Customer Reviews

The Hunt for Red October

5 star:		(168)
4 star:		(46)
3 star:		(9)
2 star:		(10)
1 star:		(14)

 

 

Had to purchase the book because it was not available for Kindle.
That seems to be happening a lot, but it's never talked about in reviews of Kindle.

Like the book by the way, but PO'd with Kindle.

This is quite possibly the most boring book I've ever read. If you want a several hundred page analysis of the inner workings of a nuclear submarine, this is the book for you. If you want a gripping, fast-paced, satisfying spy novel with well fleshed out characters, stick with Follett or Ludlum. I know Clancy sells billions and billions of books, so there must be something to them that I'm not really digging. However, if this is his best book I don't want to waste my time reading any others. I'm a person who believes in sampling the best from all genres, a la Lonesome Dove for westerns, Dune for sci-fi, etc. I figured Clancy was the pinnacle for the spy novel, but he is simply not my bag, baby.

Somewhere in the North Atlantic, a Russian sub breaks away from its patrol route and makes a mad dash for the coast of the United States. Are the Soviets planning a stealth attack or what? The Americans don't have a clue. Oddly enough, neither do the Soviets. The sub's captain, Marko Ramius, is a man with a deep loathing and resentment towards the government of his homeland, and he's planned a spectacular revenge. It falls to a lower-level CIA functionary named Jack Ryan to figure out what's afoot: Ramius and his crew are attempting to defect to the United States, bringing a billion-dollar present with them.

Tom Clancy has churned out dozens of novels since, of descending quality; "Red October" was his first and it's by far his best. He goes into great technical detail describing the workings of a submarine but he explains it so well that any reader can understand what he's saying. His characters aren't very profound, but characterization isn't the main draw here; the hunt and the subsequent chase of Red October by the Americans, who want to keep it and the crew safe, and the Russians, who want to destroy it at any cost, keep us spellbound while turning page after page. Clancy didn't fall into the trap of venting out the political propaganda that spoiled so many of his later books; he keeps "Red October" squarely on target, concentrating on the thrill of the chase, and the actions rockets along non-stop from the first page to the last. If you read only one Clancy novel, this is definitely the one to go with. None of his other books can touch it.

I've wanted to read a Tom Clancy novel for a long time. Since this is his first, one of his shortest, and since I have seen the enjoyable movie based on it, I thought I'd give this novel a try.

At first, the book was pretty exciting. It got off to a quick start, taking us aboard the Red October as it's about to head to sea.

Then the boredom slowly began to build up. Page after page, Clancy shows what is happening elsewhere as the crew of Red October defect. We learn what is happening in every U.S. government office, on every U.S. ship and submarine, on and on and on. Every twenty pages or so, the story returns to the Red October for a couple pages. Eventually, it seems like you go for 50 pages without reading about what's happening on the Red October.

What's more, his descriptiveness gets to you after a while. It's nice to learn in-depth details about certain relevant things, but when he goes into the history of a Russian official's letter opener (how he first received it and what he was doing in his life at the time), it just gets to be too much and too unimportant.

I now realize this is Clancy's style -- to paint a full picture in order to see everyone's point of view and to be completely thorough. But in the process, the plot is lost. The book loses its momentum and becomes completely boring. By page 272, I withdrew my bookmark and closed the book, escorting it to my pile of books to trade.

If I was someone with only a few books to read, I might have bore (pun intended) this out to the end, but I have too many books and too little time. Not even John Updike is this detailed and longwinded. Rent the movie instead!

This narrative presents one of the most frightening deceptions in modern history; Captain Marko Ramius intends to defect to America, while his crew remain loyal to the Soviet Union.

This deception is made doubly daring by the Soviet Navy's claim that he is a renegade who threatens independent missile launch. Luckily, the crew believes him after his sub is fired upon by a Soviet aircraft, narrowly escaping.

He says, "if they were really shooting at us, we'd be dead." This study in the psychology of leadership presents a fascinating conclusion: though there are only 12 officers aboard, the 180+ enlisted men obey them faithfully, simply because the naval code requires it. Apparently, that's what has the navigator so worked up when he exclaims, "we could have a mutiny on our hands."

The possibility of a renegade or "rogue" launching nuclear weapons is quite real. In today's new world order, that possibility is increased dramatically, as evidenced by the recent crisis in the formerly Soviet Chechnya. Some of the new states in the Commonwealth have nuclear weapons which were strategically placed by the Soviet equivalent of the Strategic Air Command.

Thus the Soviet ploy of telling the U.S. that the missile launch was imminent was actually a shrewd move. In this way, the U.S. would have to destroy the sub or else let on that top officials knew Ramius's true intentions, alerting the Soviets that their leadership had been penetrated by CIA.

However, since Ryan acted alone and used his own instinct, the U.S. was able to simulate the destruction of the sub and take it to Norfolk, VA, where it may remain today.

Interestingly enough, President Reagan endorsed this book when it was first published, implying that the story is true. If such a tale is indeed fact, it would mean certain doom for the relationship between the U.S. and Russia if made public, as shown in Executive Orders.

Some day, we will know the truth (in 2035, when the 50 years expire). It would be really great to one day walk aboard a Soviet ballistic missile submarine, not so much as an object of conquest, but as an intriguing representation of the nuclear threat that could have destroyed everyone on earth.

Would also recommend the novels: DEBT OF HONOR and INTO THE STORM, along with Patterson's YOU'VE BEEN WARNED. Loved all of these and would highly recommend them.

The book is full of action , suspense, drama and amazingly moving characters . Also recommended: Putin's Russia, Union Moujik,Kremlin Rising

A great novel that introduced us to Jack Ryan, and kicked off the techno-thriller novel. Captain Marko Ramius, commander of the Soviet missile submarine Red October, uses his vessel as a getaway vehicle to defect to the US, and only CIA analyst Jack Ryan can convince the West of his intentions. Meanwhile, the Soviet Navy is at sea, with orders to pursue and destroy Ramius. The main story is always tense, and exciting, and the characters are quite memorable. The book does have a number of flaws, aside from the already dated plot. Like many Clancy novels, British characters are stereotyped ("Jolly good"). There are also a number of inaccuracies like F-14s dropping balloons to decoy missiles. Some of the sub-plots can be distracting and often slow the pace down, but it always picks up again when it switches back to the main story. Still, it's a much simpler, and more accessible novel than some of Clancy's later flag-waving novels.

This has to be one of the most boring "thrillers" I have ever read. It starts out strong, but just when Clancy has succeeded in getting you interested, the book dramatically runs out of steam. The plot then becomes embroiled in a welter of names, details and acronyms-too much to keep up with. The hero, Jack Ryan, is completely abandoned while the author plows through labyrinthine policy meetings and technical descriptions that sound like regurgitations from a textbook. If the writing had even a bit of spark or flair, it might have redeemed the book, but Clancy's writing is flat and uninspired. Worse still, he attempts to conceal this by throwing vast amounts of information at his readers, in the hope that they will be sufficiently impressed to overlook his deficiencies as a writer.

This is a perfect example of a great plot ruined by a terrible writer. Save your time and money; I'd vote for Frederick Forsyth as a far better representative of this genre.

The Hunt for Red October was a great book, about the hunt for a submarine that had a new motor in it that ran on jet repulsion that made it move sliently and undetective. The US was trying to find it before it got to close the the coast, they were also trying to steal the thing to.

Review: Tom Clancy's The Hunt for Red October

It is December 1986 and Captain First Rank Marko Ramius, son of a dominant Communist Party Secretary and the Soviet Union's most confident and acclaimed submarine commander, is setting out to sea with his country's newest and greatest military venture. She contains an advanced new quiet propulsion system that allows her to almost perfectly escape both radar and sonar detection, a terrifying first strike vehicle. She is also carrying one-hundred and eighty two nuclear warheads and twenty-six missile delivery systems. Her name is Krazny Oktyabr (Red October) .Once at sea, Ramius contravenes his orders and disappears into the North Atlantic after setting a course for the Eastern Seaboard of the United States. Both Soviet and American leaders are petrified, but they insist on snowballing each other with false information. Fears of either a surprise attack on the US or a possible defection abound. Both navies go on full alert, eventually resulting in a massive confrontation in the North Atlantic. And, just for kicks, Clancy tosses the British into the mix to really confuse things!

As Clancy's first, and quite possibly best, work, I feel that this is a very firmly woven story all together. The characters, even those like the C.I.A. Deputy Director (Operations), Robert Ritter who do not appear for very long are exceedingly well developed and presented. The details in the book are amazing, from the encrypted messages to the details and intricacies of the interior of the submarines and the extensive knowledge of military protocol and procedure presented. It definitely gives an "eye opening" experience to the reader.

I have heard many times that this book, like so many of Clancy's other novels, is too technical, and people who do not have previous knowledge of these topics have a hard time "following." Granted, Clancy has the peculiar flair for confusing readers with the technical military lingo that has become his benchmark. Though, the plot is easy enough to follow that even if one is stuck on a word or phrase or even an entire conversation (case in point: encrypted messages) the surrounding events of the story are actually easy to read through. There are even times when it is possible to infer a words meaning based upon who is speaking , where they are and at what point in the story you are.

All told I was very impressed with this novel. I did, however have a problem with the "denouement." With all of the unanswered questions that Clancy had developed through out the story, I was taken aback by the second climax that the author tossed in to the mix, and to be quite honest began to lose interest. I was almost to the point where I wanted to flip through to the end of the book just to see what happens to Ramius. I realize that he had to get the defected and crippled ship back to port somehow, but the reader is only interested in Ramius, they want to see what happens to defectors. I don't have any real suggestions for fixing it, so I guess I'm just complaining. Overall, I thoroughly enjoyed this novel and was very impressed with it.

5 out of 5 Stars