Rainbow Six

I recently reread this book after more than 20 years and I still find it to be Clancy's most interesting novel, if only--for no other reason--because the villains are environmentalists. This idea is so rare in modern writing and story-telling that only Michael Crichton's "State of Fear" really shares the same space as this book. But it is also a fun Clancy-style international thriller.

Madmen plan to wipe humanity out except they are well-regarded, well-educated, and well-financed. A horrible, modified Ebola strain is engineered in a lab and tested on the homeless and the lonely. A brand-new anti-terror group has been quietly established that works internationally when the locals can't/don't want to handle it. Someone is bringing old show more terrorists out of retirement to stage international incidents. What's it all for? How is any of it connected? Will the good guys find out who the actual bad guys are and what they're up to in time for it to matter? These are the questions that Rainbow Six answers in 900 pages.

The ending is very memorable. Pure Clancy, pure fun! show less

In middle school I loved this book to death. It was my jam.
Re-reading it as an adult my appreciation dropped considerably. Frankly, Clancy's personal politics are *weird* and it seeps into the book in ways that make it harder to enjoy. There's a scene of bizarre, prurient sexual voyeurism by the villains using a magic 'inhibition reducer' out of Beavis & Butthead logic. You can feel his horror at the very concept of lesbianism hitting the same way the baffling ending of Lovecraft's "Medusa's Coil" hits. There's a long aside during one of the hostage situations handled by the Rainbow team where he basically starts soapboxing Heinlein-style about the irish republican army. The use of ecoterrorists as a well-funded, sinister global threat show more with genocidal ambitions is something out of AM talk radio's wildest delusions. The glee with which the deaths of 'bad guys' is described and celebrated, without any self-introspection, gets sickening after a while.

Spawned a great video game, at least. show less

People either love or hate Clancy. I am in the former group. His books border close to hardcore science fiction in that everything he writes on - the plot, every device, the politics, capabilities and motivations, is within the realm of the possible. Just as he anticipated 9/11 (some may argue, inspired) and stealth machines in this book he anticipates (1998) a rise in non-nation sponsored terrorism and the ease in which fringe groups can cause outsize results as well as increased emphasis on special forces units to contain them.

This story focuses on 2 minor characters from the earlier Jack Ryan novels, John Clark and Domingo Chavez. They are working to stand up a new multinational counterterrorism unit with the support of the intel, show more military, and police forces of many nations. In it's infancy, it must fight an usually large number of seemingly isolated terrorist incidents that test the new unit's skill while an even greater danger lurks in the shadows.

His writing is easy to follow and flows quickly. As a measure, I took almost 2 wks to read Churchill's The River War, clocking in at just under 400 pages. This 900 pg novel took me roughly 3 days - maybe 9-11 hrs.

There are no obvious typos and editing is solid. There seems to be a minor continuity issue: characters seem to switch from Team -1 to Team -2 and back. I didn't follow that up, but it could be made clearer. Is Oso Vega on 1 or 2 and if he's on 2, it doesn't add up to a 10 man team by the initial roster. His team and that of another guy seem to change throughout the story. In any case most people won't notice as these are tertiary characters at best. show less

I read this for the "Military Related" part of my 2019 reading challenge. It was my first Tom Clancy and overall I didn't enjoy it. I found the first 2/3 of the book had too many characters to keep track of and multiple pages of gun details was unnecessary. The final 1/3 was good and I was actually interested in what was going on, but then the ending felt rushed and tied up too conveniently.

Probably my favorite Clancy book, mostly because the blind "let's go America" patriotism takes a backseat to characterization and plot. Granted, that has a lot to do with its international cast of characters (not to mention setting), but I think he actually stretched his muscles here. The book's the better for it.

I could not stand this book -- did not even make it halfway. I got completely stopped by an appalling disregard for human life (too many people measuring success by the number of body bags required), inconsistent levels of detail, and things not thought through fully. I was given this book when I was a teenager but never got very far, so I thought to give it a second chance... Mistake!

It's a long time since I read a Clancy and whilst this was enjoyable enough I was slightly put off by the repetitive descriptions of characters and events. However, decent poolside read this summer that kept me going for a while.