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Showing posts with the label Guided Tour series (Tom Clancy)

Book Review: 'Airborne: A Guided Tour of an Airborne Task Force (The Tom Clancy Military Library)'

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(C) 1997 Berkley Books and Jack Ryan Limited Partnership On November 1, 1997, Berkley Books (G.P. Putnam's Sons' paperback division) published Airborne: A Guided Tour of an Airborne Task Force. Co-written by the top-billed Tom Clancy and his researcher John D. Gresham, this was the fifth book in a series of non-fiction works devoted to specific unit types of America's armed forces.  Clancy, of course, is best known to readers as the creator and principal author of the long-running Jack Ryan series of novels. He also co-wrote (with former Navy officer and wargame designer Larry Bond) Red Storm Rising, one of the 1980s top-selling novels and his most popular work of fiction that's not set in the still-expanding "Ryanverse." In addition, he was also a respected conservative commentator and self-taught expert on military and intelligence matters, a successful entrepreneur who turned his name into one of the most recognizable names in American mass media. 

Book Review: 'Marine: A Guided Tour of a Marine Expeditionary Unit (The Tom Clancy Military Library)'

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(C) 1996 Berkley Books and Jack Ryan Limited Partnership On November 1, 1996, Berkley Books (which at the time was the paperback division of G.P. Putnam's Sons but has since been folded into the larger Penguin Random House conglomerate) published Tom Clancy's Marine: A Guided Tour of a Marine Expeditionary Force. Co-written by Clancy's researcher and defense expert John D. Gresham, Marine is the fourth volume in what is now billed as The Tom Clancy Military Library but was originally known as the Guided Tour series.  Fans of the late novelist and conservative commentator know that Clancy was an unabashed admirer of the United States Marine Corps. His best known fictional character, John Patrick Ryan, Sr. started his career in government as a second lieutenant in the Marines, a fact that has been mentioned in three of the five "Jack Ryan" films and Amazon's Tom Clancy's Jack Ryan, as well as in several of Clancy's novels.  "Marine." S

Book Review: 'Fighter Wing: A Guided Tour of an Air Force Combat Wing (The Tom Clancy Military Library)'

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(C) 1995 Berkley Books Before his untimely death on October 1, 2013, the late Tom Clancy wrote 16 best-selling novels which focus on many aspects of America's national security community. Starting with his now-classic The Hunt for Red October (1984) and continuing all the way to his final Jack Ryan novel (2013's Command Authority ), Clancy's cast of characters included soldiers, airmen, sailors, Marines, Coast Guardsmen, and special operations troops, not to mention a certain CIA analyst who eventually becomes President of the United States. All of these books - including Red Storm Rising, one of only two novels that are not set in Clancy's "Ryanverse" - are not only successful because they tell great stories, but also because they are the result of a lot of research and Clancy's ability to network with many people in the military and other branches of government. In addition to his works of fiction, Clancy wrote a seven-book series of non-fiction bo

Book Review: 'Armored Cav: A Guided Tour of an Armored Cavalry Regiment'

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(C)  1994 Berkley Books Before his unexpected death on October 1, 2013, Tom Clancy wrote 19 novels, 17 of which were set in what reviewers and his legions of fans refer to the "Ryanverse" (so-called because they feature either his central character, John Patrick Ryan, Sr. and a large supporting cast that includes his son Jack Ryan, Jr.). Most of those novels were best-sellers; including The Hunt for Red October, Red Storm Rising (the only best-seller that was not set in the Ryanverse), and the last Jack Ryan/Jack Ryan, Jr.  books he co-wrote with Grant Blackwood and Mark Greaney between 2010 and 2013, In addition to his works of fiction, Clancy also wrote many non-fiction books about various branches of the U.S. Armed Forces, including the seven-book "Guided Tour" series that began with 1993's Submarine: A Guided Tour of a Nuclear Warship and ended with Special Forces: A Guided Tour of U.S. Army Special Forces  (2001).  These books were co-written with res