The Teeth of the Tiger

Rating:
Summary: Not The Best Clancy Book, But Still Interesting
Review: There's a saying that you should not envy a man's success unless you are prepared to shoulder his burdens. Tom Clancy has had his share or personal trials and it appears some of attitude that is reflected in his latest book. Teeth of the Tiger (ToT) is one of Clancy's darker books, but then again, perhaps that's just a post 9/11 reflection of the country.

ToT is also the first Clancy fiction book to totally exclude the Jack Ryan character. In Ryan's place are three new characters, Jack Jr, and a Marine Corp/FBI Agent brother team. While there are the occasional references to previous Clancy characters and computer games, it's clear that this book was designed to appeal to movie studios looking to replace Harrison Ford as the leading man and attract a younger audience with the inevitable movie tie in.

Previous Clancy books spent chapters introducing and developing characters, sometimes to the point of diminishing return. ToT is quite the opposite. We find out very little about the background of the leadership of the new organization and not much more about the main characters. Instead, some vague references to bypassing the current legalities and fill-in-the-blank presidential pardons are all that is required before we're off to the races with four very graphic assassination sequences.

The abrupt ending may be the result of marketing research that misreads the target audience. Excluding Hunt For Red October, most of Clancy's fictional books have exceeded 600 pages. ToT is just over 400 and leaves the reader wondering when Part 2 will be released.

In summary, it's darker and more graphic than previous Clancy books, and should have been released as a single large book, but it's still technically as accurate as previous volumes and a good read.

Rating:
Summary: How Is This Possible?
Review: Did anyone notice that the terrorists headed to Sacramento somehow end up in Provo instead? Does anyone care by the end of the book? This is just one of many blatant editorial failings in this insipid read. In the context of Clancy's total body of work this is a pathetic, embarrassing attempt to extract cash from those who have supported him over the years. How is it possible that an author of so many significant works in the past has fallen so far so fast?

Rating:
Summary: Booooo - This book is not worth your valuable time
Review: This book was a waste of my time.

The characters were poorly developed, and the dialogue between the brothers (main characters) was exceptionally annoying; a bizarre mix of cheer, sarcasm and poor attempts at charm - all rolled into a painful back and forth volley which left me frustrated and deeply disappointed.

Sadly, the plot is very one-dimensional and lacks any detail or continuity.

I would recommend staying away from this offering - you can find plenty of other ways to waste several hours of your life.

Rating:
Summary: The Dentures of the Tiger
Review: Tom Clancy phones in another one. Why do I keep reading books by this guy? Maybe because you really don't have to think about the story while you are reading it. Sometimes it seems like Mr. Clancy throws various plot lines into a computer, then lets the computer mix it into a "novel" and releases it. Why, for example do the twins have nicknames as well as given names used interchangeably? This can be confusing, especially during the action sequences...which is the Marine and which is the FBI agent and does it really matter? Then there is the over abundance of information, the "man is the only one who understands men because of the type of media "typical" men enjoy," the pseudo-intellectual television viewing habits (only CNN, History and Discovery Channels, the obsession with cars, and the constant repetiton that the terrorists must not draw the attention of police (mainly by obeying the speed limits, drinking, and reading Playboy). Then there is the inane sentence, "Dawn arrived promptly with rising of the sun." When else? This is not a bad book, but it is so formulaic. But I'll keep reading Clancy's stuff as long as he writes it for the some reason I can't put my finger on. Maybe it's so I can learn to appreciate good writing even more. And by the way, I wonder why more of his books haven't been made into movies. They may not be great literature, but as action/adventure/geopolitical thrillers, they beat a lot of what is out there. Just no more Ben Affleck as Jack Ryan...I don't think he was even born when Jack Ryan graduated from Anapolis.

Rating:
Summary: Highly recommended, whether you're a Clancy fan or not
Review: It is somewhat difficult to believe that THE TEETH OF THE TIGER is Tom Clancy's thirteenth novel. One would think that he has written a veritable library of Jack Ryan tales; this simply isn't so. One might have that impression because, in addition to his novels, Clancy has authored nine nonfiction books concerning the U.S. military and has also fathered a couple of different ongoing series regarding special operation branches within and outside the Armed Forces.

But THE TEETH OF THE TIGER is only --- only! --- his thirteenth. And a lucky one it is. For this is in many ways the beginning of a new legacy for Clancy, providing the perfect vehicle for readers who perhaps fell away a book or two ago and for readers heretofore unfamiliar with Clancy to jump on. At the same time, it provides an exciting yet comfortable ride for those readers who have been with Clancy all along.

THE TEETH OF THE TIGER introduces Hendley Associates, a privately held company that does a quietly profitable business investing and wheeling and dealing in stocks, bonds and currencies. Operating out of its headquarters, known as "The Campus," its real purpose and mission is to identify, locate and neutralize terrorist threats. Hendley was set up with the knowledge and received the blessing of President Jack Ryan who, before leaving office, supplied Hendley Associates with a drawer full of signed and undated presidential pardons should any of its agents somehow be caught in the engagement of clandestine activities.

Hendley recruits quietly from a number of sources, and its first acquisitions are the Caruso brothers. Dominic is a rookie FBI agent who attracts Hendley's attention when he quickly and decisively resolves a horrendous kidnapping and murder. His twin brother Brian is a Marine captain who rapidly distinguished himself during his first combat mission in Afghanistan. Both men begin their training, with Brian in particular having some initial misgivings --- misgivings that are quickly put to rest when they stumble across a terrorist action with tragic consequences. Hendley unleashes the brothers, who cut a quiet but lethal globetrotting swath through an army of terrorists that threatens to conquer the United States a piece at a time.

Meanwhile Hendley has acquired a new hire, one who actually comes to them, having analytically surmised Hendley's mission and purpose. That new hire is Jack Ryan, Jr., son of the former president and cousin to the Caruso brothers. Ryan quickly demonstrates an uncanny ability to assimilate and connect random bits of information and make assumptions that more often than not turn out to be on the money. Soon enough, he finds himself joining his cousins in what is to be the role of a passive analyst. Fate, however, has other plans for the three of them.

THE TEETH OF THE TIGER is an incredibly fast-paced novel, in which Clancy eschews the technical explanations that occasionally bogged down the narratives of some of his previous novels. While he continues to demonstrate an uncanny ability to understand and relate to the reader The Way Things Work, the focus of THE TEETH OF THE TIGER is more concerned with the ins and outs of intelligence gathering than with the how and why of munitions (though there is a bit of that as well). Clancy continues to play to his strengths, however; there is simply no one who is better at describing the action of battle, especially the new battles in the war on terror, that occur quickly, sometimes quietly, and often without warning. Clancy also displays a fine sense of symmetry in THE TEETH OF THE TIGER, from the beginning of the tale until the very end.

Junior Ryan and the Caruso brothers are just right as well; they are young and make the mistakes in the field that young men would make, but they are errors caused by and often resolved by enthusiasm and energy. That enthusiasm and energy is Clancy's as well, and it translates onto the printed page. I'm not sure if I'm ready to call THE TEETH OF THE TIGER Clancy's best book, but I would most assuredly at this point call it my favorite. Highly recommended, whether you're a Clancy fan or not.

--- Reviewed by Joe Hartlaub

Rating:
Summary: Who's writing your books now, Tom?
Review: I've read every one of Tom Clancy's novels, several more than once. Was a time the news of a new Clancy sent me directly to the nearest bookstore. Recently I picked up "Teeth of the Tiger" at an airport having been unaware of its release. That's because the last couple of Clancy's novels have been a bit disappointing--not up to the high standard he set with his early novels. "Tiger" reaches a new low, sad to say. I find it hard to believe Mr. Clancy has even written the past couple of novels. The plots are predictable, the style has gotten clunky and repetitive, the language pedestrian, the dialogue unbelievable. And please stop telling your readers the same thing twice. You do it now time and again. We get it the first time. Oh for the thrill of reading page-turners as good as "Red October," "Clear and Present Danger," all of them up through "Without Remorse." Ah, well, thanks for those Mr. C. I'm not complaining. I'm just wistful. JW

Rating:
Summary: Don't buy this book....for the love of God, DON'T BUY IT!!
Review: Use your money to buy a classic, or John Grisham's A Painted House. Even an old Clancy book like Cardinal of the Kremlin. Anything...but not this.

Frankly, I thought Red Rabbit was a rare incident - an amazing writer with creative talent having a bad year. It was so insipid and predictable that at times I wanted to throw it out the window. Of course I had to read it since Clancy has written great books in the past.

But this book... The Teeth of the Tiger, is something else. It's almost as if Clancy is trying to spend as less time as possible on creating a remotely interesting plot. He basically just adds on ideas to the September 11th thing, predictably I might add, and refuses to add any twist to the plot whatsoever. In fact I kept expecting some wild change in the boring sequence of events to shock me, but I was left closing the book in utter disappointment.

It's such a linear plot that I wondered how I ever read his older books and liked them. Surely, they couldn't be written by the same people!

There is no excitment in this book. None. It starts off with a bit of intrigue but languishes badly in the middle and just drops off the cliff at the end, instead of hanging on. Clancy makes some cheap jingoist remarks through his characters and portrays the bad guys as ALL bad, which he never used to do with the Cold War. And of course, the good guys are ALL good, and brilliantly smart and Jack Junior is a carbon copy of his Dad, who of course is the epitome of Good. The whole Good vs Evil thing should be left to JRR Tolkien and his storybook fantasy, or Bush and his real-life fantasies.

If you're a clancy fan, don't buy this book, if you value your sanity. If you're not a Clancy fan, buy another of his books (not Red Rabbit).

I don't know what happened to Clancy, but he better fix it before his career goes down the tubes.

Rating:
Summary: The Teeth of the Tiger
Review: This book is best described as Clancy-lite. Whatever happened to the man who wrote such excellent books as Executive Orders and Debt of Honor? This book is tedious and predictable with characters that may as well be cardboard cutouts. The character of Jack Jr. is especially weak. And while I agree with many of the sentiments expressed in the book, such as handcuffing intelligence agencies and then criticizing them for not being effective, the book comes across as overly preachy. There also seemed to be a lack of proper editing, since information conveyed in one chapter was often repeated in another as if it were being offered for the first time.

Rating:
Summary: CLANCY KILLS TERRORISTS, BUT THIS NEEDS MORE PLOT
Review: Mercifully, Tom Clancy has given John Clark and Jack Ryan a rest in this terrorism/hit team novel. Unfortunately, he doesn't stray very far. The three main characters, Jack Ryan, Jr., and his cousins, Dominic and Brian Caruso, are assembled as a team for an agency called "The Campus" to deal with the terrorist threat against America in classic Clancy fashion.

Captain Brian Caruso is a US Marine, back from operations in Afghanistan; and rookie FBI agent Dominic Caruso, following a case in which he kills a child kidnaper/molester, are summarily recruited by The Campus, to work on a special project that is just getting underway. Though the Carusos are left in the dark as to the purpose of their training, the reader sees from page one that some terrorists are going to die.

Later, Ryan, Jr., joins the crew as an analyst who points his cousins at the terrorists he manages to ferret out of e-mail intelligence.

Clancy does a good job of identifying the one thing a Clancy fan wants to read right now: Americans killing terrorists ala WITHOUT REMORSE. Unfortunately, he doesn't do it with the pizzazz or plot development he has in the past. In fact, other than identifying targets and sending the Carusos out to kill, there isn't a heck of a lot of plot here.

TC tries to make a case for sending hit squads out to kill terrorists before and after the fact, but in doing so, makes a better case for showing why it would be more beneficial to make criminal cases against them, prosecute them, and gather intelligence to identify and locate even more terrorists. Dead terrorists can't talk about other terrorists. Surprisingly, this is not even addressed by the characters engaged in the activity.

Though I have criticized TC in the past for "too many words," TEETH OF THE TIGER would have been a much better work if its 431 pages had been fleshed out a little further. There was little conflict and the bad guys might as well have been sitting ducks for all the characterization that went into them.

His earlier works are still his best.

Rating:
Summary: Pedestrian
Review: This book is so obvious it is pedestrian. It's corny, bitter and has no likeable characters- Jack Junior has no life and no background for the most part. None of the old faces show up- no Clark, no Ding, nobody!

The book, however is certainly laying the groundwork for spinning the Jack Ryan saga into new directions, having got Jack Senior out of the white house in the book. Makes me wonder if it was meant to kill two birds with one stone: perpetuate the legacy through Jack Jnr while removing Jack Snr from the white and the necessity on Clancy's part of having to stay 'ahead of the news'. Thus freeing him from the burden of being so relevant he is avant garde. With this book he is just so passe...

Anyway, this book does nothing to fulfill any sort of promise of good story telling. It's weak, stilted, and obvious. There is zero suspense, except for a damp squib of an ending that is so not Clancy. He seems to have stumbled here- tripped over his ego and his arrogance to think that people would lap this puke of a book up?

I stopped reading all the other spin off books: Op-Center, Power Plays, etc. because they were misrepresented by the Clancy name, increasingly so with each new book. It seems that now even the true Clancy books are to suffering the same syndrome: called Multimedia Mogul-ism. Make a choice: a writer or a mogul. Can't be both. Because if this symptomatic of Clancy's future work then he wont be getting my money for any more drivel like this.

Give this a miss. Save your money. Go buy a cereal box: it'd be more interesting to read than this stinker. Or a clothes peg for your nose if your gonna read it. Seriously, he was SO good...but now??? That's what makes it so much worse: the magnitude of the extremes of this book say compared to The sum of all fears or Clear and Present danger. I guess he got mogul-ized? For shame...