Little more than a footnote appeared in the press recently as Tom Clancy died at age 66. Arguably the preeminent Thriller/Military fiction writer of our time is gone. Gone way before his time.
I have, I believe all of the books that were written by him, numbering well over 50 and they weren't minimized in size. Executive Orders, one of his best, Threat Vector and most others number more than 800 pages. Eight hundred pages of I can't put the book down is a wholesale loss of productivity on the part of the reader.
His writing career started out while he was an Insurance agent, with a degree in English. His first book, "The hunt for red October." was published in 1984 closely followed by "Red Storm Rising,: then a deluge of cold war related tales.
When the cold war ended he created wars with an expansionist Japan, the reversing course, sided with Russia against a land grab in Siberia by the Chinese.
His detail was so uncannily accurate that he was questioned by authorities as to where he got his classified information. He calmly pointed to open source information available to anyone that wanted it.
There are others of my favorites. Steve Coonts, Dale Brown, W.E.B. Griffin, but nobody can replace the master. You'll be sorely missed, Big Guy.
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