Another Reacher novel, another winner. Set in Far West Texas, Reacher gets mixed up with an abused wife that asks him to do her a favor: kill her husband. From there a mystery slowly unfolds that is truly puzzling, leading to the inevitable shoot-em-up at the conclusion. The ending is quite predictable, but the journey there is fun.
I live in Texas, and I love it. Austin is a wonderful city: vibrant, alive, and largely accepting of varying lifestyles. The Texas described in Echo Burning is not at all like that: dusty and dry, filled with cowboys, with bigotry and racism a way of life. Sadly, I know this stereotype still exists in all to many parts of the state (not to mention rural areas everywhere), but I dislike reading one-sided portrayals like this. The only redeeming character other than Reacher was a lesbian, vegetarian, attorney from Harvard—about as far from a southern redneck as you can get. I hope at some point Reacher ends up in Austin where a different sort of Texas can be shared.
There were three watchers, two men and a boy.
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