Tom Clancy

I know I'm not the only Tom Clancy reader here, so I'm a little surprised there isn't already a Clancy thread in this forum  ^*

, though I suppose the ~10 years between The Teeth of the Tiger and his latest release, Dead or Alive  ^*

^{which has 'absolutely nothing to do with the fighting game series :P}

, might have something to do with it.

Anyway, the other day I finished Dead or Alive, which I got for Christmas (indirectly, anyway... gift card for Barnes & Noble). While it doesn't leave a bad taste in my mouth like Tiger did, I still think he has a bit to go before re-reaching his best stuff. Without getting too much into spoiler material, there were a couple of minor setbacks for the protagonists, but no major screwups like, say, the chopper that crashed in The Hunt For Red October, killing the original group tasked with boarding the titular submarine.

Also, the way Tiger and DoA shoehorned 9/11 into the Ryanverse kind of bothers me, as did the fact that in DoA Kealty seems to have become Clancy's stand-in for Obama, and gets strawmanned appropriately  ^*

.

Not sure I'm so keen on Clancy reverting back to Doorstopper lengths, though that may be in part due to complaints (mine among them) that Tiger seemed to have been cut too short. In retrospect, though, if the overall storyline of Tiger and DoA were created as one big story at the same time I guess where he broke it wasn't too bad.

Enough yakking by me, though. Anyone else care to save this thread from being a one-hitpost wonder?

edited 31st Dec '10 6:53:10 AM by Nohbody

All your safe space are belong to Trump

There actually was another Tom Clancy thread here... I guess it got deleted in a forum cleanout.

I haven't read Dead or Alive yet. Actually, I've been trying to go through his books in order of publication, and that means I've read Red October, Patriot Games and Cardinal of the Kremlin. I tried to read Red Storm Rising but couldn't get into it, and couldn't do Clear and Present Danger just yet due to general burnout.

Considering my lack of love for reading though, by the time I get to Dead or Alive, Clancy will have released another ten books.

I find it odd that I like the guy at all, really. He goes on forever on tangents, describing technology that I can't at all picture in my head (one of the reasons I hate reading is because if I haven't seen something, I have a hard time forming a concept of it from descriptions), has disjointed plots that jump around and relies on subtext so much that sometimes its hard to figure out what's going on. Not to mention politics usually isn't my thing anyway...

But there's something good about his books, that just keeps me coming back. I guess its just, Clancy is good at what he does. He's no Ian Fleming, true, but he's got... something.

He probably does need an editor, though.

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Red Storm Rising was what got me into Clancy in the first place, and Hunt For Red October cemented it.

As for the Technology Porn, my being somewhat of a minor MilGeek makes me think that's not necessarily a bad thing. I can understand that it's not everyone's "thing", though.

I'm sure I had something else to say, but it slipped my memory. Guess having an exposed tooth nerve can be somewhat distracting like that...

edited 2nd Jan '11 4:53:49 AM by Nohbody

All your safe space are belong to Trump

Honestly, I enjoyed Red Storm Rising far more than I did his other works. It helped a lot that chronicling World War III meant there was a reason for the book to be the size it was, rather than two-thirds of it being comprised of rather dull Padding.

What's precedent ever done for us?

I can't really think of all that much, off the top of my head, that comes across as padding, though. In fact, without a re-read of the series from start to end (in copious free time ), the only real "doesn't do a thing for the story" that comes to mind right away is the whole Mountain Men subplot in Executive Orders. Removing that would've done nothing to the story as a whole, considering how none of the interactions between the idiots in question and the rest of the world got even close to contact with the federal agencies that would handle that thing (FBI and Secret Service).

I suppose the tech geeking could seem extraneous to some, but considering that's part of the technothriller genre (hence "techno"), I don't think I'd really count it as padding.

All your safe space are belong to Trump

Part of it is the works' tendency to meander, to give us a rather bloated Twenty Minutes with Jerks before the action kicks in. The Sum Of All Fears is particularly guilty of this - only the last fifth or so of the book is devoted to the terrorist attack and its aftemath, resulting in a rushed element to the ending that is simply unacceptable in a book of that size. Yes, I know that it's necessary to show the players and motives to the latest crisis, but Red Storm Rising managed to do a thoroughly competent job of it in barely a quarter of the time.

edited 2nd Jan '11 5:52:10 AM by Iaculus

What's precedent ever done for us?

Hunt was great, and Storm was pretty awesome, but Ryan got... well not exactly Sue like, but he felt kinda out there.

Without Remorse surprised me as being rather well done, despite being, in my opinion, an attempt at writing a Bourne novel.

Didn't he have some "help" with this latest, though?

...

Oh, and it's not exactly a crossover, just some cannibalized elements. The discussion topics are supposed to have fun names.

Charlie Tunoku is a lover and a fighter.

Yes, Dead or Alive was co-written with Grant Blackwood.

Not sure which parts are his (or at least strongly influenced by him), as I'm not familiar with his work, nor do I know how they've divided the work between them.

edited 2nd Jan '11 4:38:35 PM by Nohbody

All your safe space are belong to Trump

Only Clancy book I've read is Op-Center which I enjoyed quite a bit. I tried reading The Hunt for Red October but jesus christ was it boring.

It's been ages since I've read a Clancy book, and I think the last book that I read is largely to blame for that: Executive Order. Forget the pointless domestic terrorist plot that goes nowhere. What really irked me was the part when Ryan remakes the US tax code. I mean, I'm reading a book about war in the Middle East, Ebola outbreaks and other such fun things. What does the tax code have to do with any of that? At least you were finished with the book by the time you realized that the domestic terrorist plot was pointless.

But on the other hand, I liked Red Rabbit. The whole 'pope assassination attempt' was pretty stupid, but at least it was a return to the old days of Clancy thrillers.

Ironically, the Op-Center books aren't even real Clancy—they're ghostwritten. Same for the Net Force novels.

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I liked Netforce, actually, but his name really shouldn't've been on 'em.

Charlie Tunoku is a lover and a fighter.

That explains why I like it better then.

The two best works I've ever read from Tom Clancy were ironically,not Jack Ryan novels.

My two favorites are Red Storm Rising because of how he depicted what world war 3 would be like. It seemed like it was such an accurate depiction of what would happen should the unthinkable happen.

However,my favorite book of all time from Tom is Without Remorse. This is also ironic because it seems to be the black sheep of his books because rather than focusing on a global or national crises,he focus on the origins and life of a specific character.

No nuclear threat,no secret force deployed to Columbia. Just the life of a man who became a vigilante to avenge the one he loved.

This origins story is so powerful because explains one of the most powerful and prevalent characters in the series,second only to Jack Ryan himself.

This is part of what makes his story so good as opposed to other Tom Clancy books-it's living. It's about a person,not an event.

That said,I'm glad Tom Clancy has returned to writing crises books,because that's what he's best at.

I've read most of his stuff up to Bear and Dragon, except Red Storm Rising. I found most of them entertaining, but as time went on they sort of lost it. B&D was at turns boring, melodramatic (the outcome is never in doubt) and chock full of strawman politicos. I'm glad to hear Red Rabbit and some of the later books are better.

You need to read Without Remorse to truly understand John Clark's character.

I really enjoyed Rainbow Six, even if the padding was completely unnecessary.

And yeah, I like Net Force, but those shouldn't have been under his name.

Half-Life: Dual Nature, a crossover story of reasonably sized proportions.

I really liked Without Remorse, despite it being nothing like his other books. I've always liked Clark as a character, and it was interesting finding out about his story, even if it got very gory at times.

Yeah,the torture scene was pretty gruesome,although in later books he said he regretted it. I liked how the police were confused. I found that interesting.

Without Remorse was kind of like Clancy doing Ludlum, but it worked out surprsingly well.

Charlie Tunoku is a lover and a fighter.

Dead Or Alive's opening is really cliched, in my opinion. Usual "some guy finds something anomalous during routine check, while unscrupulous clowns transporting Big Bad get maimed". Is the rest of the book any better?

Was Jack Mackerel. | i rite gud

I've read Hunt for the Red October, Patriot Games, and the first half of Rainbow Six.

I love the mission setup scenes, where the "good guys" discuss the situation, the challenges and potential disasters of the plan they're about to execute, and go into detail about what they're going to do and why. This goes mostly for Rainbow Six.

Tom's also, like many best sellers, great about driving the plot constantly forward no matter the info dump density. He manages to knit several plot threads together pretty well.

That said, his good guys are mucho wish fulfillment overload for my taste. And they're all pretty much the same, and so darn smarmy and pleased with themselves. It makes me wish the villains would win or at least kill off most of the cast. The villains are unrepentant mustache twirlers and liberal communist straw-men, but they still manage to have a lot of personality. I both hate them and wish them well at the same time. The good guys just come off as shallow.

Having read two and a half books (though there might be one I'm forgetting), I feel I've read as much Clancy as I need for one lifetime. And dissing Rambo is not cool, even if the first two movies are hella unrealistic. It just comes off as insecure.

Teal Deer: some nice qualities and great info dumps, but no characters I can root for = no love from me.

edited 28th Mar '11 12:23:13 AM by MildGuy

You might want to try Red Storm Rising. Good plot, relatively balanced conflict, and some pretty badass Russian Anti Villains.

There's a reason I consider it my favourite Clancy novel.

What's precedent ever done for us?

I've read Red Storm Rising and everything in the RyanVerse except Dead or Alive (truth be told, I didn't even know about it until it showed up on our Tom Clancy page), and I'm a major fan of Clancy's work. I don't delude myself into thinking he's God's gift to techno-thrillers (an attitude he is claimed to have had at times), but his work is very enjoyable.

Some points I see commonly raised...

• The lengths of the books: Well, I suppose they might compare unfavorably to "Go Dog Go", but for a guy who's read Lord Of The Rings cover to cover a dozen times, I like my books nice and meaty and Clancy delivers here bigtime. Part of the reason Teeth of the Tiger disappointed me was its relatively short length. However, in recent rereads, I've found myself skipping to the action bits as often as not.

• As has been repeatedly pointed out, the only real Padding in any of the novels is the Mountain Men arc in Executive Orders, although my personal opinion is that it's there to show how evil sometimes sabotages itself — without the Ebola scare, they would have made it to Washington DC and potentially wreaked havoc. So, an example of Nice Job Fixing It, Villain on Daryaei's part. He even points it out earlier, lamenting that Hussein's assassin wasn't able to coordinate with him on the timing, or that the JAL pilot (Sato) who crashed into the Capitol building did so without telling anyone.

• Ryan as a Sue. I don't agree with this at all. I agree that he shares some Sue traits, and in particular is an Author Stand-In for many political points that Clancy wished to make, but he's a very rounded character with realistic weaknesses. I also can't think of any point where he's handed explicit author favoritism — except possibly for the very end of Debt of Honor where he gets shoehorned into being VP just in time for The Plot Reaper to show up. And then spends most of the next novel getting vilified.

• Strawman Political. Yes, Clancy does this a lot. I can't argue much, here, and it's amazing how conveniently all the conflicts in later novels set themselves up to dispose of major world hotspots one by one, like going off a checklist. I guess it started in Sum of All Fears, but really got going in Debt of Honor. Russia, check. Japan, check. Iran, check. China, check. (And let us not forget poor India.) Oh, and let's throw the Villain Ball at some radical environmentalists while we're at it.

• Technology Porn: Hell yeah. I guess I can understand why some people would be turned off by it, but I am such a technophile that I geek out over that stuff. Love it, love it, love it. And you can skip over it if you like.

• America Saves the Day: Again, more prevalent in the later novels, once they started getting really politically focused rather than action thrillers. Debt of Honor is of course the clear dividing line.

edited 28th Mar '11 9:48:50 AM by Fighteer

"It's Occam's Shuriken! If the answer is elusive, never rule out ninjas!"

My main problem with the Technology Porn is that I don't understand the descriptions, like at all.

If Tom Clancy would just draw me a picture that would be fine.

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