How About The WORST Naval/Submarine You've Ever Read?

[Subnuts]

Sure, we're always fast to RECOMMEND a book or shower it with glowing praise. But how about the worst book you've ever forced yourself to read?

My money is still on Ed Offley's Scorpion Down. So horribly pompous, boring, and filled with :roll:-inducing twists of logic. The review I wrote of it on another site is even more bitter than the one I wrote for it here. I basically summarized it by saying that the author was pissing on the graves of 99 sailors for his own financial gain. Apparently, a woo-woo site by the name of militarycorruption.com picked up on this review recently, and called me a hysterical disinformation agent working in upper levels of the Pentagon, under the personal payroll of George W Bush. Sorry to dissapoint you folks, but I'm just a civilian who happens to enjoy using my brain. :damn:

Runner up would probably be Patrick Robinson's USS Scorpion, which I don't remember much of besides being a tedious racist diatribe against the Chinese.

[Sailor Steve]

Pride Runs Deep, by R. Cameron Cooke.

Reviews at Amazon are varied, and at least one reader there, and one here, loved it. My personal take was that it was just another novel, and it left me flat. In spite of the author's years of submarine surface, he didn't make me feel like I was there, and the characters seemed stereotypical to me; not to mention the subplot about two-guys-in-love-with-the-same-girl.

It's been done before, and it's been done better.
http://www.amazon.com/Pride-Runs-Deep-Cameron-Cooke/dp/0515138339

[waste gate]

You must really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, dislike this book Subnuts. To start another thread after dissing the book in your regular review.

[Subnuts]

You must really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, dislike this book Subnuts. To start another thread after dissing the book in your regular review.

It's transcendently awful. It's the Manos: The Hands Of Fate of submarine books. And now, some people think I'm a government disinformation agent for not buying into it. :rotfl:

[waste gate]

You must really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, dislike this book Subnuts. To start another thread after dissing the book in your regular review.

It's transcendently awful. It's the Manos: The Hands Of Fate of submarine books. And now, some people think I'm a government disinformation agent for not buying into it. :rotfl:

Do you think the book is politically motivated? As a 'government disinformation agent' you should know.

[Torplexed]

It's transcendently awful. It's the Manos: The Hands Of Fate of submarine books.
Does it feature Torgo as some sort of disturbed torpedo officer? "When ya gotta shoot me out the tube boss...unk"? ;)

[Bill Nichols]

Red Star Rogue - one of the very few books I've felt like throwing against the wall in disgust. :down: :down: :down:

[HunterICX]

bad Books?

well , dont throw them away
put them to good use

''TOILLET PAPER!'' :rotfl:

[AntEater]

"Tom Clancy's (actually it wasnt him) SSN"
The game sucked, but compared to the book, the game was quite good.
:D

The chinese are just comicbook villains while a single US SSN simply massacres the whole people's liberation navy and of course the whole russian navy; which was conveniently sold to China to keep the USS Cheyenne from running out of targets.
Also, the gloating about multiple chinese (and russian) deaths is sometimes sickening. Of course in war novels soldiers die, but SSN makes it sound like stamping out insects.
And if that was not enough, there had to be a chinese über sub as the "boss" in the end.

[TLAM Strike]

Clancy's SSN -AntEater discribed it already. :o
Robinson's Barrcuda 945 - the only time I have yelled at characters in a book, infact I did it twice. Once when Morgan tells the President that since the sub could be hiding in thousands of miles of ocean we shouldn't go looking for it. WTF thats why we have P-3s! Twice when the DDG captain dosn't go after the sub when its in the Panama Canal simpy because the Chinese operators say now. If I was him I would have eather sent my Seahawks in with Penguins or just blasted the damn thing with a few Tomahawks or Harpoons, hell I would have sent in a landing party with M-16s and a few M-60s and just take the Canal Locks by force I'm hunting a mass murdering terrorist here I'm not going to stop because some guy on a patrol boat says no! :damn:

But I got to disagree with Sailor Steve here Pride Runs Deep wasn't that bad. It was predictable but not that bad for the guy's first novel.

[XabbaRus]

Pretty much all of the Patrick Robinson books.

Clancy's SSN which I don't care if he didn't write it he shouldn't have put his name to it. I guess he needed a new car or something.

I want to read Red Star Rogue just out of curiosity.

[Bill Nichols]

Pretty much all of the Patrick Robinson books.

Clancy's SSN which I don't care if he didn't write it he shouldn't have put his name to it. I guess he needed a new car or something.

I want to read Red Star Rogue just out of curiosity.

And I want to hit my head with a sledgehammer, just out of curiosity ... NOT!

:damn:

[Radtgaeb]

I abhor Crush Depth or any other Joe Buff Novel.....

I'm still cringing from the stupidity of the conflict in the book and the awful cheesy...ugh, you just have to read it to understand the awfulness!

[DAB]

Pretty much all of the Patrick Robinson books.
To be fair, Nimitz class does feel plausable, and has an original plot.

I have to say my vote goes with Michael DiMercurio's later books. There was something I liked about Pheniox Sub Zero, even if the ending was bizzare. What came afterwards though!!!

But Barracuda Final Bearing and Pihana Firing Point were the same story, down to the chapter headings almost. The story's seemed egotistical, and the technology fantastical.

[STEED]

I don't waste time or money on bad books, do your research people. :yep:

[Linton]

Who did write Clancy's SSN then?

[nikimcbee]

Red Star Rogue - one of the very few books I've felt like throwing against the wall in disgust. :down: :down: :down:

I thought about buying this one at one time:dead: . What didn't you like about it?

[nikimcbee]

"Tom Clancy's (actually it wasnt him) SSN"
The game sucked, but compared to the book, the game was quite good.
:D

The chinese are just comicbook villains while a single US SSN simply massacres the whole people's liberation navy and of course the whole russian navy; which was conveniently sold to China to keep the USS Cheyenne from running out of targets.
Also, the gloating about multiple chinese (and russian) deaths is sometimes sickening. Of course in war novels soldiers die, but SSN makes it sound like stamping out insects.
And if that was not enough, there had to be a chinese über sub as the "boss" in the end.

I totally agree. I had the book on tape from the library, and it struck me as a video game book. Use some imagination, and quit wriiting your computer games missions down.

[Chock]

Not a fan of Tom Clancy's books at all, let alone SSN.

With most writers, I usually prefer to read one or two of their books rather than form an opinion based on their 'reputation' as a good author. To this end, I bought what is probably Tom Clancy's most famous novel, The Hunt for Red October, many years ago and read it. And I was not impressed at all.

In the case of Clancy (admittedly he is not the only action writer guilty of this), I think his writing style is too unwieldly; yes it is very technically accurate in almost every detail, but that often gets in the way of the narrative flow. Nobody would ever 'grab a gun from a desk drawer' in a Clancy book, they'd 'grab a Belgian-made FN Five Seven semi-automatic pistol loaded with ten armor-tipped 5.7x28mm catridges (serial number 265432990), from the third drawer down on the left hand side of the exquisitely-inlaid Florentine-styled boxwood and mahogany Bureau (dimensions 4' 8''x4'10''x9'7''), in the corner of the room'. That's all very well, but when every sentence reads like that, it feels more like you are reading something with notes for a screenplay production office than a fast-paced novel.

On top of all that, nobody in his novels is ever 27th in their class at Quantico (or wherever), they are always the top scorers, the best there is, which tends to make things a bit one-dimensional to say the least. And with the length of Clancy's novels, there would be plenty of pages for character exposition if we didn't have to suffer tedious technical details about every piece of hardware the hero ever comes into contact with.

Of course I wouldn't want it to go to the other extreme - which if anyone remembers the scene in the movie Throw Momma from the Train, is hilariously highlighted when someone with no technical knowledge at all in Billy Crystal's writing class attempts to write a submarine story in that style, but Tom, enough with the technical specifications already!

So although Clancy's novels are clearly great fodder for movies if someone can pare them down, they make great stories, but as a reading experience they aren't that enjoyable. A bit like Bob Dylan really: All Along the Watchtower is a great song, but you'd much rather hear Jimi Hendrix doing it.

:D Chock

[nikimcbee]

Not a fan of Tom Clancy's books at all, let alone SSN.

With most writers, I usually prefer to read one or two of their books rather than form an opinion based on their 'reputation' as a good author. To this end, I bought what is probably Tom Clancy's most famous novel, The Hunt for Red October, many years ago and read it. And I was not impressed at all.

In the case of Clancy (admittedly he is not the only action writer guilty of this), I think his writing style is too unwieldly; yes it is very technically accurate in almost every detail, but that often gets in the way of the narrative flow. Nobody would ever 'grab a gun from a desk drawer' in a Clancy book, they'd 'grab a Belgian-made FN Five Seven semi-automatic pistol loaded with ten armor-tipped 5.7x28mm catridges (serial number 265432990), from the third drawer down on the left hand side of the exquisitely-inlaid Florentine-styled boxwood and mahogany Bureau (dimensions 4' 8''x4'10''x9'7''), in the corner of the room'. That's all very well, but when every sentence reads like that, it feels more like you are reading something with notes for a screenplay production office than a fast-paced novel.

On top of all that, nobody in his novels is ever 27th in their class at Quantico (or wherever), they are always the top scorers, the best there is, which tends to make things a bit one-dimensional to say the least. And with the length of Clancy's novels, there would be plenty of pages for character exposition if we didn't have to suffer tedious technical details about every piece of hardware the hero ever comes into contact with.

Of course I wouldn't want it to go to the other extreme - which if anyone remembers the scene in the movie Throw Momma from the Train, is hilariously highlighted when someone with no technical knowledge at all in Billy Crystal's writing class attempts to write a submarine story in that style, but Tom, enough with the technical specifications already!

So although Clancy's novels are clearly great fodder for movies if someone can pare them down, they make great stories, but as a reading experience they aren't that enjoyable. A bit like Bob Dylan really: All Along the Watchtower is a great song, but you'd much rather hear Jimi Hendrix doing it.

:D Chock

Good points. Did you ever read Red Storm Rising? If you did, what did you think?

[AntEater]

Red Storm Rising is not entirely by Clancy either.
It was co-authored by Larry Bond, the creator of the "Harpoon" computer/board (how do you play such a thing on a tabletop anyway? :D) games.
Bond wrote a bunch of books himself which range from good to mediocre.

[Captain Vlad]

I read an utterly awful Douglas Reeman novel (which, after a couple more attempts, seemed to be a redundant phrase) about the Surcouf's sister sub, loose in the Pacific with a British crew who single-handedly sank what appeared to be the entire Japanese Navy.

Seriously...even SH IV war patrol kill lists look paltry next to what those fellas did.:D

Some silliness in there about the XO and CO after the same woman...which also occured in the other two Reeman novels I had the tenacity to read.

For movies? Full Fathom Five. I probably don't have to say anything else.

[AntEater]

You mean Fire from the Sea?
Read this one while in the navy and pretty much laughted myself to death.
Actually I thought it was written by Alexander Kent, at least I think the german version actually WAS sold as being by Alexander Kent..
:rotfl:
But it surely seemed to be a steep drop in quality compared to other Kent novels.

[Captain Vlad]

You mean Fire from the Sea?
Read this one while in the navy and pretty much laughted myself to death.
Actually I thought it was written by Alexander Kent, at least I think the german version actually WAS sold as being by Alexander Kent..
:rotfl:
But it surely seemed to be a steep drop in quality compared to other Kent novels.

Strike from the Sea when I read it (now that I've wikied Reeman and found the title). And yeah, he uses the pen name Alexander Kent. Had already read With Blood and Iron and Send a Gunboat, which were a little better, though still a bit farcical.

When the same CO/XO/Girlfriend subplot showed up in A Ship Must Die I sorta gave up on him. Really...three times was enough...

[AntEater]

I read a bunch of Kent novels in german translation while in service (ship's store had them).
Some were quite good, others like "strike from the sea" or one about a british naval aviator were pretty abmysal.
Could it be that translation actually improved the novels?
:D

Btw, I've never read Erich Maak's U-Boat novels, which are pretty much the closest to Alexander Kent by a german author, so I suppose they're quite bad as well.
I read "duel with the wet death" (not part of the series) which is about a young Officer who does one U-Boat Patrol as WO in 1944 (sinks half the Royal Navy and even survives!) before taking over a converted ASW Trawler in the baltic, assisting the east prussian evacuation.
Thereby sinking half the soviet sub and MTB force and of course falling madly in love with his former U-Boat CO's sister...
:rotfl:

[Captain Vlad]

I read a bunch of Kent novels in german translation while in service (ship's store had them).
Some were quite good, others like "strike from the sea" or one about a british naval aviator were pretty abmysal.
Could it be that translation actually improved the novels?
:D
He did a series of Age of Sail stories I've never tried or even seen, and I hear they're quite good. The library's selection of him was a bit paltry here, though. All I had was his more 'modern' stuff. Might have to give his Boloitho series a try.

And I've seen translations improve movies...it could happen with a book too, I suppose.


I read "duel with the wet death" (not part of the series) which is about a young Officer who does one U-Boat Patrol as WO in 1944 (sinks half the Royal Navy and even survives!) before taking over a converted ASW Trawler in the baltic, assisting the east prussian evacuation.
Thereby sinking half the soviet sub and MTB force and of course falling madly in love with his former U-Boat CO's sister...
:rotfl:
Almost wanna read that now just to see how bad it is, like when I deliberately watched Manos, The Hand of Fate without the benefit of the MST3K crew.

[TLAM Strike]

Runner up would probably be Patrick Robinson's USS Scorpion, which I don't remember much of besides being a tedious racist diatribe against the Chinese. Did you mean USS Seawolf? I just read it too see how bad it really was and wow its that bad. Any story that has a SSN being forceably towed by a PLAN Destroyer has got to take the cake.

Just dive and pull the SOBs under with you, then surface after they've all drowned and cut the cable. :arrgh!:

And the ending :damn: why does someone always blow their brains out in Robinson's books. Thats twice in a row for crying out loud. I was expecting the CO to go on CNN or MSNBC and spill the beans after what the POTUS did to him not have him eat his own gun. I know people in the military are loyal but I dout their that loyal. :down:

I enjoyed his first three books but after that wow talk about a turn down hill. In Seawolf the oh so mighty Arnold Morgan probaly says it best "This has got to be the most incompatant navy and adminstration in the history of the US" (or something close to that). So lets boil it down in Robinsons first 6 novels the US loses an Aircraft Carrier, A Seawolf class SSN, the vice President is killed, the President's son turns trator, the Strait of Hormuz is shut down, Taiwan is captured by China and the US is attacked with Cruise Missiles. All the adminstration does is say its the Democrats fault and sit on their hands helpless, I think a monkey flinging poo in the oval office could do a better job than these idiots.

Just so no one has to read any of Robisons books after HMS Unseen let me boil them down for you: Arnold Morgan is your one and true GOD, Democrats hate America, everyone but Americans (and occasonly the English) are all inferior, and the US Navy doesn't know a Russian attack sub from its own @$$ holes unless Arnold Morgan tells them what to do.

Are these books a joke, a strange pariody of reality or is this guy serious?

[AntEater]

I've read in Wikipedia that many people consider Robertson's books parodies, voluntarily or not.
It always struck me as odd that Robinson is british, while at the same time writing more or less very US centric books.
Normally, in UK novels, the Amis need a smart british guy to get things done: James Bond, Mike Martin and who else.
In Robinsons books, the US does it all by themselves, usually by just killing everybody and his dog.

But I must admit that such writers have had a very positive influence on my life:
The day I read my first Clive Cussler novel, I realized I could be a writer as well.
:rotfl:

[XabbaRus]

Anyone else noticed how Tom Clancy's books get longer with each one published but take even longer to actually ge to the story and the action?

[Captain Vlad]

The day I read my first Clive Cussler novel, I realized I could be a writer as well.
:rotfl:

I like Cussler.

I don't like to admit, but God help me, I do. He's like those fun, bad movies you used to see on late night TV that you'd be making fun of as you watched them but somehow, you just couldn't make yourself change the channel.

[AntEater]

It isnt Naval or Submarine, but it is the worst
http://www.dcs.gla.ac.uk/SF-Archives/Misc/eyeargon.html

The Eye Of Argon by Jim Theis (1970), considered to be the worst SciFi/Fantasy story ever.

[Grayback]

I abhor Crush Depth or any other Joe Buff Novel.....

I'm still cringing from the stupidity of the conflict in the book and the awful cheesy...ugh, you just have to read it to understand the awfulness!

Buff's books are a guilty pleasure of mine - I've only read two: "Crush Depth" and (last spring) "Seas of Crisis". I don't take them seriously, and each has its lagging points. Still I hold them a cut above most.

[Grayback]

[quote=Subnuts]Just so no one has to read any of Robisons books after HMS Unseen let me boil them down for you: Arnold Morgan is your one and true GOD, Democrats hate America, everyone but Americans (and occasonly the English) are all inferior, and the US Navy doesn't know a Russian attack sub from its own @$$ holes unless Arnold Morgan tells them what to do.

Are these books a joke, a strange parody of reality or is this guy serious?

I could never go for the parody theory because Robinson's books lack two essential elements needed for effective satire: 1st they're boring. What's the point of a story with a message that you sleep through? Robinson's stories are belabored with mindless minutiae that are often so irrelevant, they're almost unreadable. In Barracuda you get set up for this great hunt for the rogue missile sub - instead you get this prolonged and pointless diatribe against democrats. Earlier in the book, the main character has a sit-down with these Ayatollahs to get them to bankroll his venture to attack the USA - but before we get there, Robinson has the character observe an Iranian missile boat, noting that it carries missiles powered by engines built on Toulouse.

2nd - satire or parody work well when you get the idea that the subjects of the parody are the story's punchline. Instead, the Robinson's own writing is his biggest joke - plot ideas that go nowhere, a singleminded obsession with what people are eating (ironically, the principals can afford fine cuisine - you'd think the economy would have been beaten senseless by the many geopolitical reversals occurring in Robinson's books) and despite his being hailed for his realism, a habit for getting it horribly wrong (ensign junior grade? British Commandos on patrol with Israeli troops in the West Bank? cruise missiles used against aerial targets?)

Those are my reasons for concluding PR's horrible writing to be something other than parody, but I've got two others for why he's so bad. Beside his overheated (frequently pompous) prose, it's the plot-holes that dog each of his books:

In Nimitz Class we've got a CV nuked by a single SSK, just the sort of target that the carrier's screen and ASW planes should have picked up;

In Kilo Class, we've got the US in a huff because the Chinese are getting Kilo SSK's (even the Russians call them "Kilo"?) which could effectively shut the entire USN out of any invasion of Taiwan - by the end KC, a single US sub has singlehandedly sunk about 6 of the subs, including 2 submerged and part of a convoy that includes both surface ships and russian nuclear boat. The Russians, who are transporting the subs, obligingly try screening the Kilo's behind purposefully roiled water - the noisemaking proves better at shielding the US Sub from the convoy than it does the Kilo from the US Sub.

In Barracuda, Hamas (!?) buys a nuclear sub that they plan on only using once - they could have just used a tramp freighter loaded with missiles.

And lastly (because I haven't gotten to Ghost Force yet) Hunter Killer takes the cake. A Saudi Prince has had it with his country's current regime because of its financial destabilization and the West's subversion of it, colludes with France to subvert and financially destabilize his country. The French, knowing this will be a covert operation, make sure that the commando Jacque Gamoodi is enlisted by two top officials who tell him (and his wife) everything (right down to the Saudi Prince who got everything rolling). The planned operation has Saudi Arabia collapsing under the very sort of attacks you'd think they'd have anticipated (cruise missile attacks against petro-industrial targets; guerrila attacks against airbases, etc) and despite the fact that a number of French took part in the attack, the only person the French treat as a liability is Gamoodi. Plotholes big enough to sail the Red October through.

[Chock]

Cussler's novels are fun, they aren't too taxing on the brain and generally whack along at a fair old pace, a bit 'Boy's Own' it is true, but I kind of like that as they seem to have no pretensions of being anything other than that, especially when he puts himself in them as an incidental character, which is indicative of not taking yourself too seriously. They remind me of the Biggles books by Capt. W.E. Johns in that sense, which incidentally, have a lot of great WW1 historical detail in them for all their 'thrash the Hun' mentality.

Cussler's books are a decent 'holiday read', and again they transfer well to celuloid, with Sahara being a great, fun film. I suspect Black Wind (another one with the same character in it) would make a good, fun movie too.

:D Chock

[Linton]

I saw Sahara in a flea pit cinema in Florida.My ticket cost me 50 cents.I think that was 40 cents more than it was worth.

[Iron Budokan]

Oh, I have quite a list of stinkers. Here are a few off the top of my head:

Patriot Games. It was the last Clancy novel I've read. Really lousy. Badly written, plot based on dangerously simplistic ideas that wouldn't be operative in Whoville, laughable characterization that wouldn't work in a 1925 Erich von Stroheim silent film, poorly conceived resolution with a typical Hollywood ending. An all around bad book on every conceivable level. Never read him since; have no intention to try him again.

I also read Crush Depth. Truly laughable. I'm a professional science fiction writer and this wouldn't pass the smell test in any SF publishing house I know since it purports to take place in an alternate future history. Filled with howlers, but the best one: This novel takes place in the near future, but Americans are listening to music from the 1940s because they're at war and they feel nostalgic. That wouldn't even fly in Whoville, fellas. Also, the ill-conceived alliance between South Africa and France. Anyone who took an introductory class in poli-sci would spot the holes in that one. Having said that, the fights between the subs was cool, along with the environmental factors considered, though the people manning the hardware were never more than cardboard cutouts.

Islands in the Stream by Hemingway. Hemingway, for God's sake! But, boy, does this one suck canal water even though the hero is hunting a u-boat. Save yourself the grief and give it a pass.

The Harry Potter books. Total garbage. Lousy writing. Embarrassing on a whole new scale of embarrassing hack writers who have no talent and sell a lot of books. Rowling has no pull whatsoever in the fantasy genre, either, despite her phenomenal sales. Despite her sales nothing she has written has had any impact on the genre as a whole, which is astonishing. I don't know of one professional fantasy writer who thinks she has talent. No, seriously. And it's not sour grapes; she really is just a hack who struck lightening.

Critique of Pure Reason by Kant. Kill yourself first.

But the number one worst book on my Worst Book List:

Atlas Shrugged by Ayn Rand.

[Chock]

Well I'm glad there is another professional writer out there who agrees with me on JK Rowling.

Agree with you on Clancy too (as it seems a lot of others on this forum do, which kind of surprised me a little bit, given the subject matter, guess I should credit my fellow forum members with more taste), see another post somewhere else from me on why I don't rate Clancy.

Never liked Hemingway either, he was a bullsh*tter of the first magnitude in real life, and it shows in his books.

Kant. Erm no thanks.

Don't know the others you listed, sounds like I should be grateful for that too.

:D Chock

[AntEater]

Well, Kant is hard to digest even in German.
It is 18th century german, after all.

Regard Rowling, never read Harry Potter, the movies were quite ok on TV, even if I fell asleep during one.

Btw, regarding Clancy (sub or not), it just occured to me that Jack Ryan is Tom Clancy.
Actually a more kickass version of Clancy without the weirdo glasses.
But basically at least the Ryan novels are simply some kind of teenage fantasies blown up to a few hundred pages.

[porphy]

Critique of Pure Reason by Kant. Kill yourself first.

I'm reading that right now in fact. Part of my job, I might add. Not the most entertaining book, no. But Kant probably didn't set out to write a sub novel and produced Critique of Pure Reason as a mishap. :) Someone might want to try the popular version, Prolegomena... ;)

[DAB]

In Nimitz Class we've got a CV nuked by a single SSK, just the sort of target that the carrier's screen and ASW planes should have picked up;


Without deminishing your point about Patrick Robinsons books in general, I should point out that a lot of people in the Royal Navy Submarine community do actually consider the senario at the beginning of Nimitz class to be realistic.

[Konovalov]

Anyone else noticed how Tom Clancy's books get longer with each one published but take even longer to actually ge to the story and the action?

That probably explains why I only got as far as The Sum of All Fears. I should have given up at the Kardinal of the Kremlin. :oops:

[Big Paul]

I don't mind Clancy, although I do agree with an earlier post that he appears to be living his life vicariously through Jack Ryan! The technical stuff did get a bit long winded in the end, and Ryan's rise to president was pretty laughable, where next? The Pope? God? I gave up after The Bear and the Dragon. As for SSN, it had me in convulsions of laughter after the first few chapters. One thing that REALLY gets on my goat is how he has every English character saying "Quite" at every opportunity. As for Patriot Games, I think he sees us Paddys as saying "Begorrah" and "Saints Alive" at every turn. His greatest crime is referring to Guinness as beer and writing that it has "a thin layer of foam":damn: :damn: :damn:

He needs shot for that!

Patrick Robinson's books are pretty much brain out books, I somehow can't imagine an SAS man doing a miraculous conversion to Islam and becoming a one man military machine. As for Admiral Morgan, I quite like him, he's quite a guy! Good books for a boring night with nothing on telly.

Worst factual (and I use that term VERY loosely) book is Red Star Rogue, pure supposition from cover to cover, read it once and put it in the bookcase where it has stayed to this day, I'd donate it to our local charity shop, but I wouldn't want some poor soul reading it and taking it seriously.

Worst film was Crimson Tide.

Das Boot for Beavis and Butthead viewers. If I was Gene Hackman, the XO would have been rendered unconcious and handcuffed in the ships storeroom. It made Red October seem like a documentary.:nope: :nope:

[XabbaRus]

I am going to get Red Star Rogue from the library purely to see how dumb it is.

Also I want to read that recent one on the Scorpion sinking.

Scary thing is people seem to believe it.

[Subnuts]

Also I want to read that recent one on the Scorpion sinking.


Let's just say that had my original, uncensored review of Scorpion Down been published on this site, Neal and I would have been the targets of a libel suit from the author by now. :smug: