal abuse, but when you're a panhandler, you can't expect everyone to be on the same page.
But after a while, once people saw me around Central Park with my sign on a regular basis, they started to feel comfortable with me, to understand the freedom I was offering, and they started to open up. Now when most people approach me, rather than showering me with personal attacks and derogatory invectives about my existence, they vent their frustrations about anything that's troubling them. The problems that they're unable to deal with.
Jobs. Relationships. Family.
'I hate you, Mom.' A young woman wearing a Columbia University sweatshirt tosses a dollar into my hat. 'You've ruined my life.'
...'Go fuck yourself, Kaufman.' A guy in a suit donates a dollar to my cause. 'I don't need this job or your bullshit TPS reports." [Gotta love a little Office Space reference thrown in there]
Lloyd lives with Sophie who moonlights as a Fairy in Central Park. Sophie has a cat named Vegan who "only eats cat food made with organic animal products. He also doesn't consume any dairy products, even if they're made with non-GMO ingredients or come from cows that aren't factory-farmed or injected with HGH. According to Sophie, this is a decision Vegan came to on his own."
Lloyd and his merry band of guinea pigs get together frequently to hang out, talk about new trials, and catch up. One day, Lloyd brings up something strange that he's noticed about himself. At first the others don't believe him. But soon they, too, admit that they have strange things about themselves too. They come to consider these "strange things" super powers of sorts and decide to put them to good use - defending and helping those in need. And, of course every super hero needs a nemesis - this book has those too.
This book is super strange, but has an interesting overarching theme - people test all kinds of drugs for drug companies. Drugs can have all kinds of side effects. Could some of those side effects become "powers" of sort that are transferrable to or upon others? Brown writes:
"A recent study found that seven in ten Americans are on at least one prescription drug and more than half take two or more - with antibiotics, antidepressants, antianxiety drugs, opioids, high blood pressure medications, and vaccines making up the bulk of the prescriptions. According to that same study, a third of all prescription drugs are toxic to humans, with the side effects of the medications often worse than the affliction being medicated.
Your average person will take their doctor-prescribed prescriptions without giving much thought to what long-term effects those drugs might have on them. At least we guinea pigs understand what we're getting into, even if it's not a smart career move. But for people who have normal jobs, taking a drug to cure one problem can lead to additional side efects that require more drugs until you wind up in a never-ending pharmaceutical loop, medicating your medications.
...So it seems reasonable that it's only a matter of time before evolution makes a leap forward and humans start being born with a dependency on pharmaceutical drugs. Or exhibiting permanent side effects."
Makes you think, doesn't it.
If you could have a super power of your choosing - not a prescription drug induced one - what would it be? Mine would be the power of flight.
So, after finishing Looking for Alaska by John Green on August 31, I started the next Jack Reacher novel, Worth Dying For, by Lee Child on September 2 and finished it on September 13. As with all of the other Jack Reacher novels, this one didn't disappoint. Lee Child has a very successful recipe for his Reacher books, but does throw in a few unexpected elements every now and again. It's like adding in a pinch of a new spice into the recipe. The recipe is tried and true and is super tasty, but adding in a pinch of something new adds a little bit of unexpected taste and texture to something that is already good.
It still perplexes me to no end at the casting of Tom Cruise as Jack Reacher. It defies logic and completely contradicts the main characteristics of Jack Reacher - mainly being a very large and tall man - which Tom Cruise is decidedly not. I am not the only one who feels this way. One person suggested Channing Tatum could be Reacher. I'm not sold on that, but I really don't have a concrete suggestion about who could be a fit for Reacher. Hugh Jackman? Joe Manganiello? The Rock? There seem to be a lot of suggestions out there some I agree with, some not (no no no Brad Pitt, Ben Afflek, Liam Neeson). Regardless, Tom Cruise was cast, and one article I found (from about a year ago) mentioned that another Jack Reacher movie was in the works with Tom as Jack. I found a few others that also mention a Jack Reacher 2 being made... We'll see how that one turns out.
Let's talk about Worth Dying For. It's good. Read it. The end.
Just kidding. Worth Dying For, shows us another side of Jack Reacher - a physically impaired, hurting Jack Reacher. This book picks up immediately after 61 Hours ends. Reacher is leaving the wintery South Dakota town after protecting the old lady witness (and not getting a girl), and ends up in a small wintery Nebraska town while trying to make his way to Virgina to see about a girl. This small Nebraska town is super small, as in everyone knows everyone, and some of the townfolk even have an emergency secret phone tree (that turns out is not so secret after all).
A small family of men, the Duncans, "run" this town and the residents of the town are fearful of this family because of events that took place 25 years ago. The Duncans came to run the crop shipping business in their farming town, and the residents who have disputes with the Duncans or wish to not use the Duncans to haul their harvests end up with rotting harvests sitting on their farms. Not a great situation, but there doesn't seem to be much the residents can or are willing to do about it.
But wait, Reacher is there - so the Duncans better beware... As usual, Reacher ends up involved in town business and going off to do his own investigation on the historical event that transpired. There seem to be other things at play in this town in addition to the harvest-hauling monopoly-racket the Duncans have going on. The Duncans are wrapped up in some kind of trouble involving Italian, and Middle-Eastern customers from Vegas. Apparently what happens in Vegas doesn't really stay there.
So, with Reacher poking his nose around in things that have nothing to do with him, a number of things get wrapped up together that ordinarily would have nothing to do with one another. Two Italian hit men are looking for Reacher. And two different sets of 2 Middle-Eastern hit men are looking out for the Italians, the other set of Middle-Eastern men, and for Reacher.
"...Got a description?"
"Big guy, blue eyes, white, six-five, two-fifty, brown coat."
Mahmeini's man said, "That's worthless. This is America. This is farm country. It's full of settlers and peasants. They all look like that. I mean, we just saw a guy exactly like that."
Safir's guy said, "He's right. We saw one too. We're going to need a much better description."
Cassano said, "We don't have one. But it will be easier when we get up there. Reacher stands out, apparently. And the local population is prepared to help us. They've been told to phone in with sightings. And there's no cover up there."
Mahmeini's man said, "So where is he hiding out?"
"We don't know. There's a motel, but he's not in it. Maybe he's sleeping rough."
"In this weather? Is that likely?"
"There are sheds and barns. I'm sure we'll find him."
"And then what?"
"We put him down."
"Risky."
"I know. He's tough. So far he's taken out four of the local people."
Mahmeini's man said, "I don't care how tough he thinks he is. And I don't care how many local people he's taken out either. Because I'm sure they're all idiots up there. I mean it's risky because this isn't the Wild West anymore. Do we have a safe exit strategy?"
Cassano said, "They tell me he's kind of a hobo so nobody is going to miss him. There's not even going to be an investigation. There aren't even any cops up there."
As per the usual recipe, Reacher pokes around, investigates some, theorizes some, and draws upon his MP experience to help him figure things out. And, as per the usual recipe, Reacher gets captured by the bad guys - in this case, the Duncans.
Reacher has been fighting since he was five years old, and he had never had his nose broken. Not even once. Partly good luck, and partly good management. Plenty of people had tried, over the years, either deliberately or in a flurry of savage unaimed blows, but none had ever succeeded. Not one. Not ever. Not even close. It was a fact Reacher was proud of, in a peculiar way. It was a symbol. A talisman. A badge of honor. He had all kinds of nicks and cuts and scars on his face and his arms and his body, but he felt that the distinctive but intact bone in his nose made up for them...
The blow came in exactly as he expected it to, a clenched fist, a straight right, hard and heavy, riding up a little, aiming high, as if Duncan subconsciously expected Reacher to flinch up and back... But Reacher didn't flinch up and back. He started with his head up and back, his eyes open, watching down his nose, timing it, then jerking forward from the neck, smashing a perfect improvised head butt straight into Duncan's knuckles, an instant high-speed high-impact collision between the thick ridge in Reacher's brow and the delicate bones in Duncan's hand. No contest. No contest at all... Duncan screamed and snatched his hand away and cradled it limp against his chest and hopped a whole yowling circle, looking up, looking down, stunned and whimpering...
"Asshole," Reacher said.
In yet another skirmish Reacher kicked ass and took names. (An aside here - for the past six months or so, I've been taking a self defense class and learning a variety of defense and offense techniques - JKD, Kali, Silat, Thai Boxing, Wing Chun, and more) to defend myself against a theoretical (hopefully) attacker. These classes have been SUPER fun and SUPER empowering, and I've loved every minute of them. It is amazing how good it feels to punch, kick, flip, stomp, and disarm - though I wouldn't want to be on the receiving end of the punching, kicking, flipping, stomping, and disarming. I have a new appreciation for the MMA and Martial Arts fighters I see as I'm flipping channels on TV, and it is cool to watch a Jason Bourne movie and know what style of fighting he's using - JKD, Kali - and be able to do some of the things he's done, albeit not as fast or fancy. So, reading about Jack Reacher's fights in the book, I can actually picture what he's doing, how he's doing it, how he sets up for his moves, and how it impacts the opponents because I've done it in class.)
His shoulder was moving because he was already driving hard off his back foot, jerking forward, twisting at the waist, building torque, hurling his right elbow into the gap created by turning the guy counterclockwise an inch, aiming to hit him with the elbow right on the outer edge of his left eye socket, hoping to crack his skull along the line of his temple. No rules. The blow landed with all 250 pounds of moving mass behind it, a solid jarring impact Reacher felt all the way down to his toes. The guy staggered back. He stayed on his feet. Evidently his skull hadn't cracked, but he was feeling it. He was feeling it bad, and his mouth was opening, ready to howl, so Reacher shut it again for him with a vicious uppercut under the chin, convulsive, far from elegant, but effective. The guy's head snapped back in a mist of blood and bounced forward again off his massive deltoids and Reacher tried for his other eye socket with his left elbow, a ferocious in-and-out snap from the waist, and then he put a forearm smash from the right into the guy's throat, a real home run swing, and then he kneed him in the groin, and danced behind him and kicked him hard in the back of the knees, a sweeping scything action, so that the guy's legs folded up under him and he went down heavily on his back on the path.
Six blows, three seconds.
No rules.
Reacher is kicking ass and taking names. He's not really taking names though - just kicking ass. He does a lot of ass kicking (same dependable recipe does it every time). At the end of the book after much ass kicking, solving the mystery, and ridding the town of the Duncans, one of the good townsfolk asks Reacher where he is heading next.
They drove the first ten miles in silence. Then they passed the abandoned roadhouse and the two-lane speared onward and empty ahead of them and Dorothy asked, "What's in Virginia?"
"A woman," Reacher said.
"Your girlfriend?"
"Someone I talked to on the phone, that's all..."
If you are in need of some mind candy, an easy, entertaining read, with ass kicking, violence, and Reacher - pick this one up. You'll appreciate the vulnerable Reacher (and how he became that way) if you read 61 Hours. But if you haven't read that one, you'll still enjoy this book. I'm looking forward to the next one to see what happens with this girl, as this is the 2nd book in a row where Reacher hasn't gotten the girl. Is he losing his touch? Somehow I don't think so...
