Tripwire

New York: Jove Books, 2000. Later printing. Mass market paperback. Fair. [10], 417, [5] pages.Ink marks on first page. Cover has some wear, tears and soiling. Slightly cocked. James D. "Jim" Grant (born 29 October 1954), primarily known by his pen name Lee Child, is a British author who writes thriller novels, and is most well-known for his Jack Reacher novel series. The books follow the adventures of a former American military policeman, Jack Reacher, who wanders the United States. His first novel, Killing Floor, won both the Anthony Award, and the Barry Award for Best First Novel. Grant's prose has been described as "hardboiled" and "commercial" in style, with short sentences, often without a verb, more exclamations than sentences. A 2012 interview suggested that many aspects of the Jack Reacher novels were deliberately aimed at maintaining the books' profitability, rather than for literary reasons. For instance, making Jack Reacher have one parent who was French was suggested as being partly because the presence of only American members of Reacher's family would limit the series' appeal in France. The same interview stated that Grant "didn't apologize about the commercial nature" of his fiction. Tripwire is the third book in the Jack Reacher series written by Lee Child. It was published in 1999 by Putnam in America and Bantam in the United Kingdom. It is written in the third person. The prologue describes Victor Truman "Hook" Hobie's carefully planned escape route in the event of somebody discovering his "really big, well-guarded secret". His "early-warning system" consists of geographically-located "tripwires". The first is eleven thousand miles from home and the second is six thousand miles out. His response to their activation would be to tie up loose ends, cash in, transfer his assets, and flee the country. Over thirty years of quiet success have made him feel somewhat secure. But he didn't expect both alerts to arrive on the same day.