Second Son (from No Middle Name, The Complete Collected Jack Reacher Short Stories), by Lee Child (REVIEW) -- The Boy who Was Born a Man
[ Note: When I originally wrote this review--back in 2011--this was the only Jack Reacher short story, and was only available as a digital download. In the years since, Child has written more shorts and compiled them--including this one, Second Son --into the book, No Middle Name . ] You might think that hearing about the continued exploits of a world-weary, tough-as-old-boots hero who’s seen and done just about everything there is to see and do during his five decades of tramping around the earth (and is thus, very rarely surprised by anything or anyone) would start getting a little old, some fifteen books in. You’d be wrong to think that, though-- at least, when the heroic fellow in question is none other than Lee Child’s veritable force-of-nature and one-man distributor of revenge and retribution, ex-military policeman Jack Reacher --because, like fine wine, Reacher just gets better with age. Of course, there’s also the fact that age is such a relative concept with someone like Reac...