In a stupefying final encounter, the heptapods communicate to Banks that they’ve really been trying to pass down a gift.

The foreign secretary, who has previously accused Mr Trump of "stupefying ignorance" over some of his campaign comments, urged people not to "pre-judge" the president-elect.

Here we get the stupefying, almost impossible-to-credit explanation of how Child captures the texture of Reacher’s thinking: because it’s his thinking, too.