Second Son

★ ★ ★ 1/2 (rounded up)
This originally appeared at The Irresponsible Reader.
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Okinawa, 1974: the Reacher family is assigned to a miliatry base there and is going through their well-established routine of moving into their new home. Reacher's brother, Joe, isn't dealing well with the idea that he'll have to take a placement test to get into school; Reacher is dealing with a neighborhood bully; their mother is in France as her father dies; and his father is in the middle of a crisis of his own.

It's a short story (40 pages in text), but it contains all the hallmarks of a standard Reacher tale, just on a smaller scale. It's sort of cheating, taking a well-established character like Reacher and imagining the mini-version of him. But you know what? This was so fun, I didn't care.

Dick Hill gives a pretty good performance, but his little Reacher and Joe voices are unintentionally amusing and cartoonish. I bet he'd be fun listening to with a full Reacher novel (particularly if it didn't feature kids).

Not a great story, but satisfying. Not a great performance, but satisfying. Gets the job done.

“Second Child” takes us back to the early days, when Reacher was just 13. He and his family have just moved yet again, when his mother learns that her father has died. During her absence Reacher's father and brother find themselves in trouble and it is a young, quick-thinking Reacher who saves the day.

Super fast read. I wish that there was more. I wish Lee Child had written this as a full length novel instead of Reacher's time as an MP in the 80's in The Enemy. I would love to have delved more into the Reacher family dynamic.