Probably my favorite author.  I could never get into Tom Clancy...but for some reason I can't put Hunters books down.  Funny thing is I never read...Hunter is it.  Read Blacklight, Point of Impact, The Master Sniper, and a few others.  My favorite by far was point of impact.  I'm on The Day Before Midnight now.  Its just as good as his others.  If you want a really good read start out with Point of Impact.  You'll be hooked!

Yes Point of Impact is one of my all-time favorite books.  I'm reading it again for about the 30th time.  Hunter knows guns and he knows shooters.  He is one of us through and through.  Amazing considering his day job is as a reporter for the Washington Post...

Dirty White Boys, Black Light, Time to Hunt, and Pale Horse coming are great too...

Clancy's earlier works are fantastic, but not really very realistic regarding character development, etc.  After Executive Orders his works went downhill fast though.  I haven't enjoyed anything he's done since.

Without Remorse is his finest work IMHO...  Red Storm Rising is also fine escapism....

Anyone who loves guns and shooting should read Point of Impact.  In my opinion it's the best fiction out there for gun nuts!

Peter Hathaway Capstick is the best for nonfiction.  Also Stephen Ambrose...

Quoted: Clancy's earlier works are fantastic, but not really very realistic regarding character development, etc.  After Executive Orders his works went downhill fast though.  I haven't enjoyed anything he's done since.

Didn't it come out that he had been (still does?) using ghost writers for his later material?

Hunter is my favorite author.  I read "POI" so many times it fell apart and I had to buy another.  "Day before midnight" is the best of his non-Bob Lee books ( although Puller appears in "Time To Hunt" IIRC).  "Dirty White Boys" is as good a piece of writing as can be found.  I also like that he has at least a little bit of respect for the "Gun Culture" that he writes about.

I would recommend him without hesitation.

BTW, Clancy is a good writer but he is an asshat.  Very full of himself with a condesending attitude.  Met him once.

I've read a bunch of Hunter's books, and I like them a lot. I don't think he's quite in the same class as Tom Clancy, though. Stephen Hunter comes up with great plots and ideas, but I think his writing leaves a little room for improvement, and sometimes it seems like he adds in a major plot twist at the end but it isn't very well thought out and kind of wreck the ending, and sometimes he oversimplifies things. I distinctly remember one part in Black Light where Bob Lee says "there's only one man who could set up this operation, Frenchy whatever" I think that's kind of a ridiculous jump.

He is definitely a gun nut, and his books always have a lot of stuff a gun nut likes to read. I think sometimes he goes overboard with it though. All that aside, his books are very entertaining and I would reccomend them to anybody. I like the ones about Earl Swagger the best, he seems like a more interesting character than his son. I also liked Master Sniper a lot, the target was definitely not anything I expected.

As for his Washington Post job, I think all he does is movie reviews, he's written at least one book about film related stuff, too.

I've enjoyed all of Tom Clancy's books, well all of his "real" books, I haven't read the other series like Op-Center or Net Force.

You guys should also check out Vince Flynn, his books are great and I think he's doing some advising stuff for 24 now. Start with Term Limits and read the books in order.

Read them all except the last one.

POI and Time to hunt are my favorites.

Read most of them, i am on Havana now, his latest with Earl in it set in '53. Time to hunt is a good one to read first. I am a Fan of Hunter........

I think the biggest difference between Hunter and Clancy is that Hunter's books are about 1/2 the length of Clancy's.  

I have read & own every book all hard covers some even signed defintly one of my favorites

I just read Hunter for the first time.  A coworker brought POI for me to read.  He's a great writer for straight through, no BS suspense and action.

It's awesome light reading.

Definitely a book you can't put down.  (POI that is...)    I wish they'd make a movie out of it.  Hollywood would probably fuck it up though like they did to Clancy's "sum of all fears"...

Quoted: Definitely a book you can't put down.  (POI that is...)    I wish they'd make a movie out of it.  Hollywood would probably fuck it up though like they did to Clancy's "sum of all fears"...

Last I heard, there is a movie in the works.  It looks like they are going to combine the Bob Lee & Nick Memphis characters into one (and major suckage is sure to ensue). www.aintitcool.com/display.cgi?id=22563

Hunter is a confirmed gun nut. Here's an excerpt from an interview at www.stephenhunter.net/amgunner.php

MB: So how, and when, did you first start shooting?

SH: The thing is, I loved guns from the start. I think my first coherent memories are of guns, I'm so drawn to them. I remember an episode of Dragnet, I must have been seven or eight years old, which would make it 1953-54, where Sergeant Friday is going after a fleeing felon. "Be sure to bring plenty of .45s for the Thompson," Friday says. "It looks like he wants to go all the way..." The next day, I started drawing guns in my school notebook; all my notebooks are filled with drawings of guns. And it was phenomenally liberating to my imagination! I started writing fiction with guns before I was 10 years old.

MB: But you drifted from the fold?

SH: Okay, I went through a period of creepy liberalism when I worked at the Baltimore Sun and thought all guns should be banned. But I knew on some deep level I was denying myself, not being who I was. I wasn't a movie critic yet, and I was on my way to see a movie that I thought might help me along. I got to the theater early, so I went next door to a magazine stand. There was a gun magazine on the rack, I remember it had a picture of the S&W 745 introduction. I bought that magazine, read it from cover to cover, then subscribed. It was like I suddenly remembered who I was. I bought my first gun right after that, a Taurus PT-99.

MB: Everything changed after that?

SH: Absolutely. I was who I was, and I was here I belonged. If the world or the people around me didn't like it, f**k 'em. I was going to be myself.

Quoted: Quoted: Definitely a book you can't put down.  (POI that is...)    I wish they'd make a movie out of it.  Hollywood would probably fuck it up though like they did to Clancy's "sum of all fears"... Last I heard, there is a movie in the works.  It looks like they are going to combine the Bob Lee & Nick Memphis characters into one (and major suckage is sure to ensue). www.aintitcool.com/display.cgi?id=22563 Hunter is a confirmed gun nut. Here's an excerpt from an interview at www.stephenhunter.net/amgunner.php MB: So how, and when, did you first start shooting? SH: The thing is, I loved guns from the start. I think my first coherent memories are of guns, I'm so drawn to them. I remember an episode of Dragnet, I must have been seven or eight years old, which would make it 1953-54, where Sergeant Friday is going after a fleeing felon. "Be sure to bring plenty of .45s for the Thompson," Friday says. "It looks like he wants to go all the way..." The next day, I started drawing guns in my school notebook; all my notebooks are filled with drawings of guns. And it was phenomenally liberating to my imagination! I started writing fiction with guns before I was 10 years old. MB: But you drifted from the fold? SH: Okay, I went through a period of creepy liberalism when I worked at the Baltimore Sun and thought all guns should be banned. But I knew on some deep level I was denying myself, not being who I was. I wasn't a movie critic yet, and I was on my way to see a movie that I thought might help me along. I got to the theater early, so I went next door to a magazine stand. There was a gun magazine on the rack, I remember it had a picture of the S&W 745 introduction. I bought that magazine, read it from cover to cover, then subscribed. It was like I suddenly remembered who I was. I bought my first gun right after that, a Taurus PT-99. MB: Everything changed after that? SH: Absolutely. I was who I was, and I was here I belonged. If the world or the people around me didn't like it, f**k 'em. I was going to be myself.

how in the name of all that is holy can they make a composite character of Bob the Nailer and Pork.  That is the most ridiculous thing I have heard yet.

Point Of Impact is probably my favorite book. Excellent read from start to finish.

I love when Payne gets his

Quoted: Quoted: Quoted: Definitely a book you can't put down.  (POI that is...)    I wish they'd make a movie out of it.  Hollywood would probably fuck it up though like they did to Clancy's "sum of all fears"... Last I heard, there is a movie in the works.  It looks like they are going to combine the Bob Lee & Nick Memphis characters into one (and major suckage is sure to ensue). www.aintitcool.com/display.cgi?id=22563 Hunter is a confirmed gun nut. Here's an excerpt from an interview at www.stephenhunter.net/amgunner.php MB: So how, and when, did you first start shooting? SH: The thing is, I loved guns from the start. I think my first coherent memories are of guns, I'm so drawn to them. I remember an episode of Dragnet, I must have been seven or eight years old, which would make it 1953-54, where Sergeant Friday is going after a fleeing felon. "Be sure to bring plenty of .45s for the Thompson," Friday says. "It looks like he wants to go all the way..." The next day, I started drawing guns in my school notebook; all my notebooks are filled with drawings of guns. And it was phenomenally liberating to my imagination! I started writing fiction with guns before I was 10 years old. MB: But you drifted from the fold? SH: Okay, I went through a period of creepy liberalism when I worked at the Baltimore Sun and thought all guns should be banned. But I knew on some deep level I was denying myself, not being who I was. I wasn't a movie critic yet, and I was on my way to see a movie that I thought might help me along. I got to the theater early, so I went next door to a magazine stand. There was a gun magazine on the rack, I remember it had a picture of the S&W 745 introduction. I bought that magazine, read it from cover to cover, then subscribed. It was like I suddenly remembered who I was. I bought my first gun right after that, a Taurus PT-99. MB: Everything changed after that? SH: Absolutely. I was who I was, and I was here I belonged. If the world or the people around me didn't like it, f**k 'em. I was going to be myself. how in the name of all that is holy can they make a composite character of Bob the Nailer and Pork.  That is the most ridiculous thing I have heard yet.

If they actually try to combine the two polar opposites, the movie is guaranteed to blow chunks.

Quoted: snip

how in the name of all that is holy can they make a composite character of Bob the Nailer and Pork.  That is the most ridiculous thing I have heard yet.

If they actually try to combine the two polar opposites, the movie is guaranteed to blow chunks.

yep.  i hate to be one of those folks who bash something I've never seen but it will suck worse than the abomination they made out of "Sum of All Fears".

ETA: i screwed up my first attempt at snipping a quote.  Excuse my hamhandedness.  

Quoted: Point Of Impact is probably my favorite book. Excellent read from start to finish. I love when Payne gets his

Two slugs to the chest...

Loved the Bob Lee books, loved Midnight and Boys.

Didn't care too much for the Earl books.  Only read a couple, and never finished one of them.  They're actually not even on the bookshelf with the others.  The characters were the same as the bob books, just set in the 50's.  And I didn't like the 'Gun Writers in Action!' thing he had going on either.

Clancy is very hit or miss.  I absolutely loved Without Remorse.  Rainbow Six was actually pretty okay, but I read it when it came out along with the first R6 game, so I'm a bit biased on that.  The other books though are too damn dry and text booky, and his characters are weakly developed.