True Believer: Jack Carr

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This is seriously good. I mean—seriously.” —Lee Child, #1 New York Times bestselling author of Past Tense Now a reluctant tool of the United States government, Reece travels the globe, targeting terrorist leaders, unraveling a geopolitical conspiracy that exposes a traitorous CIA officer, and uncovering a sinister assassination plot with worldwide repercussions. Replicating that life in the private sector is an exercise in futility. The operator’s search for the sensations of the battlefield on the home front can manifest in unproductive and unhealthy endeavors. A new mission with a constructive purpose is necessary, one that fulfills the quest to be a part of something greater than oneself. The old life will always be a part of us, but we need to move forward. On the battlefield if you stagnate and get complacent, you die. My goal with everything I pursue in life is to devote the time, energy, and effort toward the journey in a way that will allow for marked improvement. I have always loved reading and writing and will continue to hone my craft as I move forward. That’s what life is all about. I get it. As he states in the preface, he writes in part to deal with his own demons - but where were his editors? So much of the irritating stuff is unnecessary to the story and should have been caught by anyone reading for style and content.

The Marxist government is stealing the farms that have been in families for generations. It’s the reason we came to the U.S., but that was when I was just a kid." The strength in this book is the last 60% of the book, starts of slow, yes I understand why, but the pace is heavy to start with in the wilds of Mozambique. Now, Reece is a broken man. Still dealing with a tumor that’s spidered its way into his brain, James finds himself alone on Bitter Harvest, a forty-eight-foot Beneteau Oceanis, bobbing his way across the Atlantic Ocean. Struggling to cope with everything that’s happened over the past several months, Reece stays off the grid, makes peace with his medical diagnosis, and spends the next four months slowly making his way to Mozambique, Africa, where he’s taken in by Rich Hastings, the uncle of James’ estranged best friend and former SEAL teammate, who runs a Safaris camp near Niassa. With technical ferocity and devastating action sequences, Carr writes both from the gut and a seemingly infinite reservoir of knowledge in the methods of human combat. Loved it!' Chris HautyAll this congestion must have slowed them down, he thought as he dialed a number on his phone per his instructions and waited impatiently for an answer. Encouraged by what seemed to be the start of a new friendship and by the lubrication of the whiskey, the normally stoic Raife began talking about his upbringing in Africa, their farm in what was then Rhodesia, their move to South Africa after the war, and their eventual immigration into the United States.

Well, we might as well do this right, then. Finish that beer, he said, pulling out a bottle of whiskey with a label Reece was unfamiliar with and pouring them both a couple of fingers. Not exactly. The hero’s journey is more layered but certainly shares similar characteristics across cultures. In writing these novels, I’m aware of these stages and consciously work them into the framework of the modern political thriller. The challenge becomes working on individual novels with their own themes and journeys into an overarching longer term journey that will span an entire series. It’s a construct I love to think about and explore.Also Reece - the hero of the story - fluctuates from a stone cold killer to an almost puerile adolescent wondering about how to talk to a woman - and in the midst of an operation reflecting on people he's lost in his life. It seems a ham-fisted attempt to prove "real" Navy SEAL snipers are human. With a tinge of guilt, he thought of Katie. Fate, or a divine force, had brought investigative journalist Katie Buranek into his life at precisely the right time to help him unravel the conspiracy that had led to the deaths of his Team and family. They had endured a lot during their brief friendship, but it was how he had left her that tore at him, his last actions and words. He wondered if she understood, or if she saw him as a monster, hell-bent on revenge with no regard for those left in his bloody wake. Great second book of the series where James Reece fully redeems himself in the eyes of the US Government by helping them thwart an evil mastermind bent on world domination. In this book, Carr delves deeper into who Reece is by taking us onto his escape voyage by yacht and his time on a game ranch in Mozambique where he sets up an anti-poaching unit. He also introduces us to a rich new cast of characters on his missions, and all of them adds value to the series, I especially like Raife Hastings and look forward to reading more of him in the next books hopefully.

This sequel to The Terminal List tells the tale of James Reece and how he goes about living the rest of his perceived life span as his brain tumor slowly takes him down. He’s on the lam but finds a way to ultimately survive and eke out a rewarding life with the time he has left. What he doesn’t know is that a complex terrorist plot is in the works and of course, only he can possibly make things right. As a twenty-year-old, Reece wasn’t sure what to think, though he did recognize he was from a vastly different culture. On one hand, you had indigenous people who had elected a leader viewed by much of the world as legitimate, though there were already rumblings about the disappearances and murders of those who opposed the now-entrenched dictator. On the other, you had the established property rights of families who had homesteaded their farms with the approval of the British Crown and lived on them legally for more than a century. Both sides believed that they were in the right and neither was willing to budge. To the young American, it looked like conditions were ripe for war. CHAPTER 3

What to know

Periodically this story skips, “redacted”. Looked up why this occurs. Suspecting as a former soldier the author left in the government edits prior to publication for impact.