Lee Child on Paul Lynch, Reacher, and sharing writing duties with his brother
Lee Child and, right, Alan Ritchson as Reacher, on Amazon Prime.
When Paul Lynch won the Booker Prize for his widely acclaimed novel, his achievement was celebrated at home and abroad. Among those cheering the Irish author was an icon of thriller writing.
“It’s a terrific book,” says Lee Child, days after Lynch’s win was announced. “I read it a long time ago when it first came out and I think that it is a deserved winner.
“I take great interest in it, because I was a Booker Prize judge in 2020,” adds the author. “I know the process. I know how it feels - you find that great novel, you've got a lot to read. And you imagine that it's going to be difficult to choose. But suddenly a novel comes along that is definitively the winner, and I think that they felt that this year.”
Child knows a thing or two about achieving success. His Jack Reacher series of novels has sold over 200 million copies and created a character who is a giant of thriller fiction.
Having previously been brought to the big screen courtesy of Tom Cruise, the no-nonsense veteran military police investigator is played by Alan Ritchson in Reacher, which returns for a second season to Prime Video on December 15. A third season is already in the works.
Child is an Executive Producer on the series and a frequent visitor to the show’s set. Still, he says, it’s never not remarkable to see a character brought to life in his writing up on screen.
“It's really freaky in a way because I see him very clearly in my own head. The other thing about any main character in fiction, the author probably puts a lot of himself into it, there's really no other way of doing fiction than make it a bit autobiographical. When I see it back on the screen, it's like, not only has my character come to life, but I have. There are parts of Reacher that are me and they’re being played back to me - and that's a very strange feeling.”
Born James Dover Grant in Coventry, Child spent his formative years in Birmingham. His father was from Northern Ireland and he is proud of his Irish roots. “I’ve been Irish since birth, because of that law in Ireland, that if your father is born on the island of Ireland, you are an Irish citizen. I’ve been there a million times. I know Ireland and I love the people.”
For many years, Child worked as a presentation director in television, but lost his job at the age of 40 as a result of corporate restructuring. Always an avid reader with a curiosity about a writing career, he turned a potential crisis into an opportunity, and sat down to write Killing Floor, his debut novel and the first in the Jack Reacher series. Dozens of bestsellers later, he loves the sense of ownership people feel towards the character.
“They own Reacher - it’s a biological fact,” he says. “All I do is make strange black marks on white paper. And then it could be years later, 25 years later, it could be after I'm dead, somebody is going to scan their eye over those strange black marks, and a story pops up in their head.
“It's their mental energy being burned at that point, their calories being consumed, they are creating the story at that point, not me. Therefore, of course they own it. They're living in that story while they're reading the book.”
Likewise, he doesn’t feel a sense of ownership when it comes to letting filmmakers do their thing, although he does love the social aspect of getting to know the cast and crew on set. “I am not one of those fussy writers who worries all the time: ‘What are they going to do with it?’ That's guaranteed to turn it into a mess. If everybody's nervous about what I'm thinking, that won't work.
“The way to do it from my point of view, is to put 99% of my effort into the upfront process of choosing the team. That really is the crucial thing, you've got to put together these people who you trust, who you like, whose work you admire, and then you set them off, and step away. That is the best way to guarantee a result. You don't want those people nervous about you looking over their shoulder, and fussing and nagging, you've got to show that you trust them.”
In recent years, Child (69) has passed the torch to his successful author brother, Andrew. The siblings share author credits on the latest Jack Reacher novel, The Secret. “Writing falls into two parts,” he says. “The first part is the fun part, which is the daydreaming, making it up in your head. You come up with a great line, you're just lying there making stuff up.
“I love that and I will never stop doing that. It's automatic, you can't stop doing it. The second half of writing is the boring stuff, typing it out, getting it published, doing all the business and the promotion and all that kind of thing. I won't miss that because that's the hard work part.
“I don't want to work hard anymore. I live in America and people don't understand that. I say: ‘Look, remember I come from Europe, I have no work ethic. Retirement is a goal for me’,” he smiles.
“I think it is for a lot of European people. You understand the structure of life. You go to school for a bit. You work for a very long time, and then you're retired. It's a thing. And so what it's opening up for me is doing all the leisure things that you normally don't have time to do. I remember when my grandparents retired and then when my parents retired, they had time to have hobbies or go places. In my case, I've got time to read all the time. The only thing I've disliked about being a writer is how much time it takes away from reading.”
- Reacher Season Two returns to Prime Video with three episodes on December 15, and new episodes dropping every Friday
Wonka (cinemas from Friday): Writer-director Paul King (Paddington 2) introduces audiences to the young Willy Wonka (Timothée Chalamet), an aspiring inventor and chocolatier, in this enjoyable reboot.
May December (Sky from Friday): An actress is tasked with playing a woman involved in a sex scandal decades earlier in a terrific melodrama starring Natalie Portman and Julianne Moore.
Leave the World Behind (Netflix from today): Julia Roberts returns to the screen in an apocalyptic thriller, co starring Ethan Hawke and Mahershala Ali.
The Peasants (cinemas from today): As a 19th century village becomes a hotbed of gossip and feuds, a young woman becomes caught up in the drama in this Polish film.
Renaissance: A Film by Beyoncé (cinemas): Part concert film, part documentary, this film follows the multi-award-winning star’s tour from its inception to its finale.
