Rating: 
Summary: Riveting Thriller
Review: Not many thrillers have done what Tom Clancy's "Red Rabbit" has. This book kept me happily turning pages hour upon hour until I reached the climactic ending. You're probably thinking that a ton of books could do that. They can, but not as good as Tom Clancy has done here. Some novels are just mysteries that involve a simple murder and don't get into technicalities and what not. "Red Rabbit" is a techo thriller that, like Clancy's previous novels, includes a lot of information on foreign countries, international politics, government agencies and the way that they are run, and many other interesting things. While getting ultimate entertainment in this book you will learn a plethora of things on what was listed above. Tom Clancy fans know the character of Jack Ryan as the president or the head of the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA). This book takes place way before Ryan's career took off as in this book he has a job as an analyst at the CIA. In addition to the character of Jack Ryan there are many other main characters such as Ed Foley, a worker at the US Embassy in Russia, many of the good guys of both English and American intelligence agencies, and Russian terrorists. All of the characters are three dimensional and are very believable. Tom Clancy shows many of the characters' work and family lives, which add to the depth of each character. The plot of this book is as follows. Russian terrorists feel that the Catholic Pope can be a threat to their country because of a certain communication between the Pope and Poland. In addition, a few of Russia's past leaders felt that the Pope should be killed. Because of this a terrorist group plans a plot to assassinate the Pope. Will the good guys stop the assassination attempt? Read this great book and find out. As with other novels by Tom Clancy he has come up with a scenario that can possibly happen. While this story is not as extreme as some of his others in a sense of the future of the world, this book still presents a scary scenario, though. Clancy's writing is simple and easy to read and never gets bogged down with unneccesary passages. I felt that the plotting in this book was done very well and that not one word was wasted. Everything in the book pertained to the plot which makes for a great read. Fans of Tom Clancy, thrillers, or anyone that finds the plot of this book interesting is in for a treat. "Red Rabbit" is a fast paced novel that will definitely be enjoyed. Happy Reading!
Rating: 
Summary: Not a bad Tom Clancy book
Review: I have rated this book 3 stars in comparisom with other Tom Clancy novels. Compared to other books by other authors, it could well rate higher. But compared to other Tom Clancy books, it's only a 3. Why a 3? Well overall this book is probably better than "The Bear and the Dragon". However, it does not measure up well when compared to "Hunt for the Red October", "Clear and Present Danger", "The Sum of all Fears", or "The Cardinal of the Kremlin". For starters this book is far more linear than any of the books listed above. One of Tom Clancy's greatest assets as an author was to be able to take seemingly unrelated plot lines and bring them together. This doesn't happen in "Red Rabbit". In that sense it's much more like his last couple of books. Also, Clancy seems to repeat himself a lot in this book. For example there are several occasions in the book where the same characters have almost exactly the same conversation. This is quite obvious. While Clancy has obviously made an effort to go back to Jack Ryan's roots, he does not succeed as well as he did when breaking away from Jack Ryan in "Rainbox Six". And this book certainly isn't what his earlier books were. But overall this is not a bad Tom Clancy book, just not a great one. Clancy does have a workable plot, but the twists that marked earlier novel endings are not really there. Certainly the book didn't keep the reader guessing. Worth reading - probably. But certainly not a book you can't put down.
Rating:
Summary: Slow Going, But Totally Absorbing
Review: Let me start by saying I'm not a regular Tom Clancy reader. Nothing against his work, which I find well written and plotted, but I'm more drawn to nonfiction. A friend of mine loaned me this book on a dare, so to speak. He had not yet read it and was interested to see what I would think with no previous editorial comment. He knew I had read some nonfiction books on the subject of this novel (the attempted assassination of Pope John Paul II)and wanted to get my "take" on how well the book stuck with the established facts. So, I figured, 'what can I lose?' I found the book a slow go at first, as compared with other novels by Clancy I have read, but once firmly enmeshed, so to speak, the rewards are plentiful. The characters are well drawn and the history is dead on and the speculation right to the point. I got the feeling of actually being there, whether at a Politburo meeting or on the street with the book's heroes Ed Foley (CIA station chief in Moscow) and his agent-wife Mary Pat. To my surprise, and delight, Jack Ryan is only a supporting player, proving Clancy is capable of other scenarios. One word, though, if you are looking for suspense, you won't find that much as compared to previous novels, but the speculation and conspiracy notions are more than enough to overcome this and by the end of the novel one won't even have noticed, for that is exactly how absorbing this book is. In fact, I was so taken that I have since bought the book for my permanent library.
Rating:
Summary: A great change of pace for Ryan
Review: Absolutely magnificent. I found the throwback to the early days of Ryan's career much more fun than the current Presidential run with ryan. As with many of Clancy's novels the beginning might seem slow to some but I was enthralled by the characteristic Tom Clancy well researched and well written storytelling. The addition of actual historical events that I can relate to was a nice addition. And as usual the book finished with a true page-turning sequence of events. I highly recommend this book to all readers.
Rating: 
Summary: A Interesting Tale - Clancy may be a victim of expectations
Review: Tom Clancy is generally regarded as the father of the modern technothriller. Since Red Rabbit is set in 1983, it lacks the gizmos and high tech weapons that readers are used to finding in his books. Some people will be disappointed that the latest in gadgets and toys are missing. However, I found that what is left is actually a fine story. Red Rabbit stars Jack Ryan as a young intellegence analyst who's begining a post in England. The attack on his family from Patriot Games has already occured but the Red October still lies in the future. Also playing a major role are the Foleys as a young couple begining a tour of duty in Moscow. It comes to the attention of the West that the Russians are planning to carry out an assassination attempt on the Pope, who threatens to undermine the stabitilty of the area. I found Red Rabbit to be a refreshing departure from the chronological timeline of the Jack Ryan books. Ryan seems to have lost some of his ability to think and act freely as the President, and Clancy has succeeded in restoring some of the more interesting aspects of his character by setting the book at an earlier time. Red Rabbit also gives readers more of a plot than the recent Clancy novels in that the characters and their interactions are not obscured by geopolitical struggles and international battles. In all, Red Rabbit is a very entertaining story that almost all will enjoy reading. Clancy seems to be writing on his most comfortable subject and it shows. Keep in mind that this book is set in the past - computers and spy technology are all at early '80s levels. If you're looking for a deeply plotted and involving espionage thriller, Red Rabbit will meet that need. Also recommended - Daniel Silva's Marching Season, Mark of the Assassin, The Kill Artist, and The English Assassin.
Rating:
Summary: Clancy almost back to form
Review: This new title in Clancy's "Jack Ryan" series takes the liberty of going back in time, placing Patriot Games first in the series. This seems to come between Patriot Games and Hunt for Red October. It also sets the stage for Cardinal of the Kremlin and Clear and Present Danger. Clancy brings back Judge Moore and Ryan DDO nemesis Bob Ritter as well as Admiral Greer. Cutter makes no appearances here. CASSIUS from the later books also gets introduced. This book gets away from the trap that Clancy had fallen into - these long-winded dialogues and descent into puerile humor that characterized Bear and the Dragon. This is not to say that Red Rabbit doesn't drag - it does. but it also gets to the troika that actually defeated Communism: the Gipper and the Iron Lady in the West - and Lech Walesa's Solidarity in the East - a topic that had been lacking previously in Clancy stories. I'll leave this here with the following compliment. I bought "Red Rabbit" at 2PM yesterday. Couldn't put it down for any more than an hour or two and it is now complete at 3:30 in the following morning. 4 stars!
Rating: 
Summary: Worst Tom Clancy novel I ever read
Review: _Red Rabbit_ is the next Tom Clancy novel (after _The Bear and The Dragon_) set in the "Ryanverse," the series of stories centering around Jack Ryan. Next that is in terms of order published; the book is set in 1981 and occurs after the events in _The Hunt for Red October_ and _Patriot Games_ but before _The Cardinal of the Kremlin_. Occurring something like twenty years in the past of the history of Jack Ryan, in this novel Ryan and his family have moved to the United Kingdom in his work for the CIA. During the course of events in the book Ryan becomes involved in a complex plot involving a KGB defector and Pope John Paul II.
Clancy took the real world failed attempt on the Pope's life in 1981 and constructed a story around it. In the book (and in actual history), the Pope wrote and sent a letter to the Soviet Union, threatening to resign his position as Pope and return to his home nation of Poland to fight Soviet oppression there. Soviet leaders - chiefly KGB chief Yuri Andropov - designed an operation to kill the pontiff, dispatching a trusted Bulgarian operative to arrange for another man to kill the Pope (one that could not be traced back to the either the Bulgarians or more importantly the Soviet Union), an operative that would in turn be eliminated himself by the Bulgarians soon after assassinating the Pope so as to further safeguard the originators of the operation (here on out the book is entirely fictional). A communications specialist and cryptographer working for the KGB (by the name of Oleg Zaitzev) is assigned to the task of handling communications between Moscow and the Bulgarians. Horrified by what he learns he is encrypting and sending back and forth between the two parties, Zaitzev decides (without telling his wife and his young daughter) that he has a huge problem with this operation and seeks (rather clumsily) to make contact with the Americans working in Moscow. The man he makes contact with is Ed Foley, the rather recently arrived CIA station chief in Moscow (who along with his fellow agent and wife Mary Pat are main stays of the "Ryanverse," instrumental in many other stories), who helps to arrange under Zaitzev's (now code-named Rabbit) insistence that he be aided in defecting to the West as a "conscience defector" (as opposed to say a defector leaving just for money or some other reward or avoiding some other fate). A long (very long) description of his being smuggled out of the Soviet Union and Soviet-dominated Eastern Europe follows, after which he is brought to the United Kingdom, debriefed, and a mission is launched to act on the information about the planned Papal assassination. As you might guess, the assassination attempt is not exactly foiled - the Pope is shot (and recovers) in this universe as he is in ours - but they do manage to defeat the Bulgarian operative.
Somewhat interestingly, the Americans and British decide they value the Rabbit's knowledge of KGB operations more than the actual information about the planned Papal assassination plot, and go to some pains to fake his death so that the KGB doesn't know he defected, thereby making him even more useful (so that the KGB doesn't know that their communications and operations are being compromised). Ryan, who was involved in getting the Rabbit and his family out of Eastern Europe, has to convince the powers that be that they must undertake some sort of operation to try and save the Pope, even if they aren't allowed to tell the Vatican what they know for fear of losing the advantage of the KGB not knowing that the Rabbit is in fact alive.
There, I just told you the whole plot, saving you the effort of wading through it. This massive volume, over 600 pages long, is very long, very slow moving, not brisk reading by any stretch of the imagination. It seemed like it took forever to get anywhere in the book with the plot; you could see where things were going well before they actually got there, which is fine I suppose if there were twists, surprises, or something you didn't expect. They weren't any twists or surprises. The good guys make plans, the good guys execute plans, the good guy"s plans work. There is no real tension - and I don't mean just from the fact that we all know the Pope does get shot and does survive - as the book just doesn't go anywhere. It just plows ahead, so very slowly. I read this book during my lunch break at work, about twenty to thirty minutes three or four times a week, but the book was so slow, so dull, I would not read it for weeks at a time; it probably took me six months to read this dull tome. Easily the worst Clancy book I have ever read. If this were made into a movie I would not go see it.
I guess I didn't hate the book, it wasn't horribly written, just not terribly exciting. It was just too slow for my tastes. It could have been a lot more concise, thrown in a few twists maybe, I don't know. I thought it might be interesting to learn more about the supporting characters in the Ryan universe - Ed Foley, Mary Pat, Greer, Ritter, Moore - but you don't really learn terribly much about them either (well a little about the Foleys). Some Cold War spy intrigue might have been interesting (as it was in _The Cardinal and The Kremlin_) but the intrigue here wasn't, well, intriguing.
Skip this book. Don't waste your time. Maybe if you were a diehard fan of Jack Ryan and wanted to be able to say you read all of the novels about him, I guess it might be worth your time. I recommend instead one either try his earlier works or try the excellent novels of James W. Huston.
Rating:
Summary: A different kind of Clancy, but still a good read.
Review: The people flaming the book make some good points and some bad ones. The idea from many that they just can't believe Jack Ryan's luck or that the book is unrealistic is laughable! If "realism" is the gold standard, then I would be hard pressed to name a SINGLE book in the Jack Ryan series that comes close to that standard. The truth is that CIA operatives and analysts don't encounter one tenth of the excitement and intrigue in their entire careers that you will find in any TWO Ryanverse novels.
Tom Clancy did a couple of interesting things in this book. First, only one person is killed in the entire book - an anomaly for a Clancy novel - and he isn't killed until the last page of the book. That must have been tough to do, and it had to be a conscious effort on Clancy's part. I couldn't even count the number of people who died in "Executive Orders," so that is refreshing.
Second, how can people complain that everything in the book was too easy? They are trying to stop the asassination of the Pope and ended up having nothing to do with the outcome of the asassination! They failed to stop the shooting, but the Pope lived anyway. Sounds pretty realistic to me!
I could argue all day about whether this was a good book or not, but won't. If you want realism, don't read ANY Jack Ryan novel. Read Clancy's non-fiction books like "Shadow Warriors" - also an interesting book.
The Ryanverse novels are referred to as "fiction" for a reason. They're complete fantasy, sprinkled with realistic touches.
By the way, someone did predict the collapse of the Japanese economy quite publicly in the 1980's. His name was Harry S. Dent, and I remember him predicting that the balloon would burst in the mid to late 80's. He was spot on, except that Japan didn't burst overnight, but rather deflated rapidly over a period of a couple years.
Rating:
Summary: Red Roost
Review: Wow, the intensity, the techo thriller and the interesting plot are gone. I found this a bit to boring and predictable. Although interesting, it could have been told in 50 pages or less. I do not think I can handle another Clancy book, and I used to be a big fan. The creative juices from Clancy are gone like a burnt out rock star. Time for him to retire and read other's great novels.
Rating:
Summary: Contrived - At Best
Review: Clancy took us through the career of Jack Ryan - for unwitting hero in Patriot Games to the accidental President and beyond. Red Rabbit offers us a look at the early career of Jack Ryan as a CIA intelligence offer in light of history - and a look at some of the major players in the Clancy novels.
The plot centers around an attempt to kill a polish priest - actually, the Pope - who threatens to resign and rejoin his people in the wake of solidarity. Jack Ryan, who only 5 months earlier jointed the CIA is put into a British post. Ed and Mary Pat Foley, new station chiefs in Moscow have their first coup - a "rabbit" = in thie case a KGB cypher clerk who knows about the plot against the Pope and is willing to trade what he knows for the West for himself and his wife and child.
Where the novel falls down is in realism. Jack Ryan, despite being an honorary knight (Patriot Games) would not have been assigned to the UK after only 5 months of service. Ed Foley probably would have dismissed his rabbit's first attempt as a clumsy KGB operation. Plus, the good guy's don't really win in the end.
The novel makes it harder to reconcile real history with Clancy history. Clancy history deals with right wing presidents (Clear and Present Danger), left wing presidents (Sum of All Fears; Debt of Honor), and Ryan's own unwilling Presidency (Executive Orders and The Bear and The Dragon).
Still, Jack Ryan remains what he always was - a man of honor fighting a war he believed in. He was a rookie in this book, but proved himself a master of intelligence in later books (stealing Red October; then compromising the KGB head with it to get him to defect). Even as the President he swore before God he would do his best.
Yes, after Red Rabbit it was time for Clancy to give Jack Ryan his decent retirement - a lifetime of service. From a simple act to prevent murder (saving the Prince and Princess of Wales - and their child) to the highest office in the United States, Jack Ryan served as best he could. He also let his wife pursue her own career as a doctor.
Clancy gave us some great spy thrillers, from his breakthrough book (The Hunt for Red October) to Red Rabbit (the last of the Jack Ryan series). Some backstory (Patriot Games) to his term in office as President (Executive Orders and The Bear and the Dragon), Clancy gave us a hero. Even more, his side heros John Clark and Domingo (Ding) Chavez have provided heros on the CIA operations wing. John Clark earned it through service and his own serial killings of drug lords (Without Remorse); Ding earned it throught faithful service (Clear and Present Danger) and a hard apprenticeship.
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