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Structure
Interesting Questions, Facts and Information
- There are a total of 40 general entries. We are selecting 30 for display.
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 Interesting Questions, Facts, and Information
 Child, Lee
Army. He spent 13 years in the United States Army.
Military Police. And a very good one, as seen in 'The Enemy', a prequel to the other novels. His brother Joe worked in Military Intelligence.
Tall, well-built, short fair hair and blue eyes. A very imposing figure. Reacher is approximately 6ft 5in tall (approx 196cm), and is always described as very muscular.
France. At the age of 13, she joined the French Resistance and saved the lives of many men. She had to garrotte a boy who threatened to tell on her, but did receive the Resistance Medal for her brave efforts.
Because his name sounded like 'Jacques', the French for James, he always thought his mother thought of him as James, not Jack.
General Leon Garber. We see General Garber on a couple of occasions, firstly helping Reacher out in 'Die Trying', then in the prequel book 'The Enemy.' Gen Kramer was the officer who died at the start of 'The Enemy', Lt. Summer was his junior in the same book, and I seriously hope you realised Major Mal Function was a cute play on words...
Carmen Greer. Carmen was framed for murdering her husband Sloop (weird name, I know) in 'Echo Burning'. Jodie Garber is the daughter of his former Commanding Officer, Holly Johnson is the kidnap victim he is trapped with in 'Die Trying', and Lisa Harper is an FBI agent in 'The Visitor' (a.k.a 'Running Blind' in the US.) How he meets so many beautiful women on his travels I don't know...
One brother - Joe. We first learn of Joe Reacher in 'Killing Floor', where he turns up dead in the town Reacher is hiking through (kind of makes it personal, huh?). We see more of him in the prequel book 'The Enemy', where he is working with the Treasury Department. He was killed investigating a counterfeiting operation.
Major. He left as a Major, and is still often referred to by this title from old friends still in the Service. Though he was demoted once back to Captain, he obviously was promoted once more before he mustered out.
He always knows what time it is. No matter when in the day it is, Reacher knows what time it is to the minute, which helped fool a sentry in 'Die Trying', allowing Reacher to escape his captors. He pretended to have an implant that would wake him up at a certain time. After a brief nap, Reacher woke up on time, said the implant roused him, and told the sentry if he stepped outside he would be killed by a satellite laser that was trained on the building. Some people are just too gullible...
Thanks for trying the quiz, I'm hoping to make more in the near future that are more book-specific, so keep an eye out!
Franz. Calvin Franz was part of the (fictitious) 110th Division of the United States Army, an elite group of Military Police. All of the others were members too.
Portland, Oregon. He receives an alert via his bank account when Neagley deposits $1,030. A ten-thirty radio code with the MP's meant 'Urgent Assistance Required'. He eventually does head to California, landing at LAX airport.
Beverly Wilshire. When more of 'The Old Team' arrive, the crew head to a different hotel, as local law enforcement were sniffing around the Wilshire. I seriously hope you spotted the little Monopoly trap there.
O'Donnell. O'Donnell arrives first, followed shortly by Dixon, both of whom had been unreachable. These four are all that remains of 'The Old Team'.
Thomas Brant. Curtis Mauney is Thomas Brant's boss, the two of them being police. The other two names are one and the same man.
Reacher. After considering eleven other passwords, O'Donnell finally hits on the fact Franz used a password of the person he looked up to most. Reacher is quite surprised by this choice!
Margaret Berenson. Not the most helpful woman in the world. All of the others have featured in Reacher's adventures in the past.
Reacher. Goes without saying really. He is less than enthusiastic when voted in, as it is likely he may be arrested for busting the cop's nose earlier. Neagley is to take over should this happen.
| This novel mostly takes place in (and in between) the two towns of Hope and Despair. In which state are the towns located? | Lee Child's "Nothing To Lose"
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Eastern Colorado. Hope supposedly got its name from settlers on their way to the West Coast. An optical illusion resulting from the topography made the Rockies seem very close, promising a shorter journey. However, after a few more miles, the illusion vanished, and the mountains once again appeared to be impossibly far away. Some of the pioneers apaprently threw in the towel then and there, bitterly naming their settlement Despair.
The two towns are polar opposites in appearance as well as attitude: Hope represents small-town friendliness and is well-maintained, while Despair is ugly and run down, and its residents are as hostile and secretive as can be.
A dead body. As it is pitch dark at the time, Reacher must rely on senses other than his eyesight to try to identify the body, which turns out to be that of the young Raphael Ramirez, a military deserter trying to escape to Canada. He chose death over exposing his fellow deserters to the authorities.
The "smuggling" of human cargo into Canada is just one of many of Despair's secrets. Lucy "Lucky" Anderson, whom Reacher meets in Hope's restaurant, is the wife of one of the deserters.
The Military Police FOB (forward operating base) just outside of Despair plays an important part in the story - not so much regarding the deserters, but more in the way of guarding the sensitive material being processed in Despair's metal recycling plant.
| Reacher's love interest and partner in solving the mysteries in this book is a law enforcement officer known simply as Vaughan. What rank does she hold, and with what agency? | Lee Child's "Nothing To Lose"
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An officer of the Hope Police Department. Wherever he goes, Reacher always seems to find a beautiful and intelligent woman. A recurring theme in the series is that of Reacher referring to his lady friends (in many cases) by their last names only.
In a facility for veterans with traumatic brain injury. David Robert Vaughan, while a member of the National Guard, was seriously injured in Iraq when an IED (improvised explosive device) destroyed his Humvee. The doctors expected the swelling in his brain to abate, leading to at least a partial recovery, but it never did, and he is still confined to bed, unable to move, speak, breathe without a respirator, or respond to stimuli.
Her husband's tragic state has caused a great deal of pain for Vaughan, and her emotional struggle is a dominant theme in the book. Once we learn about David, we understand why she has hidden so much. We also come to understand her rage at the military deserters moving through Despair, and sympathize with her as she makes a crucial decision at the story's climax.
A particularly compelling scene is the one in which Reacher intimidates the staff at David's facility into cleaning up their act, explaining to them that veterans and their families deserve respect.
| Reacher pulls almost every trick in the book to break down Despair's defenses and find out what the town is so desperate to hide. What act of sabotage does he NOT perform in Despair? | Lee Child's "Nothing To Lose"
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He breaks into the electrical substation and cuts off the town's power supply. As Vaughan gradually learns of all the havoc that Reacher has been causing in Despair, she refers to him as a "maniac" and a "one-man wrecking crew." Despite her mild disapproval, she does little to punish him or stop him from causing further damage.
The "unfair" fight scenario is another familiar (and always thrilling) motif in the Reacher series. Despite facing two, three, four, or more opponents at a time, Reacher always seems to emerge the victor, barely breathing hard and not having broken a sweat. He learned to fight young, and his experience and sharp wits rarely fail him.
| Which explicitly stated proverb is an important recurring theme in the book, ultimately helping Reacher uncover the primary mystery? | Lee Child's "Nothing To Lose"
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To assume makes an "ass" out of "u" and "me". The major mystery of the book is the depleted uranium and TNT that Thurman is using to make a dirty bomb. Through some rather convoluted means, he hopes to fan the flames of war in the Middle East and speed the arrival of the Apocalypse and Rapture. A character named Underwood, one of Thurman's thugs, is suffering from what turns out to be radiation sickness. While in his sick bed, he tells Reacher "You did this to me." Reacher eventually figures out that it was not an accusation, but that Underwood meant "U did this to me" - U as in uranium. Apparently his work at the plant dismantling tank shielding exposed Underwood to enough radiation to make him fatally ill.
Another recurring proverb is "Dum spero speri," which loosely translates as "Where there is breath there is hope."
| Reacher has several useful talents that often amaze readers. Which of his abilities does he NOT utilize in this book? | Lee Child's "Nothing To Lose"
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He is an excellent marksman, able to make very difficult shots with amazing accuracy. Reacher effectively demonstrates his almost superhuman marksmanship and superior expertise with weaponry in other books in the series, but there is very little gunplay in this book.
A few specific examples of Reacher's knowledge from this story: he apparently has a good knowledge of how cell calls are transmitted, processed, and received, having read about it in a trade magazine. He knows exactly when and how TNT was invented. He can rattle off the land area in square miles for the state of Colorado, as well as its rank in area and population. Also, he finds inspiration in the Stoic philosopher Zeno of Cittium, who believed in the unquestioning acceptance of one's destiny.
Vaughan. And what a tremendous explosion it is! Child uses more than a page to describe the mighty blast. Thurman and two of his minions, trapped within the plant's walls at ground zero, perished instantly.
Everyone in Hope and Despair "assumed" that the explosion was the result of an accident at the plant, and the Pentagon wasn't anxious to reveal its business in Despair, so no serious investigation took place. Reacher, as usual, quietly slips away to look for his next adventure.
Human Resources Command at the Pentagon. Even though she worked for an agency that handled no secret information, Susan was "good with computers," and a network security bug allowed her to acquire an extremely sensitive photograph. Loading it onto a computer memory stick, she tries to take it to her blackmailers, but a traffic jam makes her late for her rendezvous. Having tossed the memory stick and her cell phone out her car window in frustration, she decides to get on a subway train to go confront the blackmailers, who have killed her adult son due to her tardiness. Reacher mistakes her for a suicide bomber on the train, and his interference leads to her suicide.
The memory stick rapidly becomes the objective of everyone in the book - no one knows yet that Susan threw it out her car window. Reacher learns that it holds a photograph of Osama Bin Laden in Afghanistan in 1983, meeting with U.S. Delta Force soldiers (Congressman Sansom and his aide Springfield among them) on a secret "friendship" mission - the theory being that any enemy of the Soviets was a friend of the United States. This turns out to be an important theme in the story: "Sometimes our friends become our enemies, and our enemies become our friends." The photo might have been incriminating to a congressman campaigning for the Senate, but we never do find out why the bad guys wanted it so much.
Afghani terrorists. Originally posing as a Russian mother and daughter wanting to meet with a U.S. serviceman who had "once been kind" to the mother, they turn out to be the "most dangerous people" Reacher has ever met. They and their "crew" of 20 men will stop at nothing to obtain Susan Mark's photograph.
A DVD. The DVD is a video made by the Hoths of them cruelly torturing two men to death. Child's depiction of the video was actually quite difficult for me to read due to its graphic nature. Reacher even threw up after viewing it, but he blamed it on being physically overwhelmed by rage at these two heinous killers, not on his being squeamish about the torture. The first victim on the video was an Afghani man who offended the Hoths by helping an American journalist, and the second victim was Peter Molina, Susan Mark's son.
The other three answer choices - memory stick, cell phone, and the VAL rifle - were also important items in the story.
Bribing the night porter. He employs this tactic several times during the story.
I wonder how many people went out and tried this after reading the book...
Browning. Springfield served alongside Sansom in the Delta Force and is now his right-hand man. Reacher and Browning work together (after a fashion) throughout the story. A very intelligent man, Springfield understands Reacher's hints and subtexts, and even drops a few hints of his own.
He left a note at Sansom's workplace. Reacher took a train from New York to Washington to meet with Sansom. After receiving Reacher's note at the Cannon Building, Sansom, a shrewd and calculating (but not malevolent) individual, sends his aide and wife to deal with Reacher. After several more false starts and a bit of a wild goose chase, Reacher is finally able to meet in person with Sansom and earn a little of his trust.
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