The Big Bounce

The Big Bounce is a crime novel written by Elmore Leonard, published in 1969. The author's first attempt at the crime genre after having met success with westerns, it was adapted twice into film. It is also Leonard's first book starring the character of Jack Ryan (no relation to Tom Clancy's character of the same name), who would return eight years later in Unknown Man No. 89. Plot summary Jack Ryan, a drifter and small-time delinquent, arrives at the Thumb area of Michigan as a seasonal farm laborer, picking pickles for food tycoon Ray Ritchie. He soon gets involved with Nancy, a young seductress, currently Ray Ritchie's girlfriend, though she is also cheating on him with another man, Bob Jr. For a while, Ryan and Nancy get their thrills smashing windows and breaking and entering, but Ryan soon gets a shot at settling down with the help of justice of the peace Mr. Majestyk, who hires Jack as a handyman at his beach resort. When Nancy grows bored with housebreaking and burglary and conceives a plan to steal the laborers' payroll, Ryan must choose between following her in her chase for "the big bounce" or the stability of an honest life. Background Leonard started offering the story to publishers and film producers in the fall of 1966. However, no one would touch it until 1969, when it was first adapted to the screen. While the screenplay is credited as an adaptation of the novel, the movie came out earlier.