The Hit by David Baldacci

The Hit by David Baldacci

My rating: 5 of 5 stars


Oh man! I loved this book.  Baldacci took the firm foundation he built in The Innocent and kicked it up sky high.  It was like he asked, "How can I really do something interesting with Will Robie in the next book?"  And he did. He introduced Jessica Reel.  Jessica Reel is the female counterpart to Will, and that is something indeed.  Jessica is Grade A, high level lethal kickbutt to the extreme.  Her life is as edgy as you can image, just like Will.  I love bonafide tough women characters, and it's kind of hard to find the well done ones.  But Baldacci has impressed me, because that is definitely Jessica.

I liked her so much, I really didn't want her and Will to be adversaries.  Good thing that Baldacci resolves that very well in this book.  Because if you have someone guarding your back, you'd want someone like Will or Jessica. And you definitely wouldn't want them gunning for you!

As far as the action, this book is high level.  Yet, the plot and a workable story isn't sacrificed just for a good action scene. Everything holds together, and if it served the story better not to have an onscreen action scene, Baldacci wasn't afraid to do that.  This book is a good combination of action and thriller/suspense.  I don't love a lot of political conspiracy-type storylines because I just find it dry, but it's well done here.  Not too much to bore me, but sufficient for the story. With characters like Will and Jessica, you have understand what their motivations are and what would push them over the edge, and that was here in the novel.

The pacing was excellent.  I never got bored. Any downtime between action sequences progresses the story and allows us to learn more about the characters.  Actually one of my favorite parts of this book was seeing the way Will and Jessica's minds worked. It's uncanny how their minds seemed to click.  That was the fun of this book.  Had Baldacci decided to take it in another direction, it still would have been a fantastic book, but I liked it better the way it was done. And I have high hopes to see more of this dynamic duo, or at least see Jessica pop up again. 

I did get my other wish for this book, I did get to see Julie again. She wasn't in this book as much, but it fits the story.  It was just good to know that she and Will are still in each others' lives and they know they can count on each other. Also great to see Nikki Vance and Blue Man again.

I can't say enough good things about this book. Just adored it.  I definitely want to get copies of these books for my collection, because Will is definitely on my list, and Jessica as well.  Please write more books about Will, Mr. Baldacci!



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