I’ve been barrelling my way through the Jack Reacher murder mystery series of novels by Lee Child, and I have to say that I’m loving them. About four years ago, one of my pediatrics mentors strongly recommended them to me, but the first two books of the series had lapsed out of print and I had difficulty finding them. Shannon’s mother tracked copies down and gave them to me for Christmas this past year, and since then, I’ve been resisting the urge to read them all as fast as possible, instead limiting myself to one or two a month. (I’m like an addict, enforcing my limits by buying just one or two at a time so that I can’t binge.) Last night, as I was finishing the seventh book while on call, I picked up a mark of how good Child is at suspense: despite me knowing that there are three more books in the series, I was terrified that Reacher was about to die, and couldn’t put the book down without knowing how everything turned out. (For those of you who’ve read Persuader, I’m sure you know the part I’m talking about.)

If you’re into books like Robert Parker’s Spenser series, John Lescroart’s Dismas Hardy series, or Robert Crais’s Elvis Cole series, then I’d give these a shot — they’re just awesome.