Review: One Shot

One Shot by Lee Child
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

One Shot is the ninth book in my biggest guilty pleasure series – Jack Reacher. Since picking up Killing Floor, I have been slowly working my way through the Jack Reacher books. I say slowly, but it’s more of an ebb and flow when it comes to my reading of the series. There was a couple of weeks between Killing Floor and Die Trying; three months between Die Trying and Tripwire; four months between Tripwire and Running Blind; five months between Running Blind and Echo Burning; a couple of days between Echo Burning and Without Fail; five months between Without Fail and Persuader; a month between Persuader and The Enemy; five months between The Enemy and One Shot. As you can see, it’s not a series where I jump in one after the other – I pick up the series when the mood strikes me, when the guilty pleasure comes calling. Nevertheless, it is a series I will continue to read.

Despite how I will continue to read the series, part of the reason for the gaps between my reading of each book is the fact that the books never really blow me away. I enjoy them all, but I have only given three four-star ratings (Die Trying, Without Fail, and Persuader) thus far. A third isn’t all that bad, but it means my desire to read the series is not the same as my desire to read other series.

I’ve said this before, it’s because of the storytelling. I enjoy the stories, but the storytelling leaves much to be desired. It is not the kind of literature I can read a lot of, the writing style being something I can deal with for short periods of time before I need something with insane prose that keep me glued to the page. These are telling it as it is kinds of stories, information without the extensive prose I prefer. I know many will enjoy this, but it’s not the kind of storytelling I lean towards. Hence, it always takes me a while to get into the story.

While One Shot was the story to be picked for the Jack Reacher movie, I’m not sure why. As with the prior books it was interesting, but it was rather average compared to some of the other stories we have had in the series. There was a nice bit of mystery going on throughout, but it wasn’t my favourite from the series. In fact, while I didn’t work out all the details, quite a few things were expected. It was mediocre, and not the Jack Reacher book I would have picked to make into a movie.

Overall, another fun guilty pleasure read. As this one did not blow my mind, it may well be a couple of months before I pick up another Jack Reacher novel.

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