If you've never read it, this is as good a time as any to pick up a copy of The Hunt for Red October. I had never actually read it until three or four years ago (though I had seen the movie as a teen). It has held up remarkably well.
I devoured his books as a kid and I credit that with having a somewhat realistic view of politics and military. Most of it came from meticulously investigated details but even plots that seemed fantastic (a plane crushing into the Capitol) almost happened later.
Dammit<p>The first book by Clancy I read was "Red Storm Rising", I picked it up at 6pm and read until 3am. Some of the titles of chapters would have made great band names such as "Frisbees in Dreamland".<p>I wish they had actually made a movie of one of his books instead of just using the title.
Damn, that was unexpected. I must say that his books were pretty awesome.<p>I especially liked his "Red dawn rising" which is one of the only WWIII books that doesn't go to a nuclear holocaust right away - if you a like to watch politics and have a military interest I recommend you check it out.
In my high school you had to do a senior English thesis by reading three books of one author and then writing a thesis tying together the themes and characters.<p>I chose Tom Clancy. My English teacher said I was crazy and "would never find anything in those books writing about".<p>Somehow I pulled it off and got an A on that project.<p>So basically, I got to read Clancy books for school. :)
Thanks for all the memories, TC. My first shipped game title was Tom Clancy's Splinter Cell: Double Agent, and throughout high school, I read all his Jack Ryan novels.<p>Even though his later novels devolved into ghost-written, right-wing political soapboxes, still sad to see him go.
I'm terribly sad to hear this. Tom Clancy's "Into the Storm: A Study in Command" was one of the first books outside of the fantasy genre to inspire me as a child. It led to years of creating RTS total conversions based on his work; activity that laid the foundation for the broad range of programming and design skills I have today.
I was never a big fan of his writing or politics, but the original Harpoon computer game (based on the tabletop game he was partially responsible for) stands as one of the best computer wargames I've ever played.
"Red Rabbit" woke up the inner foreign policy wonk in me, despite how transparent Clancy's imperatives were - it's a pity he could never end up working his same genuine interest with China; I all recall is supposed Chinese naivety being dredged up - corporate espionage ("Chinese secretary has sex with supposed Japanese computer salesman in the name of her company"); "China: We Kill Priests and Babies".<p>They'd nevertheless invoked a great deal of meaningful machinery, though - certainly compared to the sheer suppository of machismatic agency that was Chavez-verse (credit probably required yet again, though: he was probably first to tread within the grounds of "contemporary tacticool".)
I will miss his books, "Red Storm Rising" and "Clear and Present Danger" are both in my library. Some of his later books [1] suffered from too much detail, where I would have appreciated an editor with the guts to say "Tom, its great that this character has a full life history and several motivating events in their past, but we don't actually need all of that in the book to tell this story ...".<p>It's also sad to see a talented writer die at such a young age. Goodbye Tom, thanks for the great books.<p>[1] I am specifically referring to "The Bear and the Dragon" in this example.
A friend's dad loaned me The Sum of All Fears when I was 11, and that was the first Clancy novel I read (Having seen the movie of The Hunt for Red October, I figured I'd enjoy it). Those 914 pages took me a couple weeks to read while relaxing in a recliner, especially since I was kind of OCD at that age about looking up every word I didn't understand in a massive dictionary that sat on my lap. After hearing about nukes throughout the 80s, the story felt to my young mind like it could happen any moment in real life.
I'm a big fan of the Ryanverse and I am really sad to hear about his passing.. I've read and listened to the books countless times and it makes me sad to think that there is now an end once the next book comes out.<p>(I know that he has had ghostwriters for the last x books but the characters and stories are now finite)
At the exact moment I read this headline, I was cropping a picture of Sam Fisher, one of Clancy's characters, for a fan website. (I'm a nerd, I know.) Terrible news. I'll definitely miss his knack for portraying action and suspense.
Sad. I really liked the earlier Ryan-verse books (I've not read anything by him after Bear and the Dragon).<p>My favourite remains Without Remorse. I miss a film adaption; Jim Caviezel would be perfect as Kelly.
I especially remember the first chapter of Red Storm Rising being absolutely gripping. Wonder if they'll ever make a film from that one (the plot is basically WW3 in the late 80s).
Really sad to see him pass. Some of his books were absolutely superb: Rid Storm Rising, Hunt for the Red October, Patriot Games, Without remorse. RIP :(