Winner of the Theakstons Old Peculier Crime Novel of the Year Award 2011.
Jack Reacher is the man from nowhere who emerges from darkness to avenge injustice like a modern cowboy. In his 14th adventure, he arrives in South Dakota during an icy winter snow storm. The mayhem soon begins as expected.
Get ready for the most exciting count-down of your life hour number sixty-one. Icy winter in South Dakota. A bus skids and crashes in a gathering storm. On the back seat: Jack Reacher, hitching a ride to nowhere. A life without baggage has many advantages. And disadvantages too, like facing the arctic cold without a coat. Hour number thirty-one. A small town is threatened by sinister forces. One brave woman is standing up for justice. If she's going to live to testify, she'll need help from a man like Reacher. Because there's a killer coming for her. Hour number zero. Has Reacher finally met his match? He doesn't want to put the world to rights. He just doesn't like people who put it to wrongs.
Lee Child is one of the world’s leading thriller writers. His novels consistently achieve the number one slot in hardback and paperback on bestsellers lists on both sides of the Atlantic, and are translated into over forty languages. His debut novel, Killing Floor, was written after he was made redundant from his television job in Manchester, and introduced his much-admired maverick hero, the former military cop Jack Reacher. Born in Coventry, he now lives in America.
The 2013 Crime Writers’ Association Diamond Dagger was awarded to Lee Child.
Members of the CWA vote for the Diamond Dagger award-winner, which celebrates an author with an outstanding body of work in crime fiction.
Peter James, chair of the CWA, said: “I am delighted that the CWA has chosen Lee Child as this year's recipient. Lee is one of the few British crime-thriller authors to have become a global brand name; he is also an extremely charming and open person and a tireless promoter of our genre.”