45crittergitter
Member
I agree pretty much anything by Stephen Hunter. My favorite is Point of Impact. I don't think anyone has mentioned Enemies Foreign and Domestic, and Domestic Enemies, by Matthew Bracken.
Novel Recommendations
- Thread starter WildeKurt
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DougDubya
Member
I only started writing in 1999, and I've got 16 books on the shelf so far. There are a lot of fine writers working on the series, though. If you look on the copyright page, if you find the name Jon Guenther, Chuck Rogers, Nathan Meyer or Michael Linnaker, you'll have a fine, fine read.
Mike is also a good western author as well, writing under the pseudonyms Neil Hunter, Richard Wyler, and Daniel Rockfern.
Mike Newton's written over 200 of the books, as well as countless other novels, and he's got excellent firearms research.
Dan Schmidt is hit or miss. When he's good, he's one of the finest writers alive. When he's phoning it in, though, it can be disappointing.
Nick Polotta writes entertaining books, but his gun knowledge tends to incorporate too much vaporware.
As for the RV with the rocket launcher, it's been replaced, occasionally, with a high tech helicopter named Dragonslayer. We tend to avoid using it too much, because it can be deus ex machina (a .50 caliber GECAL machine gun can solve WAY too many problems too quickly for a good book).
DougDubya
Member
I seriously have to recommend the Stephen Hunter Bob Lee Swagger books. Point of Impact was one of the most fun and exciting reads I'd ever experienced. Havana, about Bob Lee's father, has all forms of old school firearms goodness with BAR's, 1911's and such.
Geronimo45
Member
Frederic Forsyth (Day of the Jackal, Dogs of War, Odessa File, others) is very accurate in firearms usage. Old guns are full of grease, and require lots of work to clean out. New rifles must be sighted in. Supressors exist to mask the location of the shot. Crew-served weapons are better than individual-served weapons... etc. Dogs of War is especially gun-related. A good bit of the book involves getting the weapons and ammunition purchased and shipped out of Europe.
sm
member
Great Replies.
Some other ideas for a variety if I maY:
The Old Man and The Boy - Robert Ruark
(everything by Ruark)
Plum Island
Up Country
The Lion's Game
The Charm School- Nelson DeMille
(everything by De-Mille
Anything by Louis LaMour.
Montana Sky - Nora Roberts
(don't laugh, one heck of a mystery!)
Some other ideas for a variety if I maY:
The Old Man and The Boy - Robert Ruark
(everything by Ruark)
Plum Island
Up Country
The Lion's Game
The Charm School- Nelson DeMille
(everything by De-Mille
Anything by Louis LaMour.
Montana Sky - Nora Roberts
(don't laugh, one heck of a mystery!)
sm
member
Great Replies.
Some other ideas for a variety if I maY:
The Old Man and The Boy - Robert Ruark
(everything by Ruark)
Plum Island
Up Country
The Lion's Game
The Charm School- Nelson DeMille
(everything by De-Mille
http://www.nelsondemille.net/books/books.asp
Anything by Louis LaMour.
Montana Sky - Nora Roberts
(don't laugh, one heck of a mystery!)
Not really "gun" still of the best all time reads:
The Pillars of the Earth. - Ken Follett
Some other ideas for a variety if I maY:
The Old Man and The Boy - Robert Ruark
(everything by Ruark)
Plum Island
Up Country
The Lion's Game
The Charm School- Nelson DeMille
(everything by De-Mille
http://www.nelsondemille.net/books/books.asp
Anything by Louis LaMour.
Montana Sky - Nora Roberts
(don't laugh, one heck of a mystery!)
Not really "gun" still of the best all time reads:
The Pillars of the Earth. - Ken Follett
The "Island" series by S.M. Stirling. A neat sci-fi/fantasy/alternate history series. Basically, the island of Nantucket is transported back in time to about 1500B.C., plopping a high-tech society with little food and resources into a primitive world. It's a good read, but the continuation series is even better.
Baba Louie
Member
- Joined
- Dec 26, 2002
- Messages
- 3,831
Any and all of Bernard Cornwell's "Sharpe's Rifle" series. Actually, any of Cornwell's books are excellent reads. That's a couple dozen good books easily.
Radagast
Member
Eric Flints Ring of fire series is good, they actually get better as you go along. Start with 1632.
Basic premise: The town of Grantville West Virginia gets dumped back in time and space into Thuringia germany during the 30 years war, the good old boys from the local coal mine then procede to remake europe to suit their ideals.
The anthologies with stories by other authors are particularly good, 'Curio & Relic' about a retired tunnel rat & C&R collector who ends up taking over the towns reloading work is excellent. It's the only story I've read with a realistic use of the .577 T-Rex in combat.
Flints "1812 The rivers of war" is shaping up to be a great series as well. Another what if, what if the Cherokee, instead of embarking on the trail of tears, had seen the writing on the wall and bugged out early, setting up their own republic on the other side of the mississippi and started making cannon?
John Ringos Ghost series. Basic premise: Mike Harmon, 'ghost' washed out SEAL & university student likes to stalk girls. While doig so he witnesses a kidnapping, jumps on the back of the perps vehicles, ends up in a major gun fight with the bad guys, but the girl gets moved, ended up in the wheelwell of a 727, ends up in the best gunfight I've ever read..... bugger it, I can't give you any spoilers, just buy the book. If you like it you'll buy the rest. It costs me $55.00 to buy them in hardback here in Australia and it's worth it not to wait for the paperback. *warning* There are some heavy sex scenes, including rape, bondage & S&M. Thankfully these are fairly self contained and I simply skip those chapters.
Ringos stand alone books, Through the Looking Glass & Princess of Wands are very accurate about their gun handling. TTLG is an aliens invade through a stargate that appears on earth. They get thrown back at great cost by a scratch militia. Then more gates start opening..... POW is about a hot christian MILF soccer mom (sorry but that's pretty much the way she is described) who believes in the jesus, no cussing, the sanctity of marriage,only saying nice things about people, that her husband is the head of the house hold and what he says goes. She also has a blackbelt and a H&K USP. Then real demons appear....
SM Stirlings Island series is good. His Dies The Fire series is even better.
In The Island In The Sea of Time, Nantucket is enveloped by a strange force field that sends it back in time, swapping positions in time with the Nantucket of 3000 BC. A coast guard square rigger, the Eagle is in port and provides a basis for exploration and trade with Mycean Greece. Unfortunately one of the coast guard officers is a psychpath with delusions of being the next Stalin and the technological base to carry it off......
In Dies The Fire, at the same time as Nantucket disappears, in our world the lights go out. Permanently. Electricity, gun powder, explosives and internal combustion engines cease to work. The great dieing begins as cities starve, with no way to move food or people other than on foot. In the bitterroot ranges a light plane crashes and the former ranger piloting it does what he can to save his passengers, gradually linking up with other survivors to form a band and restart civilisation again. Swords, cavalry, bows and arrows, norman castles and the roman phalanx return as the weapons of choice. Four books in the series and more to come, there are hints in book four that book five will hook up the two series.
Also by Stirling is Conquistador. If you've read anything by H Beam Piper, such as Gunpowder God, you will like this. It's the best alternate universe/cross time story I've read. It's a stand alone book, although I wish it was a series. The war is over. A former force recon marine is now a department of fish and game investigator on the trail of smugglers of protected species. In a raid on a warehouse he finds a live dodo...... It get's better from there. Blackhawk helicopters beside WWII mosquito fighter bombers. trecking across the west in a land where there really are wild indians. Real live Nazis. Incas who wear greatful dead T shirts while cutting out hearts... I've reread it several times.
Basic premise: The town of Grantville West Virginia gets dumped back in time and space into Thuringia germany during the 30 years war, the good old boys from the local coal mine then procede to remake europe to suit their ideals.
The anthologies with stories by other authors are particularly good, 'Curio & Relic' about a retired tunnel rat & C&R collector who ends up taking over the towns reloading work is excellent. It's the only story I've read with a realistic use of the .577 T-Rex in combat.
Flints "1812 The rivers of war" is shaping up to be a great series as well. Another what if, what if the Cherokee, instead of embarking on the trail of tears, had seen the writing on the wall and bugged out early, setting up their own republic on the other side of the mississippi and started making cannon?
John Ringos Ghost series. Basic premise: Mike Harmon, 'ghost' washed out SEAL & university student likes to stalk girls. While doig so he witnesses a kidnapping, jumps on the back of the perps vehicles, ends up in a major gun fight with the bad guys, but the girl gets moved, ended up in the wheelwell of a 727, ends up in the best gunfight I've ever read..... bugger it, I can't give you any spoilers, just buy the book. If you like it you'll buy the rest. It costs me $55.00 to buy them in hardback here in Australia and it's worth it not to wait for the paperback. *warning* There are some heavy sex scenes, including rape, bondage & S&M. Thankfully these are fairly self contained and I simply skip those chapters.
Ringos stand alone books, Through the Looking Glass & Princess of Wands are very accurate about their gun handling. TTLG is an aliens invade through a stargate that appears on earth. They get thrown back at great cost by a scratch militia. Then more gates start opening..... POW is about a hot christian MILF soccer mom (sorry but that's pretty much the way she is described) who believes in the jesus, no cussing, the sanctity of marriage,only saying nice things about people, that her husband is the head of the house hold and what he says goes. She also has a blackbelt and a H&K USP. Then real demons appear....
SM Stirlings Island series is good. His Dies The Fire series is even better.
In The Island In The Sea of Time, Nantucket is enveloped by a strange force field that sends it back in time, swapping positions in time with the Nantucket of 3000 BC. A coast guard square rigger, the Eagle is in port and provides a basis for exploration and trade with Mycean Greece. Unfortunately one of the coast guard officers is a psychpath with delusions of being the next Stalin and the technological base to carry it off......
In Dies The Fire, at the same time as Nantucket disappears, in our world the lights go out. Permanently. Electricity, gun powder, explosives and internal combustion engines cease to work. The great dieing begins as cities starve, with no way to move food or people other than on foot. In the bitterroot ranges a light plane crashes and the former ranger piloting it does what he can to save his passengers, gradually linking up with other survivors to form a band and restart civilisation again. Swords, cavalry, bows and arrows, norman castles and the roman phalanx return as the weapons of choice. Four books in the series and more to come, there are hints in book four that book five will hook up the two series.
Also by Stirling is Conquistador. If you've read anything by H Beam Piper, such as Gunpowder God, you will like this. It's the best alternate universe/cross time story I've read. It's a stand alone book, although I wish it was a series. The war is over. A former force recon marine is now a department of fish and game investigator on the trail of smugglers of protected species. In a raid on a warehouse he finds a live dodo...... It get's better from there. Blackhawk helicopters beside WWII mosquito fighter bombers. trecking across the west in a land where there really are wild indians. Real live Nazis. Incas who wear greatful dead T shirts while cutting out hearts... I've reread it several times.
I am going to strongly disagree here. Jack Reacher is some Chuck Norris type superbeing. When he was recovering from being wounded in Beruit, as a Lt, he was allowed to decide if the US military should go for the Glock 17 or the Beretta 92, he chose the Beretta because it's longer barrel made it much more powerful ???? He runs around with a Desert Eagle jammed in the waste of his pants, or in his jacket pocket??? The Ithica 10 gauge pumpgun is the criminal weapon of choice, because it is a deathray slaying anyone in the forward arc of the shooter for at least 100 yards, so because Reacher's love interest is always in that arc of death, you got to sneak up on em from behind rather than engage them with your desert eagle at long range.
He can walk up to a Barret .50 BMG and shoot a smiley face in a tree 1000 yards past the 1000 yard paper target he is supposedly unable to hit. He works with the government to bring down a militia, then has no qualms about helping the government hide it all from John Q Taxpayer.
I second Michael Z. Williamson's "The Weapon" but also STRONGLY recommend his book "Freehold". Freehold is the best description of what a society would look like with a true Libertarian government. It also depicts the end result of encroaching government control on rights for another society.
Also " A State of Disobedience" by Tom Kratman. His bio is indicative of the quality of his books:
Kratman is a political refugee and defector from the People's Republic of Massachusetts. The mechanism of his defection was enlisting into the Army in 1974 at age 17, which deeply distressed his high school (Boston Latin, founded 1635) as they thought he had "higher and better things" ahead of him. He served two years as an enlisted grunt with the 101st Airborne and one and a half with the 193rd Infantry Brigade in Panama, getting 2 years of college done in the process (when he wasn't in the field he was taking courses). At that point the Army gave Kratman a scholarship and sent him off to Boston College to finish his degree and obtain a commission.
Tom graduated, cum laude, in 1980 and returned to the Army as an infantry officer. Tom served another three year tour in Panama, then more schooling at Benning, then 4+ years with the 24th Infantry Division near Savannah, Georgia. Fun times then ceased for a while while he did two years in Recruiting Command.
Saddam Hussein (PBUH) saved Tom from this by invading Kuwait. He has been told that he was the only captain to actually escape from USAREC for the war. Tom arranged a transfer to Special Operations Command and went through the active part of the campaign attached to 5th Special Forces. He continued slurping at the Army trough until it became painfully clear that the bottom had dropped out of the militantly and violently aggressive anti-communism market and that he was not going to like the rather PC direction the Army (which was, arguably, the only thing he ever selflessly loved) was heading in.
Among other things, Tom earned a Combat Infantry Badge and the Ranger Tab.
Tom got out in 92 and went to law school. He hated it but was far too pig headed to quit. He became a lawyer in 95 and quickly realized that what he had felt about law school was but a pale shadow of true hate. Stayed in the Reserves and took every tour he could to avoid practicing law. And when the reserves had nothing interesting there was MPRI ("white collar mercenaries R us").
Saddam Hussein (PBUH) once again stepped to the fore and saved Tom from the continued practice of law. In February of 2003 the Army called him up to participate in the invasion of Iraq. Still, God has a sense of humor. While awaiting a flight over Tom was informed he had a 100% blockage in his right coronary artery (imagine his chagrin) and wasn't going anywhere fun anytime soon. Instead, he spent eight months stuck at Fort Bragg, then a few in the DC area, before finally being sent on to be on the faculty of the Army War College as Director, Rule of Law, for the US Army Peacekeeping and Stability Operations Institute. Keep in mind that divine sense of humor previously mentioned.
Also " A State of Disobedience" by Tom Kratman. His bio is indicative of the quality of his books:
Kratman is a political refugee and defector from the People's Republic of Massachusetts. The mechanism of his defection was enlisting into the Army in 1974 at age 17, which deeply distressed his high school (Boston Latin, founded 1635) as they thought he had "higher and better things" ahead of him. He served two years as an enlisted grunt with the 101st Airborne and one and a half with the 193rd Infantry Brigade in Panama, getting 2 years of college done in the process (when he wasn't in the field he was taking courses). At that point the Army gave Kratman a scholarship and sent him off to Boston College to finish his degree and obtain a commission.
Tom graduated, cum laude, in 1980 and returned to the Army as an infantry officer. Tom served another three year tour in Panama, then more schooling at Benning, then 4+ years with the 24th Infantry Division near Savannah, Georgia. Fun times then ceased for a while while he did two years in Recruiting Command.
Saddam Hussein (PBUH) saved Tom from this by invading Kuwait. He has been told that he was the only captain to actually escape from USAREC for the war. Tom arranged a transfer to Special Operations Command and went through the active part of the campaign attached to 5th Special Forces. He continued slurping at the Army trough until it became painfully clear that the bottom had dropped out of the militantly and violently aggressive anti-communism market and that he was not going to like the rather PC direction the Army (which was, arguably, the only thing he ever selflessly loved) was heading in.
Among other things, Tom earned a Combat Infantry Badge and the Ranger Tab.
Tom got out in 92 and went to law school. He hated it but was far too pig headed to quit. He became a lawyer in 95 and quickly realized that what he had felt about law school was but a pale shadow of true hate. Stayed in the Reserves and took every tour he could to avoid practicing law. And when the reserves had nothing interesting there was MPRI ("white collar mercenaries R us").
Saddam Hussein (PBUH) once again stepped to the fore and saved Tom from the continued practice of law. In February of 2003 the Army called him up to participate in the invasion of Iraq. Still, God has a sense of humor. While awaiting a flight over Tom was informed he had a 100% blockage in his right coronary artery (imagine his chagrin) and wasn't going anywhere fun anytime soon. Instead, he spent eight months stuck at Fort Bragg, then a few in the DC area, before finally being sent on to be on the faculty of the Army War College as Director, Rule of Law, for the US Army Peacekeeping and Stability Operations Institute. Keep in mind that divine sense of humor previously mentioned.
Millwright
Member
Lots of Heinlein, A.E. Van Vought - The Weapons Shops - series, H. Beam Piper, Jerry Pournelle, David Drake and a slew of others.......All stress/pivot plots on personal ownership of arms... >MW
CypherNinja
Member
The "STEN" series. Not entirely gun related, but good stuff for a gunny.
They're about a soldier (Sten) in ~4000AD. Sci-fi, but not 'hard sci-fi'.
I'm reading them on LawDog's recommendation, good stuff.
First of eight: http://www.amazon.com/Sten-Chris-Bu...bs_sr_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1201484786&sr=8-1
They're about a soldier (Sten) in ~4000AD. Sci-fi, but not 'hard sci-fi'.
I'm reading them on LawDog's recommendation, good stuff.
First of eight: http://www.amazon.com/Sten-Chris-Bu...bs_sr_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1201484786&sr=8-1
yhtomit
Member
I think that Gordon Liddy's novels all have *some* gunplay, and I remember his portrayals as being quite accurate -- typical Liddy 
timothy
timothy
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